Watch Dogs 2
Ubisoft's grudging crawlback to Steam continues with achievements for Watch Dogs 2 added a mere 9 years after releaseFeb 6, 2025 - PC GamerUbisoft is currently engaged in what we Brits would call a reverse-ferret: After years of releasing its games exclusively on the Epic Store, the publisher has returned to distributing them on Steam. The first game to mark a return to day one releases will be Assassin's Creed Shadows on March 20, even if Ubisoft is still trying to make you sync-up your Steam account to a Ubisoft Connect one. It just can't quite let go!.. Read more.Ubisoft finally adds Watch Dogs 2 Steam achievements as rollout continuesFeb 6, 2025 - PCGamesNFollowing in the footsteps of the Assassin's Creed and Far Cry series, one of Ubisoft's greatest open-world games now has another reason to come back. Watch Dogs 2 Steam achievements have been missing for a long time, but now the publisher has finally introduced the feature to its stylish cybercrime sequel. In even better news, you won't need to replay the whole game if you've already fulfilled the requirements previously. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Classic Ubisoft open-world game blows up on Steam thanks to big sale Hang on: Watch Dogs 2 is actually kind of brilliant PSA: This is your last chance to claim Watch Dogs 2 free Achievements Unlocked for Watch Dogs 2Feb 5, 2025 - Community AnnouncementsAttention Dedsec, We are pleased to announce that Steam Achievements are now available for Watch Dogs 2! As a heads up, achievements will be retroactively earned for the accomplishments already completed in your game. For the sync to happen you need to launch the game once, and the previously unlocked Ubisoft Connect achievements will be automatically unlocked on Steam. Keep your eyes peeled, Hackers!The Watch Dogs movie has wrapped up filming more than 10 years after it was first announced, which I'm assuming means it's a guaranteed best picture winnerSep 15, 2024 - VG247It turns out the Watch Dogs movie is in production, and in fact has already wrapped on filming. Much like the Minecraft movie and the Borderlands movie, the Watch Dogs movie has been in the works for about a decade now, though unlike the Minecraft movie which finally received a trailer last week, and the Borderlands movie which was released last week (and was so abysmal that it got a digital release only three weeks after it came out in cinemas), we haven't seen all that much of the Ubisoft adaptation. In fact, we haven't really seen anything, though there were a couple of pieces of casting news earlier this year, as well as one bit this week. With that came a tweet from Ubisoft confirming that uh, filming has been completely finished on the film adaptation of Watch Dogs, though I somehow seem to have missed the fact production had started at all. I guess that's what happens when Ubisoft spends 10 years trying to make a movie - there's only so long someone can pay attention when it comes to production timelines. Apparently Ubisoft did actually announce production was underway this summer, but again, there hasn't been a game in four years (the AAA games industry is fine, thanks for asking), so general awareness of the series isn't exactly at an all time high. Read more Classic Ubisoft open-world game blows up on Steam thanks to big saleMay 16, 2024 - PCGamesNOh, The Division Heartland, we hardly knew ye. A spin-off from the main multiplayer looter shooter series, Ubisoft has just canceled Heartland to refocus on the upcoming XDefiant and the Rainbow Six series. Nevertheless, an open-world classic from the Assassin's Creed and Far Cry studio is currently surging on Steam, eight years since it was first launched. Witty, satirical, and full of creative opportunities for mayhem, it's also available at its lowest price ever. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Hang on: Watch Dogs 2 is actually kind of brilliant PSA: This is your last chance to claim Watch Dogs 2 free Get Watch Dogs 2 free for watching Ubisoft's E3 event Sunday A decade later, they’re still trying to make a Watch Dogs movie - but now it has a director, writer and starMar 8, 2024 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunRemember when Ubisoft announced they were working on a movie adaptation of hacking series Watch Dogs, before it was even released? I sure didn’t! Well, allow us both to be reminded of something from over a decade ago, because the Watch Dogs film is still apparently A Thing. It’s more of A Thing now, too, because it has actual names attached rather than just a corporation’s vague “excitement” about licensing out its IP. Read more Game Pass added Watch Dogs 2, Ubisoft's fun open-world Hackers homageJul 21, 2022 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunUbisoft's campy cybercrime-o-rama Watch Dogs 2 arrived on Game Pass this week, and it's worth a look. I've been playing Watch Dogs 2 lately myself, by coincidence, and I am enjoying its gang of goofballs who want to stick it to The Man by hacking the planet and forcing people to watch their meme videos. Good camp fun with a nice group of friends. Read more As Dusk Falls, Inside, the best Watch Dogs game and more coming to Xbox Game Pass soonJul 18, 2022 - VG247It's the middle of the month, just about, which means a fresh wave of Xbox Game Pass games, this time around including the best Watch Dogs. A smaller crop than the batch of games that dropped on Game Pass in the first half of the month, but we've got a good mix of small and big titles to choose from (via Xbox Wire). The first set of games for the latter half of July will arrive tomorrow, July 19, which is where you can get stuck in with some interactive drama, and some stylish hacking. First off is As Dusk Falls, which is a day one release on Game Pass. This one comes from developer Interior/ Night that "explores the entangled lives of two families across thirty years," and will be available on cloud, console, and PC. It got shown off at last month's Xbox Games Showcase, and in it you'll make choices that can have big impacts on the character's lives. Read more Far Cry 3 creative director leaves Ubisoft after almost two decades at the companyApr 17, 2022 - VG247Long standing senior developer at Ubisoft Patrick Plourde has left the company after almost 20 years. Plourde announced earlier this week (April 13) that he would be leaving Ubisoft after working at the studio for almost two decades, and has set up an independent creative consultancy. In a tweet on his personal Twitter account, Plourde referenced the various games he's worked on such as Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas, Assassin's Creed, Far Cry 3, Watch Dogs 2, and Child of Light, saying "it's been a privilege to collaborate with everyone at Ubi on these great games! Now, I'm happy to share that I'm starting my own independent creative consultancy, where I will keep working with Ubisoft and also spend time on some personal projects. The now ex-Ubisoft developer also provided a statement to Axios (via VGC) saying that he will "have a position outside a traditional structure (with mandate cross department)," and that he "will be able to dabble with other fields outside gaming" without the need to ask for Ubisoft's permission. Read more Have You Played… Watch Dogs 2?Oct 30, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day, perhaps for all time. I won’t dignify the underscore that is in the official title. Watch Dogs 2 may not have an iconic cap, but you know what it does have? An iconic mask. (more…) Watch Dogs 2 review - brazenly sillySep 18, 2020 - PCGamesNWant to know how many dudes I killed in Watch Dogs 2? Two. No, not two hundred. I mean two, as in the one between one and three. Marcus Holloway's San Francisco-set sandbox elegantly bypasses that old chestnut of ludonarrative dissonance - a phrase fittingly first coined by a former Ubisoft creative director - by giving your goofy hacker the ability to go through the entire game non-lethally. Hooray for videogame pacifism! This seems like a small detail. It's actually a crucially smart design decision; one which encourages you to experiment with Watch Dog 2's delightfully manipulative gadgets. In turn, you embrace a far more thoughtful style of play than you could achieve by simply shooting men with the game's underwhelming guns. Messing with people's phones, bank accounts or emails is often more effective than brute-forcing your way through missions with a grenade launcher. And hey, it makes the life of San Fran's coroner a whole lot more sedate. Alas, my 18-hour playthrough isn't totally corpse-free. Below, you'll find the two poor souls who just happened to be the victims of an 'accidental' explosion my little Jumper RC car caused. Ooops. My bad, guys. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Hang on: Watch Dogs 2 is actually kind of brilliant PSA: This is your last chance to claim Watch Dogs 2 free Get Watch Dogs 2 free for watching Ubisoft's E3 event Sunday Hang on: Watch Dogs 2 is actually kind of brilliantSep 18, 2020 - PCGamesNAt a glance, there's only a thin line that separates Watch Dogs 2 from GTA. A thin white line, extruding from the phone perpetually in your hand, that hops between potential hacking targets - traffic lights, SUVs, manhole covers, voicemails - with an eagerness that borders on impatience. It's a roaming cursor that represents an invisible layer of interaction GTA doesn't have, encouraging you to stick your finger in Ubisoft Montreal's simulation and give it an experimental waggle. The trickster god in the machine. You'll have seen that same line drawn all over Ubisoft's promotional shots, zigzagging across those first images until they resembled geometric puzzles. But, to some degree, that promotional campaign was in vain. Watch Dogs 2 sold a fraction of the copies its predecessor did at launch, and it didn't come as a total surprise. In the months before release, we'd noted alarmingly low reader traffic on previews. It wasn't just that buyers were wary of Watch Dogs 2 - they didn't even want to hear about it. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: PSA: This is your last chance to claim Watch Dogs 2 free Get Watch Dogs 2 free for watching Ubisoft's E3 event Sunday Ubisoft's mysterious sci-fi game isn't dead - it may be rebuilt with Rainbow Six tech PSA: This is your last chance to claim Watch Dogs 2 freeJul 15, 2020 - PCGamesNJuly 15, 2020 Claim your free Watch Dogs 2 before time runs out. Last week, Ubisoft announced that anyone who watched Ubisoft Forward would receive a free copy of Watch Dogs 2 - but the way that worked was that you'd have to log in to Uplay and watch it there. Unfortunately, that didn't work for many players during the 45-minute presentation, meaning few were able to qualify for the free game. The good news is that Ubisoft is going to make sure everyone gets a copy anyway - but you're going to need to be quick about it. You can head on over to the promo page to claim your free copy of Watch Dogs 2 by signing into Uplay. This is open to everyone, whether you watched Ubisoft Forward or not, but the promotion ends today, July 15 at 23:59 PDT. (That's midnight, or 2:59 EDT / 7:59 BST on July 16.) It's worth noting that many players still have not received access to their copies of Watch Dogs 2 yet, so stay patient - you should be safe as long as you've got your claim in. Ubisoft says the giveaway will be distributed "by the end of the week". Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Get Watch Dogs 2 free for watching Ubisoft's E3 event Sunday Ubisoft's mysterious sci-fi game isn't dead - it may be rebuilt with Rainbow Six tech Ubisoft's AI assistant Sam is out but has shut up about Watch Dogs 3 Ubisoft's server issues won't stop the Watch Dogs 2 giveawayJul 12, 2020 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Update: Anyone with an Ubi account can now sign up for a free copy over here. Ubisoft’s offer of Watch Dogs 2 for free if you watched today’s Ubisoft Forward stream today was meant to be a tempting little sweetener, but things broke. The servers seemingly overloaded, meaning that not only were many unable to sign into their Ubi accounts and become eligible for the giveaway, some people are complaining all the failed attempts got their accounts automatically disabled. Welp. Sounds like it’ll take some fixing, but Ubisoft have at least said people who couldn’t log in will get the freebie. (more…) You can grab Watch Dogs 2 free during Ubisoft Forward on July 12Jul 6, 2020 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunUbisoft’s big not-E3 showcase is scheduled for this Sunday, July 12th where they’ll be showing off new gameplay and trailers for upcoming games. As part of the event, they’re also letting you claim a free copy of Watch Dogs 2 for PC, though you’ll have to be fast. You need to grab it while the show’s live, meaning you’ll have about a 45 minute window to make those dogs yours. (more…) PC gaming's best US citiesJul 4, 2019 - PC GamerHappy July 4 to all our friends in the USA! Today the UK team loosely tries to join in with a story about the Independence Day game that time forgot, and this celebration of the best US cities in PC gaming. We're lucky enough to have visited a lot of the cities on the list, and it's always a surreal experience to compare reality to a virtual interpretation. These games capture something special about the places they model. It's not just about getting all the landmarks in, the best cities use light, weather and sound to create a distinct mood. Sometimes the shooting and driving feels secondary to the experience of wandering the streets, soaking up the atmosphere. Washington DC, The Division 2 It's odd to walk around a virtual city you've also visited in real life. The layout of the city has to be changed to fit the mechanics (cover everywhere!), but there are sudden moments of powerful recognition as you have a tense gunfight in the National Air and Space museum. As in real life, the White House is smaller than you expect, and the Capitol Building seems huge. The soft storms of the Division 2 make DC's wide avenues even more beautiful. A cracking bit of virtual tourism with the bonus ability to shoot nanobees at bandits.—Tom Senior Liberty City, Grand Theft Auto 4 Los Santos is a much bigger and undeniably more impressive location, but the now decade-old Liberty City is still my favourite open world city in any game. The over-the-top golden skies of Rockstar's love letter to New York are completely unrealistic, but they add this mythical feel to a playable space that was unprecedented in detail at the time. From Star Junction, its version of Times Square, to the light coming through the train tracks on the streets of Broker, it's still an emotionally stirring place to explore. I'd love to see it revisited in GTA Online or a new singleplayer game at some point.—Samuel Roberts San Francisco, Watch Dogs 2 My memories of San Francisco mostly consist of sunshine and good sandwiches—our sandwiches are crap in comparison. Ubisoft's interpretation of San Francisco is luminous and extremely fun to drive around, not least because you get to live the Bullitt fantasy of careering down those steep hills. The in-game phone has a Scout app that encourages you to tour the city's landmarks, which is a really nice touch that encourages players to see the city as a storied, lived in place, rather than just a chaotic play space. I've always wanted games to follow Ubisoft's approach to cities. In Assassin's Creed you can access historical information about the locations you're visiting. I like learning little bits about places I won't get to see in real life.—Tom Senior City of Glass, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst I had to check the wiki to make sure the City of Glass is technically part of North America (it is! If it's technically in Canada and we've ...Watch Dogs 2, Ghost Recon Wildlands, and Far Cry Primal are $5 each on the Epic Games StoreJun 7, 2019 - PC GamerThe Epic Games Store has its fair share of critics, and there are some good reasons to be critical—its half-assed search functionality, for instance, or the inability to easily pull full-res screenshots from store pages. But it also offers some pretty spectacular prices at times, including at this moment a trio of big-name games from Ubisoft—Far Cry Primal, Ghost Recon Wildlands, and Watch Dogs 2—that you can pick up for just $5 each. Each of the games is on sale for $15, which is a good deal on its own. But Epic is slicing another $10 off the top of every game in its ongoing Mega Sale priced $14.99 or higher, so those $15 games end up a fiver—three for the price of one, basically. And when you compare that to the regular price points—$50 for Far Cry and Wildlands, $60 for Watch Dogs 2—you very suddenly find yourself deep in "screamin' good deal territory." The EGS pages don't say how long these prices are valid, which is unfortunate, but the Epic Mega Sale runs until June 13. Steam Charts: Some Things Old, Some Things New EditionJun 3, 2019 - Rock, Paper, Shotgun Good hello. Please, grab hold and sit, for this is some Steam Charts. (more…) The sci-fi game Ubisoft teased in Watch Dogs 2 has apparently been cancelledJan 16, 2019 - PC GamerRemember a couple of years ago, when a trailer for a fake game that appeared in Watch Dogs 2 turned out—maybe, according to sources—to be a real project called Pioneer? It looks like that report may have been accurate, because now it appears that the whole thing has been cancelled. Hutchinson is in a position to know: Prior to co-founding Typhoon Studios in 2017, Hutchinson was the creative director of Far Cry 4 and Assassin's Creed 3. And while he didn't come out and say explicitly that the project had been cancelled, he did have this to say when asked about it specifically: Jonathan Cooper, the animation art director on Asasssin's Creed 3, also chimed in: It's worth emphasizing that this is all purely speculative, not just because of the nature of the tweets, but because Pioneer was never actually confirmed to exist in the first place. It's really more akin to sad musing about what might have been, then, but it fits with the 2016 report, which said that the game was facing an uncertain fate: Development wasn't unfolding as smoothly as expected, and so the announcement had been put off while the project was "retooled." But the trailer had already been inserted into Watch Dogs 2 by that point, and so out the door it went. I've emailed Ubisoft to ask if there's anything to all of this, and I'll update if I receive a reply. But unless Hutchinson and Cooper are messing with us, it looks like that's the end of any hope we had of one day getting our hands on Pioneer. Amazon Prime Day 2018: Best deals on PC games and hardwareJul 17, 2018 - Rock, Paper, ShotgunThis year’s Amazon Prime Day is almost at an end. At midnight tonight, Amazon’s big day o’ deals will be over for another year (or, you know, until Black Friday in November), so if you had a look at the deals yesterday and thought, ‘Hmm… I could do with a new SSD or graphics card’, then you’ve still got time to pick one up. I know Amazon is evil etc, but just in case you do fancy picking up a bargain, I’ve put together a list of all the best of the best PC Prime Day deals right here, covering hardware and games alike. Happy hunting. (more…) Watch Dogs 2 Player Count Launch NumbersDec 6, 2016 - GitHypAfter Ubisoft debuted “gameplay” footage of Watch_Dogs at E3 2012, many believed it could be the open-world game to finally topple the Grand Theft Auto series. That quickly turned out to not be the case once the final product launched, which looked and played nothing like the debut footage, and GTAV had a record-breaking release on every platform.
Now, four years after all the controversy, the original Watch_Dogs only averages around 400 players per hour on Steam, while GTAV is still in Steam’s daily top five averaging around 40,000 players per hour. And Ubisoft’s latest follow-up, Watch Dogs 2? Well, it isn’t off to a hot start with the player counts on Steam aligning with the initial low sales and low viewer counts as we originally reported.
Debuting on PC two weeks after its troubled PS4 and Xbox One sans-multiplayer launch, we now have the player count numbers for Watch Dogs 2 which has failed to break the top 10 highest played games on Steam. Ubisoft's latest is even trailing behind their other latest games with less concurrent players than both The Division and Rainbow Six: Siege.
[caption id="attachment_223215" align="aligncenter" width="771"]
Watch Dogs 2's Players Per Hour Launch Numbers via GitHyp[/caption]
Watch Dogs 2 debuted one week ago with a peak of 18,113 players in a single hour (less than half of the original’s 47k peak) and the player counts have already dropped 47% to a peak of only 9,604 players today. The players per hour average is brought down even further with the game dropping to slightly under 5,000 users per hour when factoring in prime after school/work hours in the U.S. each day.
Ubisoft has already tried to put a "incredibly happy" positive spin on the low sales numbers stating to PC Gamer: “We expect both week-two and week-three sales to be above traditional sales patterns. There is a trend toward games, especially high-quality games, having stronger and longer 'tails' as favorable reviews and word of mouth spread. Watch Dogs 2 is already considered a tremendous addition to the open-world action adventure series and we're confident that millions of players are going to love it."
Looking at the current player counts certainly doesn’t show Watch Dogs 2 trending in that direction. It’s already fallen out of Steam’s top 50 games and isn’t showing signs of growth. So expect another press release from Ubisoft in the future claiming the numbers have risen (right after the game is put on sale) as we’ve seen them do time and time again.Watch Dogs 2 Viewer Count Launch NumbersNov 21, 2016 - GitHypThere’s been a lot of animosity from gamers towards Ubisoft lately, and rightfully so as the developer/publisher continues to put out “gameplay” trailers for their upcoming triple-A titles that fail to match the same exact look and feel at launch.
The best example of this was back in 2012 when Ubisoft debuted the first Watch_Dogs with gameplay that many considered stole E3. Only to then release a game that looked and played nowhere near as impressive two years later. Two more years later and now Watch_Dogs only averages around 250 players per hour on Steam and rarely ever has anyone watching the game being played on Twitch.
With the amount of negative backlash Ubisoft has received for using this tactic -- more recently with The Division, which also had huge drop in players and viewership -- the marketing for Watch Dogs 2 seems to have been slightly toned down to show what looks like more legitimate gameplay footage.
Yet, here we are the week of Watch Dogs 2’s launch and the multiplayer is broken and there’s a two week delay on the PC launch that will keep gamers from knowing its early player count stats.
[caption id="attachment_219435" align="aligncenter" width="771"]
GitHyp's Watch Dogs 2 Viewers per Hour[/caption]
Although we don’t have the initial player counts for Watch Dogs 2, we do have the viewer counts from Twitch which aren’t looking good. Watch Dogs 2 had a pretty hot start on its Tuesday launch, hitting a peak of 59,226 viewers and ranking as high as #3 on Twitch. But after its first day, it has been all downhill for the Dogs with viewers quickly losing interest after finally seeing what the latest from Ubisoft has to offer.
Even over its launch weekend that should have seen interest at an all-time high, Watch Dogs 2 only managed to peak at 10,801 viewers and averaged around 5k viewers. Dropping 82% since earlier in the week and placing the game right around the #30 spot on Twitch where it’s now continuing to fall.
Such an early drop in viewer counts is already showing that gamers are losing interest in the sequel, so it’ll be interesting to compare Watch Dogs 2 to Ubisoft’s last bomb, The Division, when it hits Steam and the PC player counts are made public. Considering the current state of multiplayer and how low viewer counts already are in its first week, things aren’t looking good for Watch Dogs 2.
GitHyp will have the player count numbers when Watch Dogs 2 launches on November 29, 2016 on PC.
Watch Dogs 2's Players Per Hour Launch Numbers via GitHyp[/caption]
Watch Dogs 2 debuted one week ago with a peak of 18,113 players in a single hour (less than half of the original’s 47k peak) and the player counts have already dropped 47% to a peak of only 9,604 players today. The players per hour average is brought down even further with the game dropping to slightly under 5,000 users per hour when factoring in prime after school/work hours in the U.S. each day.
Ubisoft has already tried to put a "incredibly happy" positive spin on the low sales numbers stating to PC Gamer: “We expect both week-two and week-three sales to be above traditional sales patterns. There is a trend toward games, especially high-quality games, having stronger and longer 'tails' as favorable reviews and word of mouth spread. Watch Dogs 2 is already considered a tremendous addition to the open-world action adventure series and we're confident that millions of players are going to love it."
Looking at the current player counts certainly doesn’t show Watch Dogs 2 trending in that direction. It’s already fallen out of Steam’s top 50 games and isn’t showing signs of growth. So expect another press release from Ubisoft in the future claiming the numbers have risen (right after the game is put on sale) as we’ve seen them do time and time again.Watch Dogs 2 Viewer Count Launch NumbersNov 21, 2016 - GitHypThere’s been a lot of animosity from gamers towards Ubisoft lately, and rightfully so as the developer/publisher continues to put out “gameplay” trailers for their upcoming triple-A titles that fail to match the same exact look and feel at launch.
The best example of this was back in 2012 when Ubisoft debuted the first Watch_Dogs with gameplay that many considered stole E3. Only to then release a game that looked and played nowhere near as impressive two years later. Two more years later and now Watch_Dogs only averages around 250 players per hour on Steam and rarely ever has anyone watching the game being played on Twitch.
With the amount of negative backlash Ubisoft has received for using this tactic -- more recently with The Division, which also had huge drop in players and viewership -- the marketing for Watch Dogs 2 seems to have been slightly toned down to show what looks like more legitimate gameplay footage.
Yet, here we are the week of Watch Dogs 2’s launch and the multiplayer is broken and there’s a two week delay on the PC launch that will keep gamers from knowing its early player count stats.
[caption id="attachment_219435" align="aligncenter" width="771"] GitHyp's Watch Dogs 2 Viewers per Hour[/caption]
Although we don’t have the initial player counts for Watch Dogs 2, we do have the viewer counts from Twitch which aren’t looking good. Watch Dogs 2 had a pretty hot start on its Tuesday launch, hitting a peak of 59,226 viewers and ranking as high as #3 on Twitch. But after its first day, it has been all downhill for the Dogs with viewers quickly losing interest after finally seeing what the latest from Ubisoft has to offer.
Even over its launch weekend that should have seen interest at an all-time high, Watch Dogs 2 only managed to peak at 10,801 viewers and averaged around 5k viewers. Dropping 82% since earlier in the week and placing the game right around the #30 spot on Twitch where it’s now continuing to fall.
Such an early drop in viewer counts is already showing that gamers are losing interest in the sequel, so it’ll be interesting to compare Watch Dogs 2 to Ubisoft’s last bomb, The Division, when it hits Steam and the PC player counts are made public. Considering the current state of multiplayer and how low viewer counts already are in its first week, things aren’t looking good for Watch Dogs 2.
GitHyp will have the player count numbers when Watch Dogs 2 launches on November 29, 2016 on PC.
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