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A futuristic vision of Assassin's Creed
Sorrosyss, September 23rd, 2017
Warning: Spoilers from across the franchise.
"What is a fact? Is it fixed? Immutable? Certain in its existence and only awaiting discovery? Or might it be changed? Our first instance was to travel back. To change the past. But we could not find a way. But forward… We could look forward... And so here we sought to see beyond ourselves - and know what was to come." - Juno Assassin's Creed has never explored the far future of its timeline. Traditionally, the franchise has been known for its historical tourism, and has always retained some element of modern real world relevance. If we were to jump the storyline forward a hundred years, we would be in a completely fictional arena. An arguably more Sci-Fi based one as well. For a game known for its simulated 'time travel' though, it is the one direction we have never truly headed. If you look at the situation in the present day, Abstergo easily has the resources and the finances to completely dominate the Assassins even now. Indeed, we are pretty much in another Great Purge, with the Assassins having to resort to hiding in 'cells' purely to survive. If we were to jump forward in time, with the obvious addition of new future technologies to be exploited by their wealth - one could easily see the Templar Order dominating the world once more. They would arrogantly parade around as they once did in Victorian London, with their logos out in the open and plain for all to see. We know from recent surveys that Ubisoft is still considering allowing us to play as a Templar, therefore being exposed to a world where they have 'won' in the far future would be a wondrous way to learn more about the lore of the Order with all of their secrets to be experienced.
 CALCULATIONS How could we bear witness to such a setting narratively though? Well, we could once more turn to the technologies of the First Civilization – the Isu. 75,000 years ago the Isu were beset with a crisis. The sun was on the verge of a massive solar flare, threatening all existence on Earth. They needed a solution, and so they looked to 'calculations'. Scheming and prophesying future events became critically important, which led Minerva to create The Eye and gave access to the Nexus.
For all of their technology, the Isu were unable to prevent events playing out, and the Earth barely survived - the Isu nearly extinct. But their technology, and their expertise in this field lives on. The Antikythera Mechanism was a recognised Isu device for foretelling the future, and the technology of the Grand Temple - including the remains of the Eye - was subsequently catalogued by Abstergo. Future prediction has often been an area that real world black projects have supposedly focused on. Remote viewing for one example. It would not be outlandish to assume that the deeply secretive and well funded conglomerate that is Abstergo has already managed to reverse engineer some of this technology for their own purposes. The Last Descendants novels introduced us to the concept of extrapolated genetic memories. In essence this means that the Animus can emulate and recreate data based on assumption with no actual data being present. It is essentially 'best guessing' from available relevant information. If we were to apply the same principles to existing modern day information, it would theoretically be possible for the Animus software (with enough computing power) to recreate a vision of the future - one where the likelihood of existing trends could converge. It would in essence recapture the calculations that the Isu were utilising, especially if their original technology was now applied to this new forward looking Animus. TIME TRAVEL Seeing a simulation of the future would be amazing. But what is to stop us from just jumping forward in time with a Piece of Eden? "But wait!" I hear you cry. "The First Civilization never mastered time travel. This is all rubbish!" Ah but they did. Not only that, but Abstergo already has such a Piece of Eden, and even managed to get it working - partially. I refer you to the original Assassin's Creed, and an e-mail from Alan Rikkin to Warren Vidic; Philadelphia Project - Data provided from Animus Subject Twelve indicates that the ship briefly manifested in a future state for approximately 18 minutes. It is unclear whether the timeline is consistent with or parallel to our own. Although we have recovered enough data to reconstruct and repair the original artifact used in the experiment, Administration has refused to move forward on the project, citing paradox concerns. Corporate policy remains in place: any objects found to interfere with or manipulate time must be contained. Artifact will be moved to secure storage.
With the impending threat of Juno, and the unending hostilities with the Assassins - would Abstergo dare to pursue this project once again? If they
With Juno darting around the networks of the world, she would likely have become aware of this e-mail though, and probably knows the artifact's location and how to operate it as such. One would assume there is an attraction to her to jump forward in time, as cloning technology would have reached the point where her body could be completely restored from the remapped Isu genome. If she so chose of course. On the other hand, advances in technology would make her goal of ushering humanity into the singularity far easier to achieve. According to a memo in Assassin's Creed Unity, Abstergo estimated that Animus technology would go mainstream within "13 years", so the possibility of the entire world being plugged in - in some fashion - is quite high. Either way, her goal of creating a New Eden would be so much easier with the superior technology that the far future allows. Another possible way to jump to the future is via the Precursor Boxes. Within the events of Assassin's Creed Chronicles: Russia, we witnessed the consciousness of Shao Jun imprinted over Anastasia Romanov in 1918, suggesting that in the right conditions any individual in contact with such a box could be brought forward (within a host) to a future time point. THE FUTURE WORLD The themes of transhumanism become more and more relevant in our real world every day. Within our life times, it is more than likely we will see the typical dystopian sci-fi trope of humanity being torn further apart by those who have, and those who have not. We see in sports, and modern military, the extent that people will accept and incorporate chemicals and technology into themselves to gain an extra edge. A human being born a hundred years from now would likely be enhanced in some way directly from birth. Within this world, the Assassins would be up against an even more frightening Templar enemy. Of course, we have always been concerned about the usage of guns in any future setting, but equally from a gameplay standpoint the technology of the future could open up new and interesting gameplay mechanics. Even adapting the current themes of the Assassins, you could easily see some kind of laser or plasma Hidden blade, or stealth technology to weave your way invisibly around the neon streets. Parkour, jumping and climbing abilities would also be enhanced. For the Assassins this would be a brutal narrative indeed, fighting against the need to embrace technology to survive, or to ultimately destroy it – with it potentially being the only way to free humanity entirely. Would the concept of freedom versus control still apply to Artificial Intelligence and androids? A lot to question and explore.
ALTERNATE REALITIES We cannot discount the possibility of alternate realities as well, with futures or present time playing out completely differently. "Originally there were some discussions about AC3 being in a parallel universe, where it just seems that its in our universe and then it ends turning out that its in a different universe. My point is just that you think that you've entered some dead end, and often times when you think that you've entered a dead end, thats the best place to be at for writers - because then you create some incredibly inventive, highly energetic solution to that problem and it re-energises something."
- Jeffrey Yohalem, Syndicate / Brotherhood writer, Nov 2015 So what might one see in these other possible futures? The Tyranny of King Washington DLC showed us that not only does Isu technology allow us to see our current timeline of reality, but also those where events have taken a very different turn. One future could be where Juno has 'won' and humanity are returned to slavery. Perhaps another where the Assassins have become corrupted villains. The possibilities are indeed endless. One wild concept that has been suggested, is what if the current Modern Day storyline is just a simulation itself? Charlotte de la Cruz touched on this within the comics, but what if the actual reality is a 100 years in the future? You've been experiencing an Animus within an Animus this whole time. Animusception. (That is a word now.)
In a narrative sense, this might be viewed as a fun option though. "It was all just a dream" is a trope that has been seen many times in popular movies and TV shows, often times used to reboot a storyline. It would certainly offer another unique way to experience the future, but it would of course be at the expense of completely undermining and retconning the existing Modern Day lore. A price worth paying? Thats a question for another time. CONCLUSION
A future setting is something that Ubisoft have certainly considered at some point in the past as well. Nolan North quite famously spoke about Desmond being able to time travel. Patrice Désilets also recently revealed that one of the original plans was for Desmond to survive on a spaceship beyond 2012. Still, who knows what the future holds? Well, this old survey might...
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