In Watch Dogs Legion, the third part of the series, the big promise is that players can recruit and control anyone in London. That’s about 9 million characters. How does Ubisoft plan to accomplish this?
There are supposed to be this many characters: During the impressive gameplay presentation at E3, it was especially the grandmother who caught attention as an unusual hero in Watch Dogs Legion.
She symbolized Ubisoft’s big promise: You will be able to recruit any NPC in London and play with that character. This sounded like a tremendous promise for Watch Dogs Legion.
Ubisoft remained vague about the details. There was no exact number of how many different NPCs Watch Dogs 3 will simulate. However, players should be able to convince each of them to join the “good cause” of DedSec and be added to the team.
Now Ubisoft has become more concrete.
How many NPCs are there in total? In a conversation with Gamecrate it was said that there is no real limit to how many NPCs are available. Because they are procedurally generated.
The team has worked for 4 years to get the technology right. At one point, the number 9 million was mentioned.
How are these 9 million NPCs created? In a conversation with Gamasutra Clint Hocking reveals the details.
A data basis called “Census” is used. It is the key to creating so many NPCs.
When creating an NPC, Census ensures that all partial information of the character forms a cohesive whole.
For example, if the game creates a gardener who trims hedges in the park, he belongs to a certain ethnicity and receives an animation set. The ethnicity determines the name.
If players look at him more closely, the gaps are filled.
If he is a gardener, he earns a certain amount of money. This allows him to live in a specific area, and the ethnicity further refines the neighborhood because certain cultures live in certain parts of London.
From this, it then follows which friends he has and what activities he engages in. As a gardener, he will be more active outdoors in Watch Dogs Legion and will receive a trait that grants him additional health points or something like that, it is said.
The most important thing about generation is that every NPC feels real and believable.
When players recruit the NPCs, they gain a narrative personality, a voice, animation, and their own melee combat style.
All of this is supposed to fit the guy you saw in the park trimming the hedges.
Here’s what’s behind it: These “procedurally” generated things always ensure huge numbers and dimensions. It is similar in Star Citizen, where one wants to simulate an entire galaxy. When you hear someone talk about those dimensions, your ears perk up.
The question is how relevant the differences in gameplay really are. In Watch Dogs Legion, there will only be three classes: Hacker, Enforcer, and Infiltrator.
Without wanting to be a spoil-sport: To what extent an Indian 60-year-old gardener hacker differs from a Russian 20-year-old punk hacker, and whether it has significant effects on gameplay, will then be seen.
In any case, it is a great promise for now.
Watch Dogs Legion is set to be released on March 6, 2020, for PS4, Xbox One, Google Stadia, and PC.
