Assassin’s Creed Mirage is out this week, ut there’s also been one major change.
The latest title in the franchise is set in 9th Century Baghdad and developers Ubisoft have recorded the game’s audio dialogue in Arabic.
Previous games in the long-running stealth franchise have taken place in the Middle East, Europe and Africa, but the game has always been voiced by English-speaking actors.
Players will still be able to choose to play the game with English dialogue, but Ubi hope they’ll choose the original Arabic.
“Our philosophy usually with localization is for the player to experience it and enjoy it and not notice that it was actually translated from the source language,” art director Jean-Luc Sala explained.
“The game is fully voiced in Arabic as the launch proposition. It’s a part of the game. We [paid] special attention [to the fact] that people love to play Ghost of Tsushima in Japanese, for example.
“Honestly, it would have been a shame to miss that opportunity to return to the Middle East with Assassin’s Creed and not [include] a language that is still here,” he says. “It feels more accurate to play in Arabic, even if you’re not Arabic.”