Assassin's Creed has had a very long history, with the first installment releasing all the way back in 2007, but the initial protagonist Desmond Miles has been gone for a decade and is still being talked about with nearly every new game. The Assassin's Creed brand has slowly become one of Ubisoft's most successful and well-known franchises, but the series has never really gotten over Desmond Miles and the impact that he brought to the overall story of the beginnings of the series. Each main game in the series has always jumped back and forth between the modern-day and ancient-day perspectives, but after Desmond Miles exited the franchise, the series has been trying to catch up to the legendary status he and his ancestors brought to the brand.
The Assassin's Creed series has been defined for being set in ancient cities with unique history and architecture, but it's more than just Assassin’s Creed’s coolest settings. The series began to change after the release of the Assassin's Creed movie in 2016. With the launch of Assassin's Creed Origins, the series began going in a new direction, introducing significantly larger open worlds, hundreds of side quests, a weapon and armor system, and RPG-style dialogue options to tailor certain story decisions toward player action. With Desmond long gone, this new Assassin's Creed series began with a new modern-day protagonist named Layla Hassan, who carries on the work laid out by Desmond.
While Layla has been the primary character for the past three Assassin's Creed games, she doesn't appear throughout the games very much, only popping in after huge story revelations are revealed and leaving more room for the ancient day protagonists to shine. The ancient day characters are so much more ed by the fans that the Assassin's Creed VR game features fan-favorite characters. The older Assassin's Creed games with Desmond focused equally on his own story and his ancestor's stories, with each of the original five games being divided with Desmond appearing consistently throughout. The modern Assassin's Creed games focus more on the ancient settings, but that still doesn't prevent the modern story from mentioning Desmond and the work that he did in those original entries. It only makes it more complicated when the ending to Assassin's Creed Valhalla reveals that Desmond may not actually be as dead as previously thought.
How Layla And Desmond Wrap Up Assassin's Creed's Story
Layla Hassan has been the primary protagonist for the last three main Assassin's Creed games, and while she hasn't been as impactful or influential as Desmond Miles was in regards to the overall narrative, she seemingly concludes the storyline at the end of Assassin's Creed Valhalla and sets up the next Assassin's Creed to end its long-running story. At the end of Assassin's Creed 3, Desmond sacrifices himself to save the world from a potential apocalyptic disaster that wiped out the Isu and seemingly dies after merging with Isu technology. It wasn't until eight years later that Assassin's Creed Valhalla finally confirmed what truly happened to Desmond, and even Layla seems confused by the whole ordeal.
After all of Layla's journeys through Egypt, Greece, and Norway, reliving the lives of Bayek, Kassandra (or Alexios), and Eivor, she finally uncovers a hidden realm called "The Grey," created by the Isu that essentially acts as a physical computer space. This revelation brings into question whether or not the Assassin's Creed Dawn Of Ragnarok DLC is canon, as it takes place after the events of the main story. While inside of this space, she meets a being of pure light referenced as, "The Reader," who is actually Desmond, though he has forgotten his past identity and has been given the task of preventing future disasters.
This is quite a shocking reveal, as Desmond had been absent from the series for a long period of time, only to show up at the very end of the last game in a new form with a new identity. Layla is equally as shocked as the player is to see Desmond all these years later. However, she seems to understand and sympathize with his new objective, and ultimately s him in his quest for saving the world.
How Assassin's Creed Can Continue With Ancient Protagonists
Even though the main Assassin's Creed storyline may be coming to an end, and the timeline may be skewed as to when Dawn Of Ragnarok takes place, the ancient storylines, especially following the tales of Kassandra and Eivor, are open to interpretation. After the end of Assassin's Creed Odyssey, Kassandra is gifted the Staff of Hermes Trismegistus, which grants her immortality so long as she keeps the staff on her. While she gives the staff to Layla in the modern setting, there are still several thousand years between her journey in Assassin's Creed Odyssey and the modern-day timeline. This leaves plenty of opportunities to expand on her character and provide new games that center around her travels post Odyssey and her connections with Desmond's quest for Isu relics. Ubisoft has already expanded on this in the DLC, Legacy Of The First Blade, which concludes with Kassandra traveling to Egypt to spread knowledge to distant lands, so the groundwork has already been laid for future spin-offs.
Kassandra isn't the only protagonist that can continue the franchise after Assassin's Creed Valhalla brought back Desmond Miles, as Eivor is also a prime candidate to continue forward with new adventures. Late last year, Ubisoft surprisingly announced that a new quest was being added to Assassin's Creed Valhalla, which introduced a crossover and brought Kassandra over to England to confront Eivor and continue her journey to uncover the Isu. Since Assassin's Creed Valhalla was the last game in the series, continuing to build off of Eivor's adventures seems advantageous as they were the last ancient protagonist in the series and are in their prime to continue their quest across Europe.
Assassin's Creed's storyline has been all over history and has been controlled by multiple different protagonists in the modern day, with each of them bringing their own personality and identity to the series. While the next Assassin's Creed trilogy may be its last, Desmond and Layla were the foundation for the modern-day story and helped bring it to a conclusion after over a decade of build-up and a dozen main games in the series. While the future of Assassin's Creed is still up in the air, the ancient protagonists seem like a smart bet to continue the franchise into the future.
