1666: Amsterdam

About this game

This one has history. A lot of it. Patrice Désilets - the creative director behind the original Assassin's Creed and Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time - first started work on 1666: Amsterdam back around 2011 at THQ Montreal. Then THQ went bankrupt. Ubisoft purchased the studio at auction and promptly let Désilets go, retaining the rights to his project in the process. He fought a legal battle to get it back. Eventually he did, founded Panache Digital Games, released Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey in 2019, and quietly kept building 1666 in the background for six years. At Summer Game Fest 2026, he walked on stage and finally showed the world what all that time produced. I played the prologue demo the same day it dropped. And honestly - it left me wanting considerably more. The demo is about thirty minutes long and functions as a narrative teaser rather than a gameplay showcase. It focuses on the story of how Noa Brooklyn and Aaron first crossed paths, told through the eyes of Aaron's daughter Clio as she pieces together a gift her father left her. It's structured like something between a Quantic Dream game and a mystery novel - atmospheric, slow-burning, puzzle-adjacent, and far more interested in world-building than action. The full gameplay loop - the investigation, the tracking, the Esbat confrontations - doesn't appear in the prologue at all, which given the mixed Steam reviews is the main source of friction. People expecting a gameplay demo got a story prelude instead, and that gap in expectations is understandable. But as someone who went in knowing what it was, I found it genuinely absorbing. The world Désilets is building here is unlike anything he's made before. You play as Noa Brooklyn, born as the Collector - a witch raised by a group called the Zaindaris for a purpose she didn't choose. Amsterdam in 1666 is populated by entities called the Originals: ancient beings who have lived among humanity for centuries, granted time and power and the freedom to abuse both. It's Noa's duty to identify them - hidden behind human faces, indistinguishable to ordinary people - mark them, and confront them when the Esbat comes, the monthly lunar event when they reveal their true form. Her companion in this is Aaron, a person drawn from 1999 who now inhabits the body of a black cat. The lore is layered and genuinely strange in the best way, with hints of a timeline spanning 1333, 1666, 1999, and the present day, each era containing fragments of a larger truth that Noa is only beginning to understand. The full game promises an open Amsterdam to explore by day, with the city's surface shifting to reveal hidden secrets and supernatural threats at night. Noa absorbs life essence from the air to cast spells, and based on what the demo hints at, the gameplay loop involves investigation and tracking during daylight hours followed by confrontation during the Esbat. The animal transformation abilities - controlling cats, rats, and crows to navigate and gather information - are described as central mechanics in the full game, though the prologue gives only the faintest glimpse of this. The art direction is striking throughout. 17th-century Amsterdam rendered with this dark, gothic atmosphere - candlelit interiors, cobblestoned streets slick with rain, the city feeling genuinely alive and slightly threatening at all times. It's rough in places - the demo has some animation jank and optimization work that still needs doing - but the visual identity is strong and immediately distinctive. This doesn't look like anything else currently releasing. Désilets said at SGF that for the past six years the team of nearly 70 developers has focused purely on building a playable experience, no vertical slices, no fake footage - just the actual game improving build by build. That kind of statement carries weight when it comes from someone who has been through what he's been through with this project. Early Access on PC launches later in 2026, with console versions planned for a later date. It's not finished yet. But what I played made me genuinely hungry for more.

Trailer

Screenshots