One such mystery that may never be fully explained is the disappearance of Assassin’s Creed Lost Legacy, a 3DS title Ubisoft announced back at E3 2010 - elements of which have now found their way into Revelations.

For anyone unfamiliar with the original Lost Legacy premise, the 3DS exclusive once again centered on everyone’s favorite Italian assassin - and was expected to set-up as well as mirror elements featured in Revelations: “Driven by curiosity and a desire to understand the origins of his Order, Ezio Auditore travels East in search of the lost castle at Masyaf, the ancient seat of the Assassins.”

In an interview with Joystiq, Darby McDevitt, lead writer for Revelations, indicated that when Lost Legacy development seemed to stall - the story beats were easily worked-into the next console experience:

Fans who has checked out the awesome Assassin’s Creed Revelations trailer will instantly recognize parallels in the two stories (specifically the Masyaf castle) - and the point is further compounded in the marketing for the upcoming console title.

It would have been interesting to see how the two titles would have worked together, presumably with Lost Legacy focused on the earlier (Holy Land) part of Ezio’s journey - and  then concluded in Revelations as the assassin investigates Constantinople. That said, it’s easy to see how stretching that story over two games (and two platforms) might have been overkill - had 3DS development not floundered.

With Lost Legacy dead, the bigger red flag is the lack of a tangible Assassin’s Creed 3DS title en route - which indicates that splitting-up the story was the least of Ubisoft’s concerns. Delivering a compelling Assassin’s Creed experience on a handheld continues to be a challenge - as nearly all of the spin-off titles failed to capture the success of the core AC console gameplay. As a result, it makes sense that McDevitt and company would shift some of those ideas over to Ezio’s final console title - providing a deep and large-scale conclusion to the Auditore trilogy.

While the Ezio story ending, as well as throwbacks to Altair’s contribution to the narrative, will certainly provide some interesting insight. In an interview with CVG, McDevitt also warned that anyone expecting Revelations to be a tell-all answer dump should probably lower their expectations a bit:

Maybe everything else will be answered in a forthcoming Nintendo 3DS spin-off?

Follow me on Twitter @benkendrick and let us know what “revelations” you’re hoping to see in Assassin’s Creed Revelations.

Assassin’s Creed Revelations will release on November 15, 2011 for the Xbox 360, PC, and PS3.

Source: Joystiq & CVG