Watch Dogs Legion
Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs is a series I’ve been interested in since the start. With Aiden in the first game, and Marcus in the second, I’ve really enjoyed the stories about their characters and everything going on around them. This time round, the story is on a much wider scale; set in London - you can play as anybody in the game. Like the look of someone you pass on the Underground? Recruit them, and after a short mission to gain their trust - you can play as them. Even as the game first begins, you are given the choice of a number of characters. Between mine and Allan’s playthroughs, all of these initial choices have the same skills and abilities, as well as their special items such as a personal motorbike or the ability to spawn a drone - but the characters all look different and have different names. I chose to start my journey as Sam Mulenga, a game designer.
The story of Legion is that there’s a shady group known as Zero Day who have framed DedSec for a series of bombings in and around London. You - as the many different faces you’ll recruit along the way - along with your trusty AI Bagley, must infiltrate your enemies to find out just what exactly is going on. Missions can be played in a number of ways, with varying skill sets from recruited members allowing for a greater freedom of choice in how you complete the objective. My personal favourite method of doing pretty much anything was to call in a drone and ride it into battle (often so far above everything that I would completely avoid detection). Recruits can be switched between at any time, and if one is incapacitated (or killed, if playing on Permadeath mode) you’ll be able to pick from the rest of your team to carry on. Building a team with varied skills and abilities, such as paramedics who can access healthcare facilities with less detection, or having a lawyer who can bail your team out of jail, is key to your success. Having a better selection can make completing missions or events more straightforward and gives you a greater flexibility in choosing how you want to approach the objective.
The art style of Watch Dogs: Legion is still very much in the vein of realism, but with a decidedly dystopian aesthetic. London looks and feels like London, just… shittier. There’s a severe police presence in the form of a private military company called Albion, whose enforcers you’ll see manhandling members of the public all across London. There are ctOS drones monitoring everyones’ whereabouts and actions, and there are various restricted areas under the control of a brutal gang known as Clan Kelley. Graphics-wise, the upgrade from Xbox One X to Xbox Series X (which are the two consoles we have played on) was significant, with the streets of London and the vehicles and people populating it looking far better on XSX.
The music of Watch Dogs Legion is great, with plenty of genres of music to keep everyone happy. I particularly enjoyed doing the Kick Up challenges whilst listening to Stormzy or driving around to Feel Good Inc. by Gorillaz. It would frequently turn into the equivalent of sitting in your car after you get home until the song finishes - where I would continue to drive around just a bit longer before starting a mission so that I could finish a track.
The controls feel a bit hit-and-miss, with some things feeling great and others… not so much. Pulling off successful hacks and stealthily wiping out an entire building of enemies feels well thought out - and learning when best to use gadgets adds to this. But melee combat feels stiff and unrewarding, with just a few awkward moves. It definitely encourages you to go down the stealth route more often, but sometimes you just want the combat. There’s a bunch of accessibility options available, which is fantastic, with settings for different types of colour-blindness, menu narration and text-to-speech, as well as the ability to toggle simplified puzzles. Camera effects can also be switched on and off, which is a great option as this can be very disorienting for many players.
With such a vast world, filled with different activities ranging from the aforementioned Kick Ups (keepy-ups to me as a Glaswegian - I wonder how many different terms there are for this around the UK?), to Liberation tasks where you need to set free allies of DedSec; as well as the online multiplayer which arrives on December 3rd - there’s plenty to keep you busy.
We ran into a couple of weird issues during play, such as my recruits faces in the menu being changed to show the faces of Allan’s recruits - but with their original names and characteristics showing, as well as still being played as normal. I’m not sure why or how this happened, but it really threw me for a loop upon first loading the save on XSX - genuinely thought the saves had been mashed together in the transfer. I also had an odd issue where one of my characters would repeatedly whip out then holster her nail gun after I climbed onto a drone, luckily I got it to stop after manually putting the weapon away, so it didn’t cause too much of a problem.
Season Pass Content available for Watch Dogs Legion includes additional characters, including Watch Dogs OG Aiden Pearce; WD2’s Wrench; (non-canon) modern-day Assassin, Darcy; and test subject, Mina. You also get access to some new story missions, alongside a pretty cool DedSec skin for you to customise your vehicles. Lastly, it includes a digital copy of Watch Dogs: Complete Edition - the first game including all of its associated DLC. The season pass comes in at a pricey £32.99, which can feel pretty steep, especially if you already own WD1 and the DLC.
There’s also a few cosmetic bundles available, allowing you to unlock some pretty cool recruits for your team. Frustratingly, these all come at an extra cost (although can be purchased in groups of three at a discount). As I always say with content behind paywalls - there should be a way, even if it’s a time-consuming, grindy way, to unlock the additional cosmetic items.
In the end, we decided to give Watch Dogs Legion the Collecting Asylum rating of 8/10.
Have you played Watch Dogs Legion yet? What did you think of it?
Let us know in the comments below!
- V x
Thank you to Ubisoft for the Watch Dogs Legion Xbox One/Xbox Series X review copy!
