Ubisoft announced a new engine for the game, reveals the PC as the lead platform. The game also wants to compete with Grand Theft Auto 5.
Watch_Dogs technical director Sebastian Viard from Ubisoft explained that the open-world game uses a engine called Disrupt. The new engine was built at Ubisoft Montreal for Watch_Dogs. So the game doesn't use the AnvilNext which is Assassin’s Creed 3's engine.
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot revealed that the lead platform is the PC so Watch_Dogs will be ported to all other platforms. “We expect fewer problems with porting games to the PS4 than the PS3, which had a completely different infrastructure. Previously, we developed games first on the Xbox 360 and then translated them onto the PS3. It took a lot of time and money to port.”
There is a website URL hidden in the trailer which was shown at the PS4 reveal which leads to this website www.chicago-ctos.com. The website “0wn3d by DedSec” shows an ASCII logo and the Latin phrase “quis custodiet costodes ipsos” which means "Who watches the watchmen?"
Watch Dogs wants to compete with Grand Theft Auto when both game release this Winter.
Ubisoft executive Alain Corre said that the publisher hopes Watch Dogs will become a major brand, like Assassin’s Creed. “What we want with Watch Dogs is to try and crack a new genre, which is the open-style GTA genre. Yes, Grand Theft Auto is one of the biggest brands in the industry and everybody respects the brand and we’ll have fun playing the next one too, but I think Watch Dogs’ positioning is also on next-gen, bringing a lot of features – connectivity, interactivity, companion gaming and so on which is bringing some freshness to the genre.”
Corre said Grand Theft Auto 5′s release in September isn’t a problem for Watch Dogs which is also set for Winter 2013: “When you have a great product in our or any other industry, it also excites the appetite of a lot of consumers in that category. People interested in racing games will buy many racing games if the games are great. So we think that we can even benefit from the fact that Grand Theft Auto is coming. The spirit will be that this kind of game is great fun and I think Watch Dogs can also bring a lot of the same fans.”
