Watch Dogs is a franchise that has had a tumultuous journey, finding it difficult to maintain any real consistency since the first game released in 2014. One of the most anticipated games of the PS4 and Xbox One generation, the title was sorely lacking in the quality that was promised with a bland protagonist, weak story, and sub-par presentation. It was a victim of its own hype, so the expectations were tempered when Watch Dogs 2 hit shelves a couple of years later. It was a significant improvement over what came before, and at the center of its appeal was a gorgeous, well-adapted take on San Francisco and its surrounding area.
Watch Dogs: Legion reverted to type, being a largely uninteresting tale with outdated mechanics and a frustrating choice of characters. Its saving grace was London, and how it had managed to capture a level of authenticity while also making it a fun place to explore for natives of the English capital. It's clear after three installments that Watch Dogs' strength is in its ability to present an interesting and accurate setting, so it's all to easy for players to theorize about where, if anywhere, it should go next. There are a handful of obvious choices like Tokyo and New York, but the happenings in Seattle, Washington makes it ripe for Ubisoft to take advantage of.
Seattle is a Technological Wonderland
The essence of each Watch Dogs story is the resistance of tyranny and influence of big, overbearing corporate entities. Dedsec was made in response to the top-level corruption in Chicago, San Francisco, and London respectively, and much of the series' enjoyment can be found in the slow, but meaningful mischief that the organization gets up to. Seattle is the center of the earth for all things tech, with worldwide companies like Amazon, Boeing, Microsoft, and MSNBC all calling the Seattle area home. For Watch Dogs, this would surely be very enticing, as the Dedsec organization needs to take on progressively larger entities if it wants to stay interesting to fans.
Seattle is also far different in tone style, and geography than any of the cities Ubisoft has previously visited. While the smoky, industrial, and often rainy London streets offer their own flavor and San Francisco feels like a vacation in comparison, Seattle could be altogether unique. Its populated markets, passionate sports teams, and place at the foot of Mount Rainier gives it a deep sense of identity, and being tucked in the Pacific Northwest means it's far from the top of international tourists' list of places to visit in the USA.
Watch_Dogs Wouldn't be the First Visitor to Seattle
Seattle is no stranger to video games, as it has been reimagined in such titles as The Last of Us 2 and InFamous Second Son effectively. The former does well to bring an entirely different vibe to the city with structural, geographical, and tonal changes that suit the story being told, and the latter has a brightness and size that makes each location and landmark feel easy to traverse. Watch Dogs always strives to craft a more ambitious open-world than the one presented in InFamous Second Son, though, and given the attention to detail present in Watch Dogs 2's San Francisco Bay Area, Ubisoft could definitely capture Seattle's best side.
Watch Dogs still has so much to offer the video game space, and while it has core mechanics that aren't as fresh as they were when the series debuted, the way they handle setting, scope, and side activities is largely unparalleled. The franchise is fun simply to exist in, and meandering across the landscape in search of landmarks makes up a lot of the fun to be had. It's clear the series thrives when it's in America, as Watch Dogs: Legion didn't quite go to plan, and Seattle is a town that has a deep sense of identity and community that Ubisoft could surely replicate.
Watch Dogs Legion is available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.