Assassins’ Creed Mirage’s Permadeath Mode Finally Arrives Today

Ubisoft is finally releasing the long-delayed permadeath mode for Assassin’s Creed Mirage in title update 1.0.7.

The patch notes for the update — arriving today, February 20 at 4am Pacific / 7am Eastern / 12 noon UK — include various other changes but is headlined by the permadeath mode originally due in December 2023.

“Do you think you’ve experienced everything Assassin’s Creed Mirage has to offer?,” Ubisoft asks. “Our newest game mode Full Synchronization Challenge (aka permadeath) is the ultimate test of your assassin skills.”

Dying isn’t the only thing that will end the game for good though, as committing illegal actions like killing citizens or going outside of authorised map locations will also end the game for good, whether a player has 20 minutes, five hours, or two weeks of progress logged. The Full Synchronization Challenge cannot be turned on and off once activated and fully deletes a player’s save file if triggered.

“When Basim desynchronizes from the animus, instead of the usual desynchronized reload screen, a new display appears showing statistics of gameplay time, total amount of conflicts, cause of the death, number of enemies killed, assassin rank and difficulty chosen to play,” Ubisoft said.

Completing the game in this mode comes with certain rewards though: an emblem for easy mode, an emblem and Rayhan costume in normal mode, and six new dyes for existing outfits (Initiate, Zanj Uprising, Abbasid Knight, Hidden Ones, Rostam, and Bayek) in hard mode.

The update comes in at 5.31 GB on PlayStation 4, 1.94 GB on PlayStation 5, 3.15 GB on Xbox One, 4.59 GB on Xbox Series, and 4.85 GB on PC, and also includes a new cat-themed Easter egg, new outfit, and various fixes. The full patch notes, courtesy of Ubisoft, are available below.

Assassin’s Creed Mirage launched October 5, 2023 as a smaller scale entry that returns players to the series’ roots through slower paced, stealth based gameplay, veering away from the role playing game foundations of Origins, Odyssey, and Valhalla (and potentially the next game, Assassin’s Creed Red, which recently sprouted a fresh leak).

Its map isn’t anywhere near the size of those of its predecessors for one, and it only takes around 20 to 30 hours to complete compared to the several dozens of hours of previous games.

In our 8/10 review, IGN said: “Assassin’s Creed Mirage’s back-to-basics approach is a successful first step in returning to the stealthy style that launched this series.”

Assassin’s Creed Mirage Title Update 1.0.7 Patch Notes

Full Synchronization Challenge

• Do you think you’ve experienced everything Assassin’s Creed Mirage has to offer? Our newest game mode Full Synchronization Challenge (a.k.a. permadeath) is the ultimate test of your assassin skills.
• When enabled, Basim will desynchronize from the animus if he dies, or if he commits illegal actions (e.g. killing citizens, going outside of authorized map locations).
• When Basim desynchronizes from the animus, instead of the usual desynchronized reload screen, a new display appears showing statistics of gameplay time, total amount of conflicts, cause of the death, number of enemies killed, assassin rank and difficulty chosen to play.
• There are no second chances – your save file will be permanently deleted, so perfect your skills to keep Basim alive!
• You can enable the Full Synchronization Challenge when starting a new game from the title screen.
• Full Synchronization Challenge cannot be enabled or disabled when the game has started.
• Cross-progression AND Cloud saves will be disabled when starting permadeath.
• Rewards include:
  • Unlock an emblem when you complete the game in easy mode.
  • Unlock the emblem and Rayhan costume in normal mode.
  • Unlock all the above and 6 new dyes for existing outfits (Initiate, Zanj Uprising, Abbasid Knight, Hidden Ones, Rostam, Bayek) when completed in hard. (Please note; dyes can only be applied to these specific outfits).

New Outfit Feature

• Added a new feature where players can now wear any costume they own as an outfit (Transmog).

New Easter Egg

• We added a surprise easter egg to the world, a new special assassin that you might meet purrusing the streets. Be sure to snap a photo if you meownage to find them!

General

• Fixed visual issues on Basim’s right arm when the player equipped the Bayek outfit or costume.
• Fixed an issue in the store where the sword preview models contained in packs could disappear in certain cases.
• Fixed an issue on XBOX where if a player changed their control mapping and restarted their game, the control mapping would revert to the default settings.
• Multiple stability improvements.
• Players will now correctly receive the upgrade schematics for the Bayek outfit when starting their first New Game Plus walkthrough.

New Game Plus

• Fixed a bug where the “interact” prompt showed for any historical codex entry in New Game Plus when they were previously collected in their first walkthrough.
• Players can now interact with Al-Jahiz if the New Game Plus walkthrough was started with the “skip prologue” option.

Graphics, UI, and Animation

• Fixed a bug where news pop ups would appear during active gameplay. News pop-ups are now only displayed once on the title screen upon launching the game.
• Fixed an issue where spamming ALT+ENTER would launch the game in windowed mode on Amazon Luna.
• Fixed a physics issue when jumping with the Roshan costumes.
• Reward notifications now appear correctly after finishing the main quest and coming back to Baghdad during a New Game Plus walkthrough.
• Adjusted the hidden blade position whilst player is equipping the Bayek outfit or costume.

Audio

• Music will now consistently play whilst switching tabs in the codex.
• Fixed an issue where the volume of the game would be louder than what was set in the options menu for a fraction of seconds when starting the game.
• Outfit sound effects will now play correctly when equipping costumes on top of an outfit.
• Music now properly plays whilst on the inventory menu.

Misc

• Enemies ringing the alarm bell are now correctly affected by smoke bombs.
• Fixed an issue where the Smoke Bomb Tier 2 upgrade “Choking Fumes” wouldn’t do damage during the extended range of time of the Smoke Bomb tier 1 upgrade “Extended Range”.
• Update to game credits.
• Fixed some lighting issues.

Caution: Spoilers Ahead!

• Fixed an issue where players could re-collect the mysterious shards in New Game Plus when they were already collected in the first walkthrough.
• Fixed an issue where the player could re-collect the Lost Books in New Game Plus when they previously collected them in their first walkthrough.
• A Dance with Thieves: Murjana’s second clue is optional and isn’t required to complete the quest. It will only show on the investigation board if the player interacts with the letter while Fuladh is in Harbiyah Bureau.
• Guilded Butterflies: fixed an issue where some players couldn’t attend the great auction.
• The Marked Coins: Fixed an issue where the NPC “The Hidden One” levitated towards the roof when slightly ahead of the player.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.