Animus

"You're inside the Animus. It's a projector which renders genetic memories in three dimensions."

- Vidic to Desmond



The Animus (Latin for "mind" or "soul") is a machine, developed by Abstergo Industries, to read a subject's genetic memory, and, from it, create a simulation of the ancestor's life that the subject can interact with, "playing" as the ancestor.

Use
A subject lies on top of the Animus, placing his head in the intended location. A circular glass screen opens around his head. This screen serves as a display for the Animus's menus.

The subject selects a memory to play, and the Animus's simulation begins. The glass screen is not used for the simulation- it appears that the simulation is actually projected into the subject's head. The subject appears to control the character in the simulation as someone would in a dream, with thought only. The game manual hints that the Animus is controlled by a video game controller, but that is probably just a bit of foolery to explain why they're writing the manual.

Synchronization
As the subject interacts with the simulation, his actions must remain Synchronized with those of his the ancestor whose memories are being reenacted. Important events in the ancestor's life must be recreated by the subject in the simulation. Failure to do so, or otherwise straying from the "path", will result in a loss of Synchronization. Too much Synchronization loss, and the entire simulation must restart from an earlier point.

Synchronization is measured by a bar on the top left of the HUD.

Genetic memory
Genetic memory is the accumulated memory of a person's ancestors, encoded in his DNA. While the theory is controversial in real life, it is evidently true in the Assassin's Creed world, as otherwise, the Animus would not work.

Animus 1.0
The Animus 1.0 (or more precisely, 1.28) is the model of Animus Abstergo is using. It is the one appearing in the first Assassin's Creed and also appears at the beginning of Assassin's Creed II. Abstergo possesses many of these Animi which can be seen while Lucy and Desmond escape the Abstergo building (Desmond even asks Lucy the plural term for the Animus).

The animus is colored chrome, with blue lights in some places. On top of the Animus is a metallic bed, where the subject lies as his genetic memory is read. A computer under the bed runs a simulation of the subject's genetic memory. There is a glass screen that opens around the subject's head, to display the menus of the Animus.

The Animus releases a large amount of heat. At one point it apparently overheats, although this may have been a deliberate stall on Lucy's part. When it overheated, the blue lights began flashing orange instead.

Animus 2.0
The Animus 2.0 is the Assassins' own genetic memory reading machine in Assassin's Creed II. According to Rebecca Crane who is responsible for its conception and maintenance, her "Baby" is "twice as awesome" as the one seen in Abstergo. The Animus 2.0 is different in many ways from the Abstergo's one(s): the background color has changed from an icy blue to white. Also, when loading a memory sequence the whole map is shown being generated and at the contrary, when Ezio assassinates a target (conspirator), the environment seems to "melt" away to the death cutscene. The first logo was actually the Abstergo Industries' logo. The new logo, as seen on the official website, is a Penrose diamond. It also seems that the synchronization has been increased since Ezio has an Italian accent unlike Altaïr in the first Animus who had an American accent (though he sometimes spoke Arabic). This has been hinted as part of the "bleeding" effect of an ancestor's mind blending with the descendant's, a problematic error in the first Animus - which led to the insanity and death of Subject 16 - but became part of the controlled environment of the Animus 2.0 (Desmond see hallucinations and weird dreams though).

In order to use the Animus 2.0, the subject must be uplinked via a cord inserted into the hand which is in fact, a DNA scanner device.

Despite the improvements over the original, its translator software is "a little laggy", which accounts for when the italian characters speak italian at various parts in the game.

Shaun Hastings, the sarcastic historian and tactician of the 2012 Assassins can provide Desmond with his database through the Animus 2.0.

At the end of the story, when Abstergo finds the Assassins' hideout and attacks them, Rebecca and Shaun load the Animus 2.0 into a van while Lucy and Desmond hold the Templars and Vidic. After successfully blocking the assault, the Assassins flee the hideout with the van. Rebecca invites Desmond to use the Animus until they reach another hideout while Lucy reviews the tapes of the memory sequence. In fact, this last scene occurs with a black screen and we don't see the van nor the Animus, and we don't return from the memory world (which lets us constantly be in the Renaissance) until the next episode... (or the DLC containing the corrupted memory sequence files which has been skipped).

Other Animus's
During the escape from Abstergo Desmond walks in a room which contains a lot of chambers resembling office desk and inside them we can see Animus's (1.0) inside. It is unknown whether they are working, prototypes or simply replica's.