Assassin's Creed: next sequel not set in Japan

Assassin's Creed will not be visiting feudal Japan in its next few outings, Ubisoft's Jade Raymond has confirmed.

In an interview with Adweek, Raymond addressed persistent rumours that the series would be taking a trip to feudal Japan - a setting that seems a natural fit for the ninja-like assassins, and which has been referenced among many others in in-game materials.

The Ubisoft Toronto managing director said agreed that feudal Japan would be a cool setting, but flat-out denied its use in Assassin's Creed 5. Instead, the game will visit her own personal favourite historical period - although she refused to give any further hints.

Raymond did have this to say about how Ubisoft chooses its settings for the franchise:

"When we're building a franchise, we’re thinking of a whole universe and how we’re developing a meta-story that could live on for many years in games and TV," she said.

"If the story has nowhere to go, then you end up with the video game equivalent of The Matrix 2 or something where it’s never going to be quite as genius."

We don't yet know if the next Assassin's Creed game will continue the setting of Assassin's Creed 3 or 4, as Brotherhood and Revelations did for the second game, or if it will be an all-new numbered title. We're expecting big things out of it, though, since it will be the first game in the series developed with next-gen hardware in mind right from the start.

Thanks, GameInformer.