Having acquired this one through my share-partner on PS4, posting some thoughts. Haven't by any means finished it yet of course.
The Operative System
This is the much ballyhoo'd addition in Legion. Rather then playing as one central character, you recruit operatives from the populace as you go. On the initial take, gthis seems quite interesting, giving you an Xcom esque set of up to 40 unique operatives (you can even turn permadeath on, which game overs if you run out.). There's a decent batch of pseudo-random (there appears to be some sort of background class system) perks dolly'd out to the NPCs being generated. A hard drinking brawler might excel at melee, medical staff can access some restricted areas and reduce the injury team of other operatives who've been knocked out of action. There's some more esoteric ones out there as well. Politicians and investors can add bonus ETO (cash) to you, etc. These come in negatives too, aforementioned hard drinking brawlers often also come with gambling addictions where they will lose ETO or probation that means they get jailed for longer if arrested.
This falls rather flat after the initial spread though. The tooltips do speak to more advanced operatives later in the game, but unlike many of these sort of systems, your operatives are pretty static, it doesn't look like there's any real growth. Also once you recruit them, the details and even sidequests they had to recruit just kind of go off the table. When I was working towards recruitment on one of my guys, there was a whole (random generated, so not terribly in-depth) storyline where he was investigating a corrupt pharma dealer who'd hospitalized his brother. But while I can still find that dealer out in the world and they will pop up as a suspect and even interact with that operative, the side-quest can't be pursued once recruited.
The idea is novel, but essentially let you down because there's no way to grow alongside your operatives and build that sort of attachment or customization to them. You might develop a fondness for the ones you use regularly, or one that has a particularly good voice actor (the older Bermudan gentleman is a standout so far), but the only real upgrade you get to them is clothing (which is unlocked universally as in both prior games).
Storyline
As you might guess, the operative stuff sort of kneecaps the narrative a tad. Granted, no one liked Aiden, and Marcus was himself just kind of along for the ride. But yes, there's not a whole lot of character to Dedsec. Some of the VA's for the smorgasmabord get a little personality and alternate dialogue, but its a fairly minimal bit of flair. The token sarcastic AI Bagley is at least not as irritating as some. Overall Dedsec handler character Sabine is just rather flat thus far, being a mission dispenser.
The broader narrative does seem to be harkening a bit back to Watch Dogs 1. Its not the irrascible Dedsec troupe vs the evil corporate dude one on one this round. The rival hacker group seems to be the big antagonist, with a PMC and a Mob group also slotting in.
The setting has been pushed up into the actual future no. So self-piloting cars are abundant (allowing you to get about without needing to carjack actual people). Various drones patrol the skies, ranging from spouting propaganda news, to the cargo drone (which you can ride about as a slow helicopter and use to grab objects), as well as fast moving chase drones that track you, and actual Riot/Counterterrosim heavy essault drones.
Gameplay
The core Watch Dogs gameplay is of course here. Cover, stealth, connect the dots hacking puzzlzes. Hacking stuff to explode and traps. Spiderbots have replaced the RC car from WD2. Drones are no longer a gadget you can carry, but can be found throughout the environment (or some Operatives have drone summons as a perk).
There is a more complex, if not terribly deep, melee system this go around. With guard breaks and dodge-counter attacks. This ties in to a new quirk where many enemies will not escalate to lethal guns and the like if you don't pull out yours. Somewhat in tandem with that, all the Dedsec weapons are shock/KO weapons, to get lethal ordnance you need to recruit separate operatives. with personal unique weapons.
A given operative can also carry only one ranged, one melee weapon and one gadget on them as well. So you can equip an Augmented Reality invisiblity gadget, but you give your spiderbot, or you can sub some taser knuckles in there for the more brawling inclined.
Side-missions are still by and large simply open-world restricted zones with some collectibles, tech points, or cash to grab. These are also the venue for Recruitment missions which will add on a bit of a contextual story to it.
Main missions have gotten a bit of an overall. Several now take place in specific interior levels of their own, leaning again a bit more to Watchdogs 1 days. Which allows for some atmosphere like NPCs conversing below you as you drone through ventilation, and more specific challenges that don't fit in the bite sized open world segments.'
The driving is still generally the same. It looks and feels more polished, but is defintiely still a fairly arcadey take on it. No upgrading your cars or anything like that. I know you can paint cars, since some perks relate to it, but haven't actually found a way to buy them beyond some operatives having personal vehicles.
Microtransactions
They're not in your face or anything, much like AC:Origins, they're just kind of shoved off in a side menu. I haven't found any real reason to buy them ,and had to go look just to write this bit. At time of writing you can buy ELO (the regular cash to buy clothes and presumably car paints in game), IDK why you ever would, its not hard to get. 4 operatives who have unique skins and 4 perks each (skins aside, you can get similar OPs easily enough just by telling a tax or bus to auto-drive while you can the sidewalk folk). And then some goofy looking and decidedly overpriced cosmetic skins. I will actually call out the skinpacks slightly, as they run 1500 gold whatevers. 100 golds is 1 dollar essentially, but the packs come in 1000+100(*bonus*) then 2500. That is hardly new in terms of micro-BS, but obviously sets the micor-currency as a trap to try and have you buy surplus to get things. (The operatives are 1000/$10 each for the curious)
*(EDIT : I believe the Operatives in question are just the bonuses from the deluxe edition. So you can buy those even if you didn't opt in originally without shelling out 120 or whatever for the whole shebang))
Full Summary
If you enjoyed either of the previous ones, you'd probably enjoy this one. If not you probably won't. If you're a fence-sitter, theres probably a good argument to wait for a sale or whatever on it, the unique quirks of this game aren't really enough to sell it over another similar open world game. There apparent plans for more content as well (the co-op mode is upcoming, and there are some add-on DLCs announced for story content).
While it ultimately doesn't sell the game, I will give some credit on a technical level. Ubisoft has generated a city simulation where all the random people have full schedules, relations to each other. and individual backstories. If you unlock the Deep Profile upgrade, its quite impressive how little copy paste there seems to be to it. It also is updated by your actions in game. You can save an NPC from unlawful arrest and they will thank you when you run into them doing drugs in the park across town hours later. When I came out of a drone to a policce offer harassing me and accidentally slapped him with a wrench, he went to the hospital, but later one automatically ID"d the same operative when passing him on a street.
The Operative System
This is the much ballyhoo'd addition in Legion. Rather then playing as one central character, you recruit operatives from the populace as you go. On the initial take, gthis seems quite interesting, giving you an Xcom esque set of up to 40 unique operatives (you can even turn permadeath on, which game overs if you run out.). There's a decent batch of pseudo-random (there appears to be some sort of background class system) perks dolly'd out to the NPCs being generated. A hard drinking brawler might excel at melee, medical staff can access some restricted areas and reduce the injury team of other operatives who've been knocked out of action. There's some more esoteric ones out there as well. Politicians and investors can add bonus ETO (cash) to you, etc. These come in negatives too, aforementioned hard drinking brawlers often also come with gambling addictions where they will lose ETO or probation that means they get jailed for longer if arrested.
This falls rather flat after the initial spread though. The tooltips do speak to more advanced operatives later in the game, but unlike many of these sort of systems, your operatives are pretty static, it doesn't look like there's any real growth. Also once you recruit them, the details and even sidequests they had to recruit just kind of go off the table. When I was working towards recruitment on one of my guys, there was a whole (random generated, so not terribly in-depth) storyline where he was investigating a corrupt pharma dealer who'd hospitalized his brother. But while I can still find that dealer out in the world and they will pop up as a suspect and even interact with that operative, the side-quest can't be pursued once recruited.
The idea is novel, but essentially let you down because there's no way to grow alongside your operatives and build that sort of attachment or customization to them. You might develop a fondness for the ones you use regularly, or one that has a particularly good voice actor (the older Bermudan gentleman is a standout so far), but the only real upgrade you get to them is clothing (which is unlocked universally as in both prior games).
Storyline
As you might guess, the operative stuff sort of kneecaps the narrative a tad. Granted, no one liked Aiden, and Marcus was himself just kind of along for the ride. But yes, there's not a whole lot of character to Dedsec. Some of the VA's for the smorgasmabord get a little personality and alternate dialogue, but its a fairly minimal bit of flair. The token sarcastic AI Bagley is at least not as irritating as some. Overall Dedsec handler character Sabine is just rather flat thus far, being a mission dispenser.
The broader narrative does seem to be harkening a bit back to Watch Dogs 1. Its not the irrascible Dedsec troupe vs the evil corporate dude one on one this round. The rival hacker group seems to be the big antagonist, with a PMC and a Mob group also slotting in.
The setting has been pushed up into the actual future no. So self-piloting cars are abundant (allowing you to get about without needing to carjack actual people). Various drones patrol the skies, ranging from spouting propaganda news, to the cargo drone (which you can ride about as a slow helicopter and use to grab objects), as well as fast moving chase drones that track you, and actual Riot/Counterterrosim heavy essault drones.
Gameplay
The core Watch Dogs gameplay is of course here. Cover, stealth, connect the dots hacking puzzlzes. Hacking stuff to explode and traps. Spiderbots have replaced the RC car from WD2. Drones are no longer a gadget you can carry, but can be found throughout the environment (or some Operatives have drone summons as a perk).
There is a more complex, if not terribly deep, melee system this go around. With guard breaks and dodge-counter attacks. This ties in to a new quirk where many enemies will not escalate to lethal guns and the like if you don't pull out yours. Somewhat in tandem with that, all the Dedsec weapons are shock/KO weapons, to get lethal ordnance you need to recruit separate operatives. with personal unique weapons.
A given operative can also carry only one ranged, one melee weapon and one gadget on them as well. So you can equip an Augmented Reality invisiblity gadget, but you give your spiderbot, or you can sub some taser knuckles in there for the more brawling inclined.
Side-missions are still by and large simply open-world restricted zones with some collectibles, tech points, or cash to grab. These are also the venue for Recruitment missions which will add on a bit of a contextual story to it.
Main missions have gotten a bit of an overall. Several now take place in specific interior levels of their own, leaning again a bit more to Watchdogs 1 days. Which allows for some atmosphere like NPCs conversing below you as you drone through ventilation, and more specific challenges that don't fit in the bite sized open world segments.'
The driving is still generally the same. It looks and feels more polished, but is defintiely still a fairly arcadey take on it. No upgrading your cars or anything like that. I know you can paint cars, since some perks relate to it, but haven't actually found a way to buy them beyond some operatives having personal vehicles.
Microtransactions
They're not in your face or anything, much like AC:Origins, they're just kind of shoved off in a side menu. I haven't found any real reason to buy them ,and had to go look just to write this bit. At time of writing you can buy ELO (the regular cash to buy clothes and presumably car paints in game), IDK why you ever would, its not hard to get. 4 operatives who have unique skins and 4 perks each (skins aside, you can get similar OPs easily enough just by telling a tax or bus to auto-drive while you can the sidewalk folk). And then some goofy looking and decidedly overpriced cosmetic skins. I will actually call out the skinpacks slightly, as they run 1500 gold whatevers. 100 golds is 1 dollar essentially, but the packs come in 1000+100(*bonus*) then 2500. That is hardly new in terms of micro-BS, but obviously sets the micor-currency as a trap to try and have you buy surplus to get things. (The operatives are 1000/$10 each for the curious)
*(EDIT : I believe the Operatives in question are just the bonuses from the deluxe edition. So you can buy those even if you didn't opt in originally without shelling out 120 or whatever for the whole shebang))
Full Summary
If you enjoyed either of the previous ones, you'd probably enjoy this one. If not you probably won't. If you're a fence-sitter, theres probably a good argument to wait for a sale or whatever on it, the unique quirks of this game aren't really enough to sell it over another similar open world game. There apparent plans for more content as well (the co-op mode is upcoming, and there are some add-on DLCs announced for story content).
While it ultimately doesn't sell the game, I will give some credit on a technical level. Ubisoft has generated a city simulation where all the random people have full schedules, relations to each other. and individual backstories. If you unlock the Deep Profile upgrade, its quite impressive how little copy paste there seems to be to it. It also is updated by your actions in game. You can save an NPC from unlawful arrest and they will thank you when you run into them doing drugs in the park across town hours later. When I came out of a drone to a policce offer harassing me and accidentally slapped him with a wrench, he went to the hospital, but later one automatically ID"d the same operative when passing him on a street.
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