San Fransisco, the city where I grew up in, is my playground. I’m a professional hacker and I’m trying to leave my mark on the city. Together with my crew, I hack myself into systems I shouldn’t even know existed. It’s not the safest hobby to pick and it happens more than once that people start shooting at me, but the thrill is what keeps me going. I run around in the city like I own it and one day, me and my crew might actually make that happen.
Welcome to San Fransisco
In Watch Dogs 2, you’ll take control of the young Marcus Holloway, a brilliant hacker and rebellious teen. He works together with the notorious Desec group that’s known for their perfect but sometimes aggressive hacks. It’s clear from the start of this demo, Watch Dogs dropped the whole ‘let us create a dark and emotional game’-vibe and went for a softer and modern approach thanks to our new protagonist. Marcus is born and raised on the streets of San Fransisco and knows every spot in the city. He’s a skilled parkour runner and knows how to get away from people who try to chase him down. The free running looks and feels a little like Assassin’s Creed but due to the modern setting, it does feel like something new.
San Fransisco looked great in the demo, unlike the original Watch Dogs, the developers really managed to bring the city to life. Every person you come across during the demo looked completely different and was minding his or her own business. You’ll see people talking to each other, people hanging around at bars, crossing the streets, driving cars. It feels like a real city and that’s a big accomplishment if you compare it to the first Watch Dog experience. Let’s hope that they can keep up this great work when the final product releases.
Hack all of the things
So once we checked out the gorgeous digital version of San Fransisco, it was time for the actual gameplay of Watch Dogs 2. The demo that was shown, focused heavily on the drones. You’ll have a wide variety of playable drones, we saw a flying one and a ground one. The flying drone was used to scout your environments and tag enemies so you’ll know where you can go and what objects are hackable. As you already know from the first Watch Dogs, you can hack cell phones, cameras, modern dog collars and a lot more. The hacking returns in Watch Dogs 2 of course and still feels fluent. It’s still strange, hacking from one camera to another but it benefits the gameplay so we won’t complain that much. That being said, the demo forced us to step away from deadly action and hack doors with your ground drone.
This ground drone can actually jump and open doors for you, it can even open passcode protected doors, which is a handy tool for the modern hacker. The drones looked fun but keep in mind you’re never forced to use them. The player went for the drone-approach to get passed his enemies but you could have easily taken them down with gunfire if you like that more.
Co-op experience
The demo ended in a co-op session. Just like the original Watch Dogs, you can play with other hackers around the world. Playing a mission in co-op looked like a lot of fun, if your partner is willing to work as a team. If you play together, you’ll really need to stick together and discuss strategies about how you’ll play the mission. Things won’t work out if one player likes the action more while the other likes sneaking more. That being said, the co-op mode seems to be perfectly adapted into the game and it ran very fluently.
Early Conclusion
Watch Dogs 2 looks better as the original when it comes to graphics but I’m not yet convinced. The light story seems fitting but it’s something you’ll need to get used to, it’s an entirely different vibe playing Watch Dogs 2. It’s a bit of a shame that the demo forced us to control the drones all of the time since the parkour mechanism seemed like a better solution. That being said, it looks like Ubisoft learned from its mistakes and is willing to change a lot to give the fans that Watch Dogs game they always wanted.
