Watch Dogs: Legion

 
Watch Dogs has become an interesting case study of a series ever since I played the first - highly anticipated, but semi-disappointing - game back in 2014. The original had been hyped to the stratosphere by Ubisoft and now, 6 years later, I'm not sure the series ever recovered. It's sequel in 2016 was a significant improvement, but sales lagged. For the life of me, I'm not sure I've run across other gamers that still play this series (I know they're out there and this is semi-anecdotal) where I can still find plenty of Assassin's Creed and Far Cry players [other Ubisoft staples] without issue. 

In that sense, Watch Dogs really does seem like the Ubisoft franchise that tries so hard, but doesn't quite meet the success of its direct competition. To counteract that, Legion, the third game in the series, looks to evolve the gameplay even more and take us to a new locale: London. Much like Watch Dogs 2, Legion is launching in a busy year, not to mention that Assassin's Creed: Valhalla came out mere weeks later which feels like a self-sabotaging business decision by Ubisoft. 

My time with Watch Dogs Legion has been fun, but coming off the (distant) highs of The Last of Us Part II's quality and Ghost of Tsushima's incredible gameplay and world, I believe I've come to a sobering conclusion about this series: until Ubisoft decides to invest in this series the same way it does Assassin's Creed, this is always going to be B-tier gaming. That's a shame because Watch Dogs is often so unique in its style and gameplay options that it could be something special. For three games in a row now, it has begun to scratch that underbelly, but each time I walk away from these games, I quickly forget them and find that, in some ways, I play them because they're up my alley (open world, lots to do) and less because "OMG I MUST PLAY THIS GAME".

Playing soccer in front of Parliament!
What's more British than that?

Fun fact: I've had drinks at this sky bar!

To be fair, Watch Dogs Legion provides a gameplay element this time around that is bold and one of the few "next-gen" ideas we've gotten in a generation that felt somewhat void of them. I'm still baffled that no other games have picked up Middle-Earth's Nemesis system, but Watch Dogs Legion gives us the inverse of that: you can recruit and play as any NPC you see in the world. Admittedly, when I heard about this before I bought the game, it solidified my purchase, but in practice it acts as both the game's biggest blessing and it's biggest curse. Like many other instances in this game (or the 2 games before it), it's a novel idea not fully explored, but implemented into the game regardless. Throughout the game, it's pretty cool to read up on NPCs throughout London and what their profession is, which is something you've always been able to do. This time though, it shows what their special skills are if you were to recruit them to DedSec's mission. As to be expected, there's a lot of repeats in a city as large as London, but it's clear that Ubisoft took the time here to add enough variation to make it interesting while doubling down on certain professions (e.g. hitman, beekeeper, getaway driver) that come with skills that intrigue and excite. You can build your team as big as 40ish which means that's a lot of variety and finding a new profession that you haven't seen before is actually something that's consistently fun. Some are hilariously zany like a spy who can cloak his missile-firing car or a beekeeper that can send robotic swarms on her enemies. 

However, that's where the "curse" of this whole feature comes in. Watch Dogs is a game that prides itself on gadgetry. Past that, it has had consistently "good" gunplay - though for some reason the first game is still the best here and Ubisoft has The Division series that blows this strangely out of the water so...anyway...each new TM is oddly limited to a single gadget (maybe two if it's one of their pre-selected ones) and only two weapon slots. If that feels restrictive, it's because it really really is and why they chose to do this is beyond me. The number of cool gadgets that Watch Dogs created this time around is probably 3-4x what the previous games have had, but when it comes to trading out staples like the highly-necessary SpiderBot, I rarely tried out other awesome gadgets. When I did, I found them limiting to everything I needed to do. In addition, I'm not sure why recruiting couldn't have been an element that acted as a unique way to acquire skills or special weapons vs. locking you completely in as any character you play as. Not saying that hard work didn't go into this game, but these are the kind of decisions that I struggle to comprehend and need to be fully fleshed out beforehand because it's readily apparent the "next" game will have even more examples of them. This ultimately makes you lean toward 1-2 operatives only, while forgetting the others, and - because the SpiderBot is so useful - leaving all the other gadgets unused. Even having a selection of 3-5 different gadgets would have been a game changer, but the decision makes a game that has a screaming-plethora of options and gameplay elements feel restrictive and eventually one note. 

I was also sad when my beekeeper died.
They were unique and I never found another...sad!

"Oi! It's a Stormzy mission!
With a free concert! Wild!"

Coming so close after Tsushima and having begun playing Valhalla already, Watch Dogs also struggles to make the world outside of missions have that "one more thing" feeling and I've pinpointed the reason: there's literally no extra "stuff" other than collectibles. While all open world games have some variation of collecting stuff that's hidden, they also have events in the world, or minigames that keep the exploration enticing and hidden. Watch Dogs has documents, audio files, tech points (used to unlock gadgets and upgrades), masks, and artifacts, all of which boil down to the same thing: go to where you see it on the map, potentially do a little bit of hacking trickery, and pick up the collectible. After a while, this became mindless and in retrospect I'm kind of shocked this is the case. It's fine that these things are here but to have them be the only things that are supposed to push me out into the world outside of missions? That honestly just feels lazy. 

Something that isn't necessarily Legion's fault - but perhaps the fault of not reinventing the right stuff - that the stuff I found so "cool" in the first game (i.e. hacking cameras, cars, electrical boxes, etc.) isn't as captivating anymore. The novelty has worn off and the drones/spiderbots from the last game have also lost their novelty...though not their usefulness! Either way, outside of the recruiting feature, there's nothing in this game that doesn't feel like I've done it before. Comparing to Ubisoft's other franchises, Far Cry is definitely suffering from this same issue while Assassin's Creed took a new direction several years ago and seems to find ways to continuously tweak it's gameplay (though, it was getting real stale before it's re-invention too). I fear that Watch Dogs isn't as big as either of those franchises so the simple answer may be to take it out back and shoot it (I've been watching a lot of Shark Tank), but that's annoying because I feel like what this game - and the next game - need is some direction, TLC, attention to detail, and investment. I firmly believe that this could be a GTA competitor, or at the very least as big as the Creed series, if Ubisoft took the time to get the next one right. The fact that this one grew stale quicker than the others shouldn't be the way your third game lands or how you welcome in the next gen consoles. 

You can build an eclectic team of recruits...but you'll likely only play as 1-2 characters given the limitations on gadgets and weapons

Ooooo pretty at night from the Thames!

Luckily, it's not all a struggle, and there are still many elements I enjoyed. Despite not having a "lead" character, I found the story intriguing and probably the darkest thus far in the series, despite the seemingly more playful attitude. You start the game trying to prevent a terrorist attack on London and throughout the 15-20 hour-ish campaign you'll battle against a variety of factions like a ruthless scientist, the crazed CEO of a contract military company, a British gang that is capturing slaves and selling their organs (see, I told you it go dark), as well as the ultimate conspirators behind the original bombings. It all comes together in a fairly nice bow and I was really invested to see how it all ended once I knew I was in the last couple hours. There are a few side characters throughout that do fine, but the real star of the show here is "Bagley" a uniquely (and very sassy) British AI. He's consistently saying R-rated things, giving you s**t, and mocking others. I got more than a handful of laughs from him and if there's a "best" of Watch Dogs Legion, he'd be in the running. Strangely, because I had the unique "permadeath" mode on - I also grew attached to my characters because once they were gone...they were gone for good. Losing my "Idris Elba" spy near the beginning caused me great grief, as did my Borat-esque professional hitman later in the game. I eventually found another Jason Statham-like spy and nearly lost him in the endgame which was causing me a lot of stress. 

London is also incredibly recreated with lots of detail. Despite it being a wholly city environment, I didn't find that it got old and this is something that Watch Dogs does really well (I still fondly remember San Francisco) and part of the reason I feel like they could compete at the GTA/Assassin's Creed level. Having just travelled to London in early 2019, it was a ton of fun to revisit the [touristy] sites we went to and revel in that "Hey, I've been there!" moment. The atmosphere is also distinctly London too with cabs and double decker busses everywhere, rain being a constant weather pattern, and a truly impressive - if not overdone - deep dive into British dialect, accents, and language. If I'm being honest, it almost felt like they dialed all of these up to almost obnoxious levels (similar to if a game in the South would have overly dry drawls for everyone) but I also appreciated that there were very few "prim and proper" characters both in voice and language they use. 

There are some standout missions. Like this one
where you pilot a nanodrone through a computer chip!

In the end however, Watch Dogs: Legion became more like a chore than a game I was enjoying. The series - despite the neat additions to recruit and play with permadeath enabled - has lost its luster and some of its fun in the process. It has tons of innovation in certain areas (that never quite feels fully fleshed out) but it lacks innovation in the minute-to-minute gameplay. I do enjoy what this series has to offer and I appreciate the things it does well - including creating unique, detailed locales - but until Ubisoft invests in elevating this franchise the same way they have a few of their others, I regrettably believe it will be stuck in the "good" zone. And in a gaming year THIS big, that's dangerous. 

CONS

• The game's biggest issue is locking all of its fun gadgets behind the concept of the "play as any character". Only being able to equip one (two if it's the right operative) gadget and 1-2 weapons at any time quickly forces the gameplay to grow stale
• I believe this could have been avoided by keeping all the same elements of the recruiting system, but instead having skills and even gadgets that could be unlocked for any one operative (wouldn't they cross train somewhat?)
• Some gameplay quirks that have lost their initial appeal or need to be evolved. The gunplay feels archaic (especially when you have The District under the same roof!) and flying drones/spiderbots only lasts so long. Hacking is still its schtick, but feels like it no longer makes a huge impact
• Pretty much the only other activities to do in the world is collect stuff. This is kept mildly interesting by having to hack your way to the objects at times, but otherwise it feels like a huge chore
• On that note? WAY TOO MANY collectibles. I'd be willing to bet I collected over 150 documents, almost all of which I never read because there's no way to keep all those interesting. Maybe the poor sole charged with creating/writing/hiding all of those could have put more hours into making the gameplay tighter?
• I wouldn't be the best judge, but some of the British-ness feels overdone. It can be cartoony at times
• One of my favorite aspects of previous Watch Dogs was the cat-and-mouse multiplayer. There's none of that here and it's a shame

PROS

• The ability to recruit anyone is exciting and they've done a good job adding enough variety to occupations and skills to make finding someone special an immediate sense of "I must recruit them"
• Surprisingly these characters all have memorable personalities so they fit into the "lead" role of the story well enough
• Bagley is a great [AI] character and probably my favorite part of the game. He had me rolling a few times
• I loved the ability to change masks and there are some sick ones to choose from
• Wow, permadeath mode is hurtful! It legitimately feels different when you lose an operative you really like and there's no way to get them back. Feels like a true consequence
• Missions are mostly fun and the story overall is impressive. I was genuinely intrigued to finish so I knew what happened with the story alone
• A very impressive recreation of London. The Watch Dogs dev teams nails these cities
• Equally impressive focus on London/British culture - even if it does feel like it's overdone at times
• It may grow stale faster than its predecessors but there are still moments of fun and this would have been a good "filler" game in the summer months. Instead, it was released right before Assassin's Creed which doesn't make any sense, but what do I know?!

Rath's Review Score | 7.5/10