Assassin's Creed bosses know how the franchise ends

Although Ubisoft will continue to release Assassin's Creed games annually until it needs a break, the company does have an ending fleshed out for the franchise, Assassin's Creed 4 game director Ashraf Ismail told Eurogamer.

"We have an idea of where the end is, what the end is," Ismail told Eurogamer. "But of course Yves [Guillemot, Ubisoft's overall boss] announced we are a yearly title, we ship one game a year. So depending on the setting, depending on what fans want, we've given ourselves room to fit more in this arc. But there is an end."

Ismail explained that there are multiple development teams working on the franchise, one of those being the "brand team" which "sits on top and is filled with writers and designers concerned with the series' overall arc." He went on to say that there is an overall arc to the series and "each iteration has its place inside this."

Ubisoft aims to release the sixth major installment of its Assassin's Creed franchise, pirate-centric Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag, on Oct. 29 in North America for PlayStation 3, Wii U and Xbox 360, as well as on next-generation PlayStation 4 and Xbox One platforms at unannounced dates.

Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot previously stated that the company releases titles for a franchise until it needs a break, identified when the company can't "improve enough or bring something that fans haven't seen before."