With the limited demo time I had, I couldn’t see how far Ubisoft goes in making characters distinct - particularly when it comes to things like voice actors, given that whichever recruit you’re playing as will also appear in fully voiced cutscenes. Other characters - which Legion will outright point players toward by occasionally highlighting them in the game world - are clearly “main” characters with distinct perks and useful abilities like unique weaponry, improved hacking skills, or advantages in combat and stealth. Most of the random characters walking around feature minor perks (shopping discount loyalty cards were particularly common), no benefits at all, or even purely detrimental characteristics (like being out of shape or a heavy drinker, which offer tangible in-game downsides). Ubisoft also definitely pushes players toward recruiting particular NPCs. There are clear archetypes: construction workers all feature a nail gun, a wrench, and a cargo drone, while spies come with a silenced pistol and a James Bond-style car, which can be summoned to their location and has missiles and an invisibility function. ‘Legion’ doesn’t do enough to differentiate its myriad characters The main differences are the two or three perks that each character comes with and their default gadget. One of my recruits, an elderly spy, handles exactly the same as a spry young hitman for hire or a football hooligan.

Unfortunately, for all the hype, after playing three hours of Legion, it doesn’t do enough to differentiate its myriad characters from each other.

And with procedurally generated characters, Ubisoft says that the number of potential recruits ranges in the millions. Need to sneak into a building site? Recruit a construction worker who can sneak in undetected. The idea is simple: all those NPCs, with all their strengths and weaknesses, are now actual playable characters that can be recruited as part of your hacktivist army. But in Watch Dogs Legion, Ubisoft is taking that potential and expanding it into a core part of the game - or at least, it’s trying to. NPCs were a big part of the first two Watch Dogs games their colorful histories and biographical snippets would pop up when you scanned anyone in the game world, mostly for comedic effect.

Watch dogs legion