E3 2011: Assassin's Creed: Revelations Multiplayer Hands-On

When we talk to Andreane Meunier, producer for Assassin's Creed: Revelations' online action, she tells us to expect new maps, new multiplayer avatars, new game modes, and a new post-kill taunt ability, for better humiliating your downed foes. When we get our hands on the game for ourselves, it is apparent (and not unwelcome) that mechanically, the multiplayer experience from Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood is much unchanged.

Though there will be new locations to play in, and new Templar personas to play as (we enter a game of Team Manhunt as a dark-skinned, turbaned gent), the lethal hide-and-seek action itself is refined rather than overhauled. The stun ability, for instance, with which you could counter an assassination attempt from your enemy, has been improved. Where previously it felt frustratingly unreliable, and too finicky over timing, now you can better fend off an attack--and if your stun fails, the fact that you detected your stalker before being murdered will be reflected in points docked from his kill score. The lock-on mechanism, which was on the fiddly side in Brotherhood's multiplayer, has also been adjusted for ease of use.

In our hands-on demo, we encounter one of the new multiplayer abilities: a kind of land-mine trap that can be tossed onto a patch of ground through which you suspect your foe will try to approach you--or through which you are planning your escape, in case of a pursuit. It's the only new ability we see, but Meunier hints that Ezio's new hookblade will make an appearance, too. We're also told bonus point allocation for skilful kills has been revised, especially allowing for chains of bonuses in the case of collaborative efforts in the team-based modes.

Persona customisation will be deeper, says Meunier, and though level progression achieved in Brotherhood won't be carried across, there will be some offering for those players who spent many hours skulking and stabbing in that game's multiplayer. We'll have more on that, whatever it might be, and on Assassin's Creed: Revelations generally ahead of its November 2011 release.