The use of computer-run industrial control systems has grown exponentially over the last decade and change. Such infrastructures help cities and nations around the world manage power plants, surveillance, and countless other integral functions. But as sci-fi media has long predicted, interconnected supercomputers can facilitate just as many problems as they solve. In 2010, 100,000 Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition, or SCADA, networks were discovered to have been targeted with the sophisticated Stuxnet virus, a digital weapon allegedly co-engineered by U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies to debilitate the Iranian nuclear program. Developer Ubisoft Montréal studied such headline news when formulating its cautionary tale about the horrors of an interconnected world in Watch Dogs.
Announced with an awe-inspiring trailer during E3 2012, Watch Dogs counted among first games shown for the eighth console generation. While its final form failed to fulfill the promise of the original teaser, many would argue the title’s gameplay mechanics still showcased the power of next-gen technology. These talking points undoubtedly boosted Watch Dogs’s sales numbers early on and helped it sustain long legs with over 10 million copies sold.
But this incredible momentum waxed and waned over the course of the series’s life cycle. Watch Dogs 2 released to better reception, though it came and went with little fanfare. And the third installment found itself beset by game-breaking performance issues at launch. Watch Dogs has, thus far, managed to claw its way back from multiple downturns, raising questions as to how Ubisoft will reinvent the hacking-focused series next.
This is the Rise and Fall of Watch Dogs.
