Watch Dogs 2 actor reveals first look at new lead character

The lead character of Watch Dogs 2 has been leaked courtesy of actor Cort King, who revealed in an NDA-busting Instagram post that he'll be portraying the unnamed character in Ubisoft's techno thriller sequel.

Dressed in a similar way to the original game's protagonist Aiden Pearce, the picture denies us a proper look at the character thanks to the balaclava covering half his face. What we can see though is a gun, backpack and a phone the character is likely to use to hack into a city-wide grid – as in the 2014 original.

Ubisoft announced "the next instalment of Watch Dogs" in a financial report published in February, but has yet to officially reveal the sequel. It's expected that the game will release later this year, but all Ubisoft has revealed officially is that it will launch before April 2017, the end of the current financial year.

The two-week old Instagram post - hidden behind the actor's locked account but viewable here – reads: "Had a blast doing motion capture work as the lead character in a new video game series," before a series of hashtags ending with '#WatchDogs2'.

Kotaku reported in January that Watch Dogs 2 will be released in 2016 and set in San Francisco, far removed from the original game's Chicago setting.

Watch Dogs was a huge success for Ubisoft and its biggest new IP launch ever until Tom Clancy's The Division was released earlier this year. It didn't wow the gaming world, but critics and players alike saw potential in the concept of a character able to hack and influence the infrastructure and technology of an entire city.

Ubisoft is likely to reveal the game either at its E3 press conference in June, or in the run up to it.

For all the latest video game news follow us on Twitter @IBTGamesUK