Transcription
Did you know we were supposed to get a young Edward Kenway sequence for Assassin's Creed Black Flag? Or perhaps Assassin's Creed Syndicate was once going to feature Co-op? Well, in this video, I want to go over more Assassin's Creed cut content and also remove features that did not make it into their final games.
Now, some of these mentioned in this video, I had to dig through over 6 to 7-year-old, 2-hour interviews just to find the cut content. Now, I've already made a part one for this video that goes over a lot of other cut content for this franchise, so be sure to check that one out after this video or before if you have not checked it out already, because a lot of cut content that's not mentioned in this video is definitely talked about in the other video. You know, with all the Assassin's Creed games that have been released and the ones yet to come out, I can only imagine how much more cut content has been cut from those games. Anyway, if you do enjoy this video, want to consider hitting that subscribe button, and without further ado, let's get right into the quick content of Assassin's [Music] Creed.
Okay, so let's start off this video with the most recent Assassin's Creed game being Mirage, because there's actually some pretty interesting pieces of cut content or removed features that did not make it into the final game, and honestly, some of these are pretty game-changing. I'm kind of disappointed some of these did not make it into the final game. So, the first removed feature that I want to talk about that did not make it is a monkey companion in Assassin's Creed Mirage. I mean, what now? This was an idea that got axed super early back when it was just a concept on paper, and the main reason for it being removed, well, it was incredibly expensive to bring to life. This meant a lot of animations, and they would have had to motion capture an actual monkey. Now, I do get it in a way. Assassin's Creed Mirage was created by Ubisoft Bordeaux, one of the smallest Ubisoft Studios with just around 300 people. For context, a studio like Ubisoft Montreal, one of Ubisoft's biggest Studios, has over 4,000 people. The fact that Mirage started its development around only mid-2021 is also a factor as to why a monkey companion was not featured. There's just not enough time.
Now, also, historical accuracy plays a massive role in a monkey companion. According to creative director Stéphane Boudin, he mentions monkeys in 9th-century Baghdad are a misconception we tend to have. Monkeys in mind because of Aladdin, and to be fair, he's got his spot on, especially if you watched Aladdin. Historically, Assassin's Creed tends to get a lot right in that regard, and monkeys were simply not in Baghdad at that time. But let's take historical accuracy out of the equation. I can honestly see a young Abbasid him as a street thief who has a monkey companion. I mean, come on, that fits like a glove. A street thief and a pet monkey.
Another removed feature for Assassin's Creed Mirage can consist of something that we previously seen in another Assassin's Creed game, and that is sandstorms. Now, if you played Assassin's Creed Origins, you've seen how cool these sandstorms looked, kind of swirling away from the cities and into the wilderness where they only really featured in the desert. But for a game like Assassin's Creed Mirage, Ubisoft's main focus was specifically on Baghdad, which is probably why a lot of the outside areas of the game is pure emptiness. Now, we did see sandstorms in the cinematic trailer for this game, and this kind of misled me to think that we'd see them in the final game. Was that just me? Anyway, in regards to the sandstorms being removed, Stéphane Boudin mentioned, "For us, it was not possible to do that, and it would have had a huge impact on how the player and NPCs would have to act. NPCs fleeing, having different animations, protecting themselves. It changed everything everywhere, even the detection, the guards, and it had too much impact on all the systems to be able to make it complete."
Now, based on what he just said, it's a similar situation to the monkey companion in a way, where it requires a lot more resources, and they couldn't afford to implement these kinds of features. So, yeah, I guess I'm just disappointed that they showed it in the trailer but did not implement it. False advertising.
Another Assassin's Creed Mirage feature that did not make it into the final game is dogs and a dog master, which does sound a bit strange. You would have expected something as little as this to be a thing, but it got removed during Alpha, so it's not like it was a concept or an idea because it was actually fully realized at one point. Now, the reason it was removed from the final game is because of a shift towards perfecting specific types of enemies to ensure they meet a high standard. When it comes to cut content, Stéphane Boudin mentioned the idea of dogs simply posed as a problem because there was not a way to handle them non-lethally early in the game. Now, although sleep darts eventually became available in the game, that's a feature that's not there from the start, and there just was not enough options for players who wanted to avoid harming the dogs. Now, my hot take is that this is too soft. I mean, come on, it's a video game, not real life. Stéphane Boudin even mentioned that the production team, including himself, are all animal lovers, and their decision to avoid forcing us to kill animals may cut in this feature quite straightforward. I disagree with this massively, and I'm 90% sure in Assassin's Creed 3 you were able to hunt and skin dogs, but I guess we're in 2024, and you know the rest.
Now, another piece of cut content featured in Assassin's Creed Mirage is a bit of a strange one, and that's the idea of a new district named Mukim District. Sorry if I pronounced that wrong. Now, this got me wondering because, correct me if I'm wrong, every district that we have in Assassin's Creed Mirage is or was real many, many years ago. And a district that's named Mukim District does not exist in real history. So, that's got me thinking, was this district going to be a district in Baghdad in the game, or an entirely different location? The only information we got about this is this image, so I'm not really sure what the Mukim District refers to, but it does sound pretty cool. Another district would make the game a lot bigger, so I can understand their reasonings for not implementing it.
So, those are the four pieces of removed content for Assassin's Creed Mirage that I felt are most worth mentioning. Now, there's another two that I've not yet talked about that I'll go over very quickly because compared to the previous ones I mentioned, these two did not seem as interesting. So, first off, there's a cut content of special attacks being removed during Alpha. Now, we don't know the reason for this being removed, but I guess it's got to do with budget concerns once again, because adding new special attacks requires new animations and new mocap scenes, which will cost a lot more money. Now, this is off-topic, but I do hope for Assassin's Creed Red we get a lot of special attacks, because a samurai combat style definitely warrants that.
The final removed piece of content is side story arcs, which were removed during the Alpha stage of the game. Now, as for what this is, I'd assume it goes a lot more in-depth for side characters such as Dihya, Banu Musa, mental Fad, mentor Roshan, and a lot more. Now, this would have been such a good idea because, as harsh as what I'm about to say sounds, the characters in Assassin's Creed Mirage are so soulless and definitely deserve to be fleshed out further. But I guess this feature also relates to budget constraints or maybe more animating.
Now, let's move on to Assassin's Creed Unity. So, if you play the Dead Kings DLC, there's a side character named Leon, who's just a young boy, and his role in the game is pretty special. He's an orphan that looks up to Arno as a mentor and even a father figure, helping Arno find a sense of purpose after what unfolded in the base game. But why, if I told you that there's some pretty fascinating cut content related to both Arno and Leon in Assassin's Creed Unity? Well, according to lead script writer Jeffrey Yalm, he revealed that Leon's character was going to be much more deeper. Instead of him being a mere side character as he is in the Dead Kings DLC, he was instead going to be very central for Arno's story in the DLC. So, Arno was envisioned to have a Robin-like psyche, an idea that was later adapted into the character of Leon. The creators had even planned additional scenes that would elaborate on this relationship. One key scene that was ultimately removed featured Arno putting Leon to bed, followed by a meaningful conversation with Madam Margaret. This scene was intended to reinforce Arno's paternal feelings towards Leon and symbolically his responsibilities towards Paris. It was meant to show Arno's resolve to embrace his duties instead of escaping them. However, due to various production constraints, this scene was cut from the final game, and the script had to be condensed to fit within the DLC scope and length limitations.
Okay, so for this one, I have to give credit to Slider V2, who are featured a few times on this channel, as he is, in fact, the person that discovered this. Check him out in the description if you want to. Anyway, so Slider V2 just recently, in fact, only a few days ago as of me making this video, he discovered that Assassin's Creed Syndicate, or rather Assassin's Creed Victory, was supposed to feature a co-op mode, just like how Unity did. And the locations for this feature are pretty interesting. So, he stated that instead of a co-op where he featured so many characters, this one would feature just two characters, Jacob and Evie. [Future hidden one in the editing process] Uh, just have to let you know that it's actually four players and not two with just Jacob and Evie. So, Slider V2 made a slight mistake, but he updated it quite recently. And from what he found in the game files, this removed co-op mode would take place across so many British locations. In fact, the locations in the far are read out as Stonehenge, a train station, Cambridge, Dover Castle, Edinburgh Castle, Giant's Causeway, Isle of Man, Lindisfarne, Tynemouth, and also Windsor Castle. Now, some of these locations would have been incredible, especially the likes of Lindisfarne with how there's a castle resting on a giant hill.
So, according to Slider V2, the way that co-op was supposed to work was that players would start off at a train station where they would be able to choose a specific map to play. Of course, definitely referring to the list of names I just read. After choosing a map, a cut scene would appear where a train to pass London. After completing the co-op mission, a returning cut scene would play showing the train arriving back in the city, kind of similar to the game's intro. So, yeah, what's your thoughts on this being a removed feature? It's a shame it did get cut from the final game because the co-op in Assassin's Creed Unity was a blast to play, and based on the locations I just read out, it does seem quite promising. It definitely would have been a nice change of pace from the city of London, that's for sure.
Okay, now let's move away from Assassin's Creed Syndicate and go to a game that released 12 years ago, being Assassin's Creed 3. So, we all know that we can take part in those naval missions with the Aquila, taking down ships or forts. But have you ever wondered why we were never able to simply sail the Aquila in free roam, seeing as the game does have an ocean? Well, before Assassin's Creed 3 came out, Philippe Bergeron, the mission director of the game, mentioned that in an interview, "We were going to be able to sail the seas freely with Connor on the Aquila between missions." However, this promising aspect of the game was never made into the final game, which is a fat shame. Now, I personally enjoy the naval side of Assassin's Creed, so it would have been quite cool to just free roam the Atlantic and Caribbean Ocean, seeing as the Aquila in Assassin's Creed sailed through these oceans. It is good that this naval free roam was a feature in the game after being Black Flag, and even in the game after that, being Assassin's Creed Rogue.
Oh, and speaking of Assassin's Creed Black Flag, there's a piece of cut content that deserves to be talked about. Did you know that during the initial stages of Black Flag's development, the creators toyed with the idea of featuring a 12-year-old Edward Kenway, who would be on a ship with Henry Avery and William Kidd? However, they quickly scrapped this concept because both Ezio and Connor from the previous games had a similar situation where they both started off very young and grew over time in their respective game or games, which covered around 30 years each. Now, I would have loved to see Henry Avery and William Kidd alongside Edward Kenway because that premise just sounds incredible. Two legendary real-life pirates featured in a game with Edward sounds like it could only be great, especially considering in the game before, being Assassin's Creed 3, we were able to do those Captain Kidd missions. So, actually being able to see him in the game after would have made the narrative of that game even better than what it is now. Because the creators decided to scrap this idea, the team decided to concentrate on just a decade starting in 1715, which is essentially when Black Flag started. This approach allowed Edward to still be a young man by the end of the game, yet experienced a significant personal journey throughout the story.
Now, this next piece of cut content relates to one of the most tragic characters in the entire franchise, and that is Daniel Cross. So, as you know, when we play through Assassin's Creed 3's modern day, we chase down Daniel Cross across the Abstergo facility until we eventually assassinate him. Now, what's unfortunate is that there's no final speech or memory corridor for his character. Instead, the game just carries on as if nothing happened. Well, there was actually an entire emotional alternative cut scene to his death, and it's pretty tragic when you watch it, especially knowing that this man was brainwashed by Abstergo into betraying the Assassins, and they even had the guy hooked up to the Animus for such long sessions that it eventually broke his mind, blowing the lines between his own memories and those of his ancestors. So, you can imagine his story is a tragic one. I'll play the cut scene for you now.
"All the voices in my head screaming, screaming, dreaming all the time, begging to be released. This is my body, my mind. You have to silence them. But please, please silence them."
Okay, now this piece of cut content is one that I'm surprised I only heard about quite recently, even though it's been a discussion for quite a while. So, did you know that the original idea for Assassin's Creed Unity drew inspiration from a 1998 movie called The Red Violin? Now, first of all, what is The Red Violin, and how does this movie relate to what a game could be about? Well, if you're not familiar, The Red Violin is a movie that traces the journey of a single violin as it passes through various hands over several centuries. So, the creators for Assassin's Creed Unity saw this idea and wanted to capture a similar concept in Unity, tracking artifacts as they move through different periods of Parisian history. So, I imagine this could be the likes of an artifact before the Eiffel Tower was a thing, during the Eiffel Tower, and even more modern, near the 2000s. Now, that's just my guess. However, the reason this idea was scrapped was because they decided it was a bit too ambitious. Still, bits of that idea made it into the final game through the Time Anomalies feature and the Jack the Ripper quest, allowing glimpses of Paris across different eras. But just going back to the point, "too ambitious." What does that even mean? To me, that sounds like they couldn't figure out how to implement this idea, which is saying a lot about Ubisoft.
Okay, now these next three pieces of cut content are going to be from Assassin's Creed Syndicate, and honestly, some of these are quite wild. So, first of all, in a podcast with Jeffrey Yalm, the lead writer for Assassin's Creed Syndicate, he shared some pretty fascinating ideas that they had for the game. Initially, they wanted London to dynamically change in response to Jacob's actions, specifically whenever he took down a Templar who was in charge of different aspects of the city's ecosystem. So, imagine this: after you had assassinated a Templar, the part of the city they controlled would start to deteriorate. Now, Evie, on the other hand, was supposed to step in and handle the fallout of these actions. The twist was that players could choose when to tackle these follow-up missions, even delaying them until the very end of the game. But waiting too long would lead to all kinds of chaos, like a failing economy, making upgrades and refills too expensive, or the transportation system breaking down, making it quite hard to get around London. I mean, they even planned to lock fast travel. However, the developers quickly realized that while this concept is cool, it would have made the game incredibly challenging to play, and I kind of agree. It was not just about creating a high difficulty level; it was about how these changes could potentially frustrate players. So, they decided against it, opting instead to show the adverse effects of Jacob's actions just as players were about to resolve them.
Originally, in Assassin's Creed Syndicate, the developers had this pretty neat idea to include a quirky feature linking the historical side of the game to the modern world. So, the idea that they had was envisioning a glitch in the game's Animus system that would manifest as an old-fashioned phone booth. The idea of this was that players could interact with this phone booth as a nod to the modern day, blurring the lines between past and present in a pretty playful way. Now, although any information as to what the phone booth actually does is not mentioned, the concept does sound pretty fascinating. I mean, the first thing that crossed my mind when I heard about this was Doctor Who and the TARDIS. I guess that is a phone booth, it's also London-based, and it's also very sci-fi.
In the very early brainstorming sessions for Assassin's Creed Syndicate, the game's artist Hugo Puli, who I just butchered, he came up with a pretty cool gameplay idea that unfortunately never made it into the final game. He imagined a scene where one of the protagonists, more specifically Jacob, could quite literally run through the streets of Victorian London using his physical strength to interact with the city in a very unique way. The idea was for Jacob to be able to destroy old, decrepit chimneys with just his shoulder or his foot, emphasizing the use of the environment for dynamic gameplay. This kind of goes back to the earlier point in the video about a dynamic London being cut from the game, as this would fit quite well with that theme. I can just imagine how fun it would have been to dash across rooftops, demolishing chimneys as you [Music] go.
Now, let's move on to Assassin's Creed 1 and talk about a piece of cut content that is, in a way, similar to the Frontier in Assassin's Creed 3. So, while playing Assassin's Creed 1, you're able to kind of explore a relatively large open plane with mountains named Kingdom, and this area contains small villages and encampments, but it was pretty pointless because we don't really do anything here. Well, did you know that the Kingdom area was supposed to be a lot like the Frontier in Assassin's Creed 3, complete with hunting and side quests? Now, the reason for this not being a feature is because they actually ran out of time to implement it all. There was this talk at a Ubisoft GDC event for Assassin's Creed 3 where one of the Ubisoft developers mentioned that many of the wildlife assets and models used in Assassin's Creed 3 were initially intended for Assassin's Creed 1.
Staying on the topic of Assassin's Creed 1 locations, did you know that Constantinople was originally intended to be a location in the very first Assassin's Creed game? They had plans to include the city, but it didn't make it into the game at that time. Interestingly, the idea did not just disappear; it eventually came to life in Assassin's Creed Revelations. I guess it's fascinating how an idea can be shelved temporarily only to then be revived in a later game.
Now, for the last Assassin's Creed cut content. So, in early development stages of the game, they actually had horses roaming around the cities. That's right, you could have been galloping through the streets. However, the developers ended up removing them due to some pesky debugging issues. It seems like managing those horses within an urban environment just got it too complicated. Imagine how different the gameplay could have been with that added layer of mobility.
Here's a random fact for you to do with horses in Assassin's Creed 1. So, the horses in the game, according to former Ubisoft developer Charles Randall, shared that the model of them was actually created using a stretched-out human skeleton. Bit strange, don't you think?
Okay, so let's take this to Assassin's Creed Black Flag now. Brace yourself, as this one is going to be a lengthy one. So, from a podcast interview with narrative director Darby McDevitt, he mentioned how Edward Kenway's story between sequences 10 and 11 would have been entirely different. So, to explain, when Edward Kenway exits the observatory after discovering that Roberts had escaped, initially he was not supposed to be captured and jailed. Instead, he planned to seek out Mary Read and collaborate with her, albeit for his own purpose, which was to pursue Roberts and retrieve the Crystal Skull from the observatory. His quest was to lead him back to Nassau, which was heavily based on historical events. You see, at this point in the story, Mary Read and Anne Bonny were just forming their acquaintance, which was also a moment that involved Mary Read convincing Anne to embrace piracy or join the Assassins, while Calico Jack, feeling threatened, becomes opposed. Edward's journey would have involved convincing Mary to help him locate the Sage, believing he possessed the observatory skull. They would plan an escape from Nassau, which was overrun with Templar forces led by Rogers. This escape was to feature several missions where they ended up captured by the British, leading to Edward's imprisonment. These sequences were to allow Mary to confront Edward about his reckless actions, highlighting the devastation in Nassau and questioning what he had accomplished with his life.
It does not just end there. This removed storyline would also include the famous historical episode where Anne Bonny and Mary Read defend their ship against British forces while the male crew, including Calico Jack, were incapacitated below deck. However, this piece of cut content was removed from the game simply because the game already featured Nassau extensively. Returning to Nassau for additional missions towards the end of the game and incorporating another naval mission was seen as repetitive. Now, the decision was made to move the action to Kingston instead, utilizing the Port Royal area to maintain a brisk gameplay pace. This change, while it's beneficial for gameplay, unfortunately led to the removal of what was considered a highlight for the Golden Age of piracy story within the game. You know, I'll leave a link to the full podcast episode down in the description if you want to hear it from the main man himself.
Now, this piece of cut content from Assassin's Creed Black Flag also comes from the same podcast episode with Darby McDevitt. So, in this episode, Darby McDevitt talks about how there was a planned mission where Edward Kenway would train in Assassin techniques and then eventually be given the Rope Dart. The plan was for it to be similar to how Connor would have achieved his Rope Dart in Assassin's Creed 3. However, instead, what we got in Black Flag was just giving Edward Kenway the Rope Dart without any training for it.
So, this piece of cut content once again also comes from the same podcast episode, and it's a more interesting one than the last one I talked about. So, initially, there was a concept where Edward Kenway would carry a lock of Caroline's hair, given to him before his departure. The idea was that her hair might contain the right type of DNA to activate the observatory, and if viable, Edward could have used the hair to see through Caroline's eyes, thus discovering that he had a daughter in England. However, this idea was abandoned early in development. The concern was that the observatory's visual representation was not clear enough in the game, as seen through the perspectives of Jack Rackham and Woodes Rogers, which were somewhat blurry and detailed. Now, Darby McDevitt mentions that dropping this potential plot point was the right decision because it lacked any type of clarity and execution for the observatory.
Just real quick to end the video, I want to go over two pieces of cut content that's very brief. So, the first one is related to Assassin's Creed 2, but more specifically Ezio Auditore. So, in some of Assassin's Creed 2's early concept art, Ezio was shown with not just one, but three hidden blades. There was one on his right wrist and two on his left, kind of like a double-pronged blade.
Did you know that when they were first developing what we now know as Assassin's Creed Odyssey, it actually had a completely different name? Initially, it was called Odyssey: An Assassin's Creed Adventure, and there was even an original game poster created by Ubisoft Art Director Patrice Désilets during its development. Ultimately, the name wasn't picked by the marketing team, who often decide which titles will resonate best with audiences. It makes you wonder if Odyssey: An Assassin's Creed Adventure was just one of the many names considered, or maybe it was something that the artist came up with on his own. But let's be real, if that game was called Odyssey: An Assassin's Creed Adventure, a lot of the common debates would not exist in regards to if Assassin's Creed Odyssey is even an Assassin's Creed game.
So, there you have it. That is some cut content and removed features from the Assassin's Creed franchise. Like I said in the intro, if you have not checked out my first video for this, I recommend watching that one too, as I go over a lot more Assassin's Creed cut content in that video. Now, let me know down below which of the many I talked about in this video piqued your interest the most. Anyway, if you did enjoy this video, do consider hitting that subscribe button, and with that said, I'll see you in the next one.