WMG / Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

Confirmed

The genetic memories of Edward were harvested from Desmond's corpse.

His body was taken by Abstergo. It may be possible that they used it to view his ancestor's memories.

• Confirmed.

The Abstergo Shareholders meeting and Olivier's disappearance are part of the story in Watch_Dogs

One of the files you can obtain shows that Abstergo has had a hand in developing the ctOS, not to mention both the Shareholder Meeting and the game are in Chicago.

• Confirmed. He appears in the final convoy mission of Watch_Dogs.

Jossed

One of the fantastic elements introduced in the game will be the mythical Bermuda Triangle

• Or the Fountain of Youth, which was theorized in the Facebook app Assassin's Creed: Discover Your Legacy to contain a Piece of Eden within its water. Juan Ponce De León tried to find it, but failed, leaving the possibility of someone else finding it.
• And Florida is, like, next door.
  • Jossed. None of them appear.
    • Though the Bermuda Triangle is mentioned, possibly laying the groundwork for a future game.

Connor Kenway will reappear as a playable character

Because seriously, ACIII explicitly said that Connor would have further adventures. The developers might even do the same thing as in Revelations—have the playable ancestor be Connor, but have Connor use Applied Phlebotinum to replay the memories of his ancestor, so that the player can switch between the two storylines. Since this is a new numbered title, the new Assassin would probably be more prominent though.

• The ACIII "Tyranny of George Washington" DLC seems to have something similar going on, with Connor having stumbled into an alternate universe (or an illusion of such) somehow.
• Considering that Aveline has some playable missions in the Frontier in the PS versions of Black Flag, it's likely that Connor will at least show up as a side character at some point during those segments. Also, it has been explicitly stated that the modern protagonist is researching the Kenway line, so it is possible Haytham will also appear at some point. However, it may be that we only get foreshadowing of a new Connor game, possibly one of the four (I think) other Assassin's Creed games Ubisoft currently has in development.
  • Jossed on Connor appearing in this game. Though he is heard as The Voice in the PS-exclusive Aveline missions, though as nothing more than a simple voice-over narrating the contents of his letter to Aveline that kickstarts the mission.
    • Also, by playing previous titles, the player can unlock Connor's robes (as well as Altaïr's and Ezio's) for Edward to wear.

Achilles will appear in Assassin's Creed IV.

He will either make a cameo or be a major character as Edward's student.

• The latter is Jossed, Achilles would've only been a toddler when the game takes place, and was recruited in the 1730s, shortly before to about the time of Edward's death.
  • He could still appear somehow. Considering it'd take place over the years, perhaps he grows up seeing Edward fighting the Templars and joins the cause before heading off for America to start his own chapter.
  • He never appears at all.

Assassin recruits will not be members of your crew.

Instead, they will be other captains in your fleet. Rather than having special foot-soldiers to summon in combat, you summon whole ships to assist you in naval combat.

• Jossed. There are no recruits for Assassins.

Part of the game's story will take place during the War of the Quadruple Alliance.

Specifically, the Battle of Nassau, which is one of the major hubs.

• Jossed.

Haytham's Face–Heel Turn will turn out to be related to the fact that Edward was a pirate.

• Jossed.

The framing story will show the beginnings of a Templar-Assassin alliance.

With Juno's escape and the death of Vidic and Desmond, the two ancient societies will temporarily join to fight the new threat. Expect the Templars to take after Haythem more than any other Templar, and the Assassins to be fully prepared for a You Have Outlived Your Usefulness scenario.

• That would be awesome, but the theme is wrong. AC III featured Ratohnhaké:ton trying to reconcile, unsuccessfully in a series of tearjerker moments, with his father.. Black Flag seem to be about a failed pirate/assassin city.
• Jossed, at least for this installment.

Edward faked his death, and fathered another child

If there's some way he's still alive after the end of the Revolution, he'd be in his 90s! Though then again, it's likely since assassins like Altaïr and Ezio lived to a ripe old age in times where the mortality rate was at 30-40.

• No, sadly, that's Jossed.

The player's non-Animus identity is Erudito

What with the whole "hacking Abstergo from within" and whatnot.

• Jossed. The PC doesn't even know of the Assassins or Templars until starting their first shift on the job as Edward.

Edward's tattoos work like Jason Brody's tattoos

Doing guild challenges like the previous AC games gives Edward tattoos as well as strengthens him.

• Jossed

The modern character is actually Shaun

He did consider wanting to go into the Animus during AC3. Perhaps he finds out that since Edward is his ancestor, he's also a distant relative of Desmond and William as well. His time in the Animus also gives him eagle sense as well as a lifetime experience of parkour.

• Jossed. He's working the cafe in the lobby of the office.

When Blackbeard dies, he or someone close to him will have a Piece of Eden

And it will make Blackbeard's decapitated body swim laps around the ship. Or at least make it look like it...

• Jossed. No POEs are involved in his death.

In the Freedom Cry DLC Adewale will end up killing Woodes Rogers

The DLC takes place in 1730 (and possibly onwards), and Rogers died in 1732. Edward also vowed to track him down, but had settled into a family life at that time, leaving it up to Adewale, who knows of Rogers' Templar activities, to do the job.

• Jossed. The DLC takes place in 1735, so Edward presumably did the job himself.

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The Player Character R-L's Name

Is maybe a play on pronunciation on his/her name as Aurel or Aurelia, the names derived from Aureus meaning "golden" in Latin. Maybe R-L has Eagle Vision like Desmond?

• Maybe, but if s/he does, s/he certainly doesn't know it.

Edward's first language is Welsh.

The real decline of the language didn't occur until around the 1800s. His father taught him English during his teen years.

The game will be packed with references to Pirates of the Caribbean.

Self-explanatory.

• One of the trophies/achievements early in the game is titled "A Pirate's Life for Me", which is a reference to the theme song for the original Disney amusement park ride and also gets frequent mentions in the films.
• The best reference is that toward the end of the game, Abstergo Entertainment plans to use all the data mined about Edward Kenway to create a game called "Devils of the Caribbean."

Assassin's Creed IV will feature Edward teaching Haytham because the present day character was related to Haytham's younger sibling/half-sibling

Now that Desmond's saga is over with the new central character is looking to the past and finding Edward and will not be related to Connor directly.

• According to the novel Assassin's Creed: Forsaken, Haytham never had a younger sibling. Although he did have an older sister...
  • Also Word of God has stated that by this point, Abstergo has upgraded the Animus to the point where the user no longer has to be related to the person whose memories they're viewing, so the new guy may not be related to Edward at all.

Edward's home base will be...

• Your ship. Let's face it, it basically is the pirate's overall home. Just step away from the wheel and manage things from the captain's cabin.
• A small Monteriggioni-style pirate port that you serve as "governor" of.
  • Corfirmed, Nassau will serve as the Monteriggioni of the game.
    • Jossed. Nassau is a port in the game, but you get another island called "Great Inagua" that serves as the base.

Edward's crew will be Locked Out of the Loop.

As Blackbeard asserts in the trailer, it is unwise to meddle in his personal affairs. There are probably only a handful of high-ranking confidants that know the truth of the Assassin/Templar conflict, while the remainder of the crew are your average buccaneer who either don't give a rat's arse, decide to not to get involved, or are simply ignorant of the goings-on behind the closed door of the captain's cabin.

Edward's ship will fight the Aquila, leaving it in the state Connor found it in Assassin's Creed III.

• Extremely unlikely. We know the game takes place in the days of Blackbeard, meaning it takes place at least before 1718 (the year of his death). The Aquila didn't get built until 1749 and didn't end up in its decrepit state until 1768. Unless Mr. Haytham impressed Blackbeard really early in his life and lived extremely long, it's highly unlikely that he was involved in devastating the Aquila like that. Same goes for the ship itself; I highly doubt whatever ship he uses would last 50+ years without getting replaced, decommissioned, or reconstructed so many times that the remaining original materials don't really constitute "the ship" anymore.
  • Also the reason that ship was in that state was because Haytham destroyed it.

Edward is a Villain Protagonist.

Consider that, in the launch trailer, Edward seems to be a bit more cold and have looser morals (killing a target then walking out with his lady) than all of the previous Assassins combined. So much that even Blackbeard is scared of him. Not to mention that Haytham took on the directly opposite ideology. It's possible that Edward will hit this trope at some point. Also, it might make a good parallel to Haytham's relation with Connor.

• Since the game is being made, in-universe, by one of Abstergo's subsidiaries, the chances for this are either going up or we're sniffing the first clues of a Templar-Assassin alliance in the face of Juno's escape.

There will be a mission that takes place in the Royal Opera House in London.

Haytham Kenway mentions in the opening level in the third game that his father brought him to the Royal Opera House when Haytham was very young, and that he remembers very little of it. There could be a mission in Black Flag that shows this, perhaps even an assassination mission. This would serve as an effective call back to Assassin's Creed III.

• He took him to see the same opera, not to the same theater.
• Due to the nature of the Animus, (you can't follow the older ancestor after they've conceived the next generation of your bloodline) that would only be possible if the source of Edward Kenway's genetic memories came from the descendants of Haytham's younger sibling(s), of which there are none.
  • There is a way around this. Subject 16 was descended from Ezio but wasn't related to Desmond by anyone else because Ezio had more than one child with different women throughout his life. This is entirely possible with Edward see above WMG.
  • Wrong. Ezio had two children with Sofia, a boy and a girl, who we see in AC: Embers. Clay is descended from one and Desmond from the other.
    • Clay was said to have been born from an illegitimate child Ezio conceived sometime during his life, giving him "far fewer" memories of Ezio than Desmond has access to.
  • There's not a mission per se, but the epilogue does show Edward taking his children to see the Beggar's Opera.

Henry Rollins will be in this game somehow.

How can you have something named Black Flag without Rollins?

• Obviously, he'd be the gung-ho, loose cannon gunner of the crew. BLOW IT ALL UP!

Bartholomew "Black Bart" Roberts will be a Templar pirate.

The most successful pirate of his time, Black Bart has plenty of traits that would make him a candidate for the Templar Order during The Golden Age of Piracy. He was much more bloodthirsty than his peers, and was a Faux Affably Evil gentleman who dressed in fine clothes and jewelry. Plus, we know that one of his prized possessions was a bejeweled crucifix, so the iconography is there. And think about the contrast between rakish, unkempt pirate turned Assassin Edward and groomed, fashionable pirate Templar Bartholomew.

• Partially Jossed, Roberts isn't a Templar, but he is the Big Bad.

The player character will turn on Abstergo.

If they are merely hired by Abstergo they will relive both Edward Kenway's memories and some of Desmond's that has been hacked back in by Erudito. Find out that Abstergo are the Templars and turn against them as a result. If they were full members of Abstergo they will use stealthy and risking tactics to help out the remaining Assassin's out in the world. Either way using the animus will bite Abstergo in the ass again.

• Played with. The player is used by John for a long time and granted the means to be as hack-happy as one wants, but given how much of a blank slate the player character is, it's up to Alternate Character Interpretation on whether it's a deliberate anti-Abstergo effort or if it's just an employee dicking around with coworkers.
• Well, at the end of that, it seems that R-L will be an ally of the Assassins now.

ACIV will involve a Templar Cabal of Pirate Hunters.

Since the protagonist is a pirate, nothing more fitting than Templar conspiracy of Pirate-hunters [and men of the royal navy] who seek to bring forth the End of an Age of the golden age of piracy [and given the period the game is set, at the very end of the golden age, they seem to be succeeding]. Possible members being:

• Woodes Rogers: The greatest and most successful pirate hunter of the entire pirate age, who basically wiped out piracy from the Bahamas (an area confirmed to appear) and was relentless in his pursue of Charles Vane [who has also been confirmed to appear].
• Benjamin Hornigold: Has been confirmed to appear in the game. Died mysteriously [his boat apparently clashed with a reef that nobody can localize]. He was [historically] recruited by the aforementioned Woodes Rogers and served as his main lieutenant.
• Robert Maynard: Slayer of Blackbeard [who has been confirmed to appear, and the game is set in the year of his death], historically, he had no connection to any of the two above, but the fact we historically know absolutely nothing about the man who killed Blackbeard makes him prime value for conspiracies.
• Chaloner Ogle: British navyman and pirate hunter who fought and killed Bartholomew Roberts more or less along the game's period. Roberts' death is seen as the nail of the coffin of The Golden Age of Piracy, so it'd make sense to portray him.
  • Partially confirmed, Rogers & Hornigold are major characters, but the latter two don't appear.
    • Stretching the definition of "appearance," Maynard is present at Blackbeard's death but doesn't have a unique character model like the formally-named characters and there's nothing to suggest that he's personally a Templar.

Edward will be reminiscent of Altaïr.

That is, early Altaïr before he was demoted for his recklessness. Specifically in terms of a libertarian, carefree interpretation of the creed "nothing is true, everything is permitted."

• Confirmed. The first time Edward hears the maxim, that's what he thinks it means, with James Kidd retorting that he parroted the words without understanding their meaning.
  • Partly. Altair was motivated by anger and arrogance. Edward is only in it for the gold. The misinterpretation and abuse of the creed is the same, but the motivations are different.

Blackbeard will be The Mentor to Edward Kenway.

By showing him the ropes of how being a pirate works, etc. Bonus points if he suffers from Mentor Occupational Hazard and Edward decides to go after his killer.

• Absolutely correct, minus the "going after his killer" bit since the guy who killed Blackbeard in-game was just a random British soldier who got a lucky hit in while in a big fight.

The 'you' in this game's modern story played AC3's multiplayer.

When you reach Level 50, you unlock a development diary video where Alan R. tells you that he wants to run further investigations on you, while the Erudito version has Erudito claiming he wants to contact you. Obviously, nothing actually happens to you, as there are no more videos to unlock, but it could be possible that you were simply beta-testing the game at the time. Maybe, you are promoted at the start of AC4 to a researcher of Edward Kenway, and will be challenged to think for yourself as Erudito tells you to.

Captain Jack Sparrow is an Assassin.

It would fit with the bird theme-naming.

• I think he'd be more of a Wild Card like Edward, affiliated with neither faction.

New group of Protagonists

The foreshadowing in the online parts of previous games will come to fruit in the modern meta-narrative as either a customisable protagonist or a selection of different people (a la Far Cry, another Ubisoft game).The voice of the hacker you hear in the epilogue of III will be secretly guiding you while you work inside Abstergo.

Abstergo is looking for the descendant of Eve

Subject 16 told Desmond to find Eve's DNA, in the Cinematic trailer Edward is shown to hold what looks like a glass cube with something red sealed in the centre. Perhaps this is some blood or tissue, more specifically Eve's blood or tissue. Abstergo will be looking through Desmond's (or maybe his father's)ancestors' history to try and find this sample so they can recover it and analyse the DNA and find Eve's modern day descendant.

There's an even Greater-Scope Villain than Juno

She'll probably go about ruling the world with an iron fist, but it's all to prepare humans for a bigger threat, whether it's from the past or in the future. Even with their new iron goddess, the Assassins and Templars will still be at each others throats.

AC4 will have minigames like in AC3, except more pirate-themed

(crosses fingers) Please have Liar's Dice, please have Liar's Dice...

There will be DLC focusing on James Kidd/Mary Read

Makes sense, since Mary had a baby just a few days before she died, making almost her entire life open to play, and Abstergo would likely want to know what she was up to.

Abstergo will get quite a lot of Precursor data from John's/Roberts' body

When Roberts died by Edward's hands, he wanted him to destroy his body. John got himself shot to death while in an Abstergo building. Accessing a security camera archive video in the basement afterwards reveals they have the body in cold storage. Whatever they find from his genetic memory won't be good.

John was Erudito

Erudito had been keeping himself fully hidden until his body was overwritten by Aita. Now that he's dead, the Assassins will probably end up losing quite a bit of ground they gained over the last year.

About " reincarnation

"The Sage, actually Aita, came to be because Juno spread Aita's genetic information through all of humanity. A Sage is "reincarnated" not by the soul being reborn in a new body—as it has been confirmed that there are no supernatural elements to Assassin's Creed—but by a significant-enough degree of Aita's genetic code building up in a single individual over many generations, similar to how eagle vision comes from one having a significant-enough degree of First Civilization heritage in general. Considering that Those Who Came Before created the Apples of Eden, which can cause impossible feats to happen if enough people are enthralled by it, it's not too much of a stretch that Juno would be able to pull off what amounts to reincarnation.

R-L is "Eve"

Clay somehow found out about Juno/Aita's intention to find a host body that Juno could use to take over the world (and let's face it, if Juno wants to take over the world she'd need a host body that can both use, and be unaffected by, the Pieces of Eden), and pleaded with Desmond to find her before they did, though obviously Desmond's death would complicate things a bit.

• Due to the events that take place out of the Animus, it is properly a safe bet is R-L is a woman.

Clay not only attempted to hitch a ride in Desmond's head...

...when Desmond's genes were put into the Animus cloud, both he and Desmond were resurrected as Ghosts in the Machine and will aid the protagonist in the next game from within the Animus, possibly tying into the above WMG.

R-L was the multiplayer character for 3 and 4

He/she definitely qualified by going through the multiplayer during 3 and the logs you get during 4's multiplayer are R-L still doing a bit of hacking.

Olivier's board meeting in Chicago will be referenced, or even a mission, in Watch_Dogs.

The Modern Day segments make hefty references to the city of Chicago, the "ctOS" security system, and Blume Security. And Oliver's disappearance seems like the perfect fodder for an easter egg or crossover event between the two series.

Devils of the Caribbean will be snark bait for Shaun and Rebecca

Especially if R-L has joined the Assassins in AC 5 to join in the snarkfest.

There will be other Aitas trying to bring Juno back

Since it's shown two Aitas could exist in Thom Kavanaugh and Black Bart Rogers, they will be messing with both the Assassins and Templars so long as it gets them closer to bringing her back. Of course, like Thom, there will be others who are trying to fight his influence and retain their original identity.

How R-L joins the Assassins

He/she will have dug a little too deep either into Edward's life or another ancestor, making Abstergo send a hit squad for him/her. prompting Shaun and Rebecca and/or the Altaïr II crew to pull him/her out of Montreal to continue digging into the ancestor's memories. He/she is still confused about the whole thing even after what he/she's seen as Edward, but may come to slowly accept them, especially once someone from Abstergo crosses the Moral Event Horizon.

R-L closely resembles Juno

Why else would he/she be chosen by John to serve as her vessel? Also, the fact that John chose R-L for this will be a future plot point.

The Sage is not the only one who reincarnates

First, a word about how Sages apparently come to be. When enough of Aita's genetic material traveling through humanity's collective DNA converge in a single person, he is reborn as a Sage. However, the way human genes are spread, there have also been several near- Aitas, i.e. people who possess most of his DNA but not all of it. Thom Kavanagh was one such person, which explains why he had Sage-like visions but was able to hang onto his original personality throughout his life, unlike Roberts or John from IT.

The other passenger in the human genome is Adam. Like the Sages, his reincarnations share a spitting likeness with each other, and also a natural affinity to Eagle Vision, seemingly superhuman agility and ability to shrug off more physical damage than a regular human being. At the moment, there are four known reincarnations of Adam throughout history. Altaïr, Ezio, Connor, and Desmond. Now, unlike Aita, Adam is all about free will and never fully takes over his vessel, but rather remains a silent passenger. But his presence does guide their lives so that all his reincarnations end up becoming Assassins sooner or later.

Edward is a near-Adam. He shares enough genetic material with him to have most of the inherited skills (which is not even a reach, given how he is a full-Adam's grandfather), but lacks the conviction to naturally adopt the Creed. There has also been a contemporary near-Adam existing at the same time as Desmond, namely Clay a.k.a. Subject 16.

Of course, the Assassins' signature skills are not limited to those who share most of their genetics with Adam. Any human can learn them through rigorous training, which explains how people like Aveline or Adewale can seemingly pull off the same feats. But they don't come natural.

• The sign of a fully reincarnated Adam is the signature scar on the lip.
• Except Connor doesn't have one. But interestingly, Aveline does. Is she p'haps a reincarnated Eve?
  • Since Edward was Welsh and his family isn't directly related to Altaïr or Ezio, perhaps various members of the Kenway line are actually the Once and Future King?

What John injected R-L with...

It wasn't a poison. It was something that would make R-L closer to one of Those Who Came Before, or possibly a hybrid. This will serve as an explanation as to how a non-descendant will have Eagle Vision. He most-likely had it ready because he was expecting Juno to inhabit R-L's body, and wanted to make her new body closer to her original one.

The Sages inspired Voodoo

If you lived in the Caribbean and you met a guy who went into bizarre fugue states where he claimed to be a spirit or a god you might come up with something a bit like Baron Samedi.

• Nope. Voudou is a religion forged by African Slaves in Haiti who combined their native believes with the Roman Catholicism their masters tried to inculcate into them. Voudou is not a traditional religion of the Caribbean at all. Likewise, Assassin's Creed: Initiates shows that the Voudou is seen positively among Haitian Assassins, which doesn't quite imply any Sage origins at all.

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