Assassin's Creed is an open-world action-adventure stealth video game franchise published

by Ubisoft and developed mainly by its studio Ubisoft Montreal using the game

engine Anvil and its more advanced derivatives. Created by Patrice Désilets, Jade Raymond,
and Corey May, the Assassin's Creed series depicts a fictional millennia-old struggle between
the Assassins, who fight for peace with free will, and the Templars, who desire peace through
order and control. The series features historical fiction, science fiction and characters,
intertwined with real-world historical events and figures. For the majority of time players
control an Assassin in the past history, while also playing as Desmond Miles or an Assassin
Initiate in the present day, who hunt down their Templar targets. The series took inspiration
from the novel Alamut by the Slovenian writer Vladimir Bartol,[1] while building upon
concepts from the Prince of Persia series.[2]

The series's eponymous first title was released in 2007, and it has featured eleven main games
in total, the most recent being 2020's Valhalla. Main games of Assassin's Creed are set in
an open world and presented from the third-person perspective where the protagonists take
down targets using their combat and stealth skills with the exploitation of the environment.
Players have freedom to explore the historical settings as they finish main and side quests.
Apart from single-player missions, some games also provide competitive and cooperative
multiplayer gameplay. A new story and occasional new time period are introduced in each
entry, and gameplay elements evolve from the previous one. There are three-story arcs in the
series. For the first five main games, the framing story is set in 2012 and features series
protagonist Desmond Miles who uses a machine called the Animus and relives the memories
of his ancestors. In games up until and including Assassin's Creed Syndicate, Abstergo
employees and Assassin initiates recorded genetic memories using the Helix software,
helping the Templars and Assassins find new Pieces of Eden in the modern world. The latest
three games, Assassin's Creed Origins, Assassin's Creed Odyssey, and Assassin's Creed
Valhalla, follow ex-Abstergo employee Layla Hassan.

The main games in the Assassin's Creed video game series have received generally positive
reviews for their ambition in visuals, game design, and narratives, with criticism towards the
yearly release cycle and frequent bugs. The spin-off games received mixed reviews. The
video game series has received multiple awards and nominations, including Game of the Year
awards. It is commercially successful, selling over 155 million copies as of October 2020,
becoming Ubisoft's best-selling franchise and one of the highest selling video game
franchises of all time. While main games are produced for major consoles and desktop
platforms, multiple spin-off games are released for consoles, mobiles, and handhelds
platforms. Assassin's Creed was adapted into a film, which received negative reviews. A
series of art books, encyclopedias, comics, novelizations, and novels have been published.