New Ascent map leaked for Valorant with Venetian theme

A Valorant dataminer claims to have discovered a fourth map for the game, called Ascent, which features a distinct Italian theme and ties to the city of Venice.

Valorant has been the talk of the town in the online gaming world, with millions of players either already enjoying the beta or spending countless hours in Twitch streams hoping to get lucky.

The beta features three maps – Haven, Bind, and Split – and with developers Riot Games recently confirming that a fourth one would be added, we may have gotten our first glimpse at what it could look like.

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According to a dataminer who goes by the name of ‘UlfricTheThird’ on Reddit, the new map is called Ascent, for which he was able to find some coding in the game’s backend files.

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He was able to extract several textures, including gondola boats, pizza boxes with Italian writing, scaffolding/construction equipment, street lamps, and two street shops, named Baitshop and Boatshop respectively.

Based on these findings, Ulfric concluded that Ascent will be themed after Italy, more specifically Venice, as a lot of those textures fit in perfectly with what one would normally find in the iconic city.

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Those textures were not the only things the dataminer discovered in his search through Valorant’s coding; he was also able to find the actual layout of Ascent, giving players an early look at what they should expect with the fourth map.

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The design looks pretty similar to Split in that it has two sites that are on the northern and southern edges of the map and situated close to where the defending team spawns in.

There is a middle area, along with a series of pathways and alleys that connect all the sections together, so there will be several access points for teams to attack/defend.

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Those who have followed the development of Valorant were quick to notice that this isn’t the first time an Venetian theme has been connected with the game.

In fact, back on March 2, the official Twitter account posted a 30-second teaser showing Agents battling over a canal that looks very similar to the ones that are commonplace in the Italian city.

Furthermore, keen-eyed fans also remembered that one of the artists who worked on Sage posted some artwork that included “Episode 1: Rise of Venice” written along the bottom. So all indications are that this leak is legitimate and has ties into the game’s early lore.

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What the dataminer was not able to find out about Ascent is its release date, so there’s no telling if Riot will introduce it during the beta phase or wait until the full launch this summer.

Based on how they’ve treated the beta, teasing that it could go on for a couple of months, chances are they’ll probably roll it out sometime soon so that players can get a feel for it ahead of the game’s official release.