Ubisoft worked with Kaspersky Lab to make Watch Dogs’ hacking more believable

Futuristic open-world action title Watch Dogs has been handed a touch of extra realism thanks to Kaspersky Lab.

The anti-virus firm has apparently been working with Ubisoft to ensure that the hacking – a gameplay mechanic central to the title – works in a believable fashion.

Players will in the game use their smartphones on-the-fly to hack into a wide array of devices as well as gain key information on story characters and identify opportunities to exploit the passing public.

But despite being set in the future, the developers still wanted the game to offer some real-world credibility.

"We’re working with Kaspersky Lab, a big security firm," senior producer Dominic Guay told Joystiq. "They have really hardcore experts there on hacking.

We send them some of our designs and we ask them feedback on it, and it’s interesting to see what gets back. Sometimes they say ‘yeah, that’s possible, but change that word’ or ‘that’s not the way it works’."