ASYNCHRONOUS! The buzzword that's set to carry us in to the arms of the next generation of games, blurring the lines between singleplayer and multiplayer, unifying handheld devices and the not handheld ones! Truly wonderful times we live in, folks. With that exact same mantra in mind, Ubisoft recently showcased three separate components of the impressive looking and sounding Watch Dogs multiplayer to Rev3 Games' Adam Sessler and, despite being one of those guys who only has passing interest on multiplayer games (or even as modes for singleplayer games), I can't help but feel a tad intrigued myself.

The multiplayer will be spread across both mobile platforms through a standalone app, and of course the game itself. Players on mobile devices will be presented with a top-down view of the game-world which will enable them to guide players on consoles or PC and help them navigate safely around guard-patrolled areas, or get you out of a jam in general, making for the game's co-operative portion. The competitive portion is two-fold; after being given a destination, the console/PC player can challenge any friends on tablets to try and stop them from reaching their goal. The more interesting aspect of the competitive multiplayer is that the game will also allow you to invade another person's singleplayer session without them having any knowledge of your presence and interfere with their experience in some fashion. Think of Assassin's Creed's multiplayer combined with Demon's Souls/Dark Souls game-invasion mechanics and you have a pretty good idea of what to expect. However, it was also stated that killing another player in their game could possibly provide some ill-consequences for you as well.