Ubisoft Montreal's latest creation; Assassin's Creed, is definitely a bold attempt to break into the foray of game concepts emerging into the next-generation game line-ups. Featuring a top notch soundtrack and visual presentation, it's clear Ubisoft Montreal's intention is to grab and immerse the player into their world of conspiracy, dystopian futures and time-twisting plotline of rewritten history. A story this deep and convoluted hasn't been done so correctly since Metal Gear Solid 2. Despite it's impressive assault on all the senses, Assassin's Creed is an example of where it's potential actually hurts the game.
Story: The tale of 2 assassin's. (The following contains spoilers of the very opening of the game)
The story of Assassin's Creed follows the primary protagonist Desmond Miles, a bartender in the year 2012 with a shady history abducted by a corporation called Abstergo. Abstergo introduces the animus to the player, a device that can read a person's genetic encoding in order to read the memories of their ancestors. Through the Animus, the player becomes acquainted with Desmond's ancestor, an assassin in 1191 named Altair. The story of Altair is introduced as he is caught disgracing his clan due to his acts of bad judgment which may have compromised the clan. Consequently, Altair is stripped of his status, and allowed the opportunity to rise the ranks once more in order to join the legion of Master Assassin's. The story itself progresses between Altair and Desmond as they come to learn of all the background dealings and secret alliances of many of the characters. The story and main dialogs are written fairly well and are easy enough to follow and compelling enough to keep the player engaged and interested.
Sound: Hit and Miss, the two extremes meet here.
The sound production in Assassin's Creed is first class in some areas, and woefully underwhelming in others. The music, is outstanding. The soundtrack to this game, for all purposes, accomplishes what it sets out to do, and it does it very well. The escape theme that begins after assassinating a major target is fast-paced, exciting, and does a great deal in making the player feel like they're doing so much more than just running away. The music that rings in the background while you walk around certain cities, or riding a horse, all fits perfectly with the setting and ambiance. Assassin's Creed falls short on its voice acting. Compared to other games, the voice acting sounds like it was recorded by performers with absolutely no experience. Most of the characters feel distinctly unattached to the voices that give them life, and thus, makes it difficult for the player to believe any of the performances as they all come off as sounding fake and forced. The dialogue on the common people littered through the city is very repetitive, and the same lines are read throughout the entire game leaving them stale and painful to listen to by midway through the game.
Graphics: A virtual tour of 1191.
Ubisoft pulled off one good looking game on both platforms, and they should be commended for it. Character models are fairly well detailed and Altair looks noticeably incredible in all of the shots. Everything is superbly animated and all of Altair's actions flow well and transition seamlessly. All of the post-processing effects are used at an advantage that suiting to the action happening on screen. When you lock on to a target, everything is blurred except for the target and Altair. This produces a frightening sense that only Altair and his target exist in the world and gives the impression that Altair has all his focus on only one thing. The environments themselves look great, and while there isn't a whole lot of variety between buildings and the different cities, they are well detailed, textured and positioned great nonetheless. There are a few graphical anomalies however. Certain standout cases such as the water being absolutely flat and motionless betrays the senses. There is tiny bits of clipping on Altair's model that is distracting if you choose to notice it. Character models are very repetitive and the player will encounter the same models in all areas thus the impression of sprawling masses of crowds is quickly broken down when you see only 3 or 4 different models in that crowd.
Gameplay: Treading new grounds, literally...
Assassin's Creed's gameplay relies on three major foundations of gameplay mechanics. Low-Profile actions, High-Profile actions, and Combat. Low-Profile actions consist of Altair not attracting any attention from guards or people. They consist of gently pushing people out of his way as he makes his way through a crowd, taking a pose in prayer to appear as a scholar, or to just casually observe the scenery. High-profile actions allow Altair to take evasive actions and enable free-running. The free-running feels excellent, natural and is pulled off with exceptional skill. The combat is a love-it or hate-it kind of ordeal. It's based off a context-sensitive system where you press certain buttons in time with a hidden rhythm to kill enemies. It works well with this game, but to some players, it may feel like they have no control over the flow and pace of combat. Mentionable as well, is that as you progress through the game, you obtain more moves that make the combat very easy. By the end of the game, stealth won't mean anything since you will effortlessly be able to take on legions and armies of guards without worrying.
The actual objectives of the gameplay are the same as most open-ended sandbox games. There is a radar, and you follow it to various objectives. The problem with this, is that the objectives are unchanging throughout the whole game, and you will find yourself playing through the same events over and over ad nauseum. You can choose how many of these objectives to complete in order to progress, and you don't have to do everything, thus, there is freedom to the never ending cycle, but to a completest, it can be pretty painful.
Bottom-Line: Assassin's Creed is a Great Game, albeit not a perfect one. If the player finds the story engaging, the setting and time likeable, enjoys the combat system, and can overlook the voice acting and repetitiveness of the objectives, there is much fun to be found in Assassin's Creed. The story is deep and enthralling and fantastically presented, but clearly enough, this game won't appeal to everyone. However, the one's who do find themselves liking Assassin's Creed, will like it alot.
There are good video game protagonists, and there are bad video game protagonists.
I disagree that max is unlikable. Chloe is infinitely more unlikable in my opinion.
Abby was absolute trash protagonist in every way..
Tidus was so meh to me..
On villain side, the one i didn’t like wa Micah, because they wanted him to be that way and it was brilliant👍🏽
Both are horrible, granted Chloe is infinitely worse, it feels like Chloe is just fanservice for people who too over the edge and wasn't written to be a character that makes sense
Ye I was expecting her too. Guess they actually played the game. Unlike you and whoever agrees.
She's actually not bad. It's the writing itself that is bad overall, but she's fine overall. She's no worse than Miles Morales IMHO. Both thrust into a spotlight and receiving both praise and blame and dealing with it.
Forspoken is a bland game because it's 75% bland, boring, repetitive going through the motions and diversions that add nothing of the value with purposefully gated memory moments that don't feel organic or like you're discovering things but waiting for others to reveal things.
Exactly Chris. Even though I liked the game. I kno u played it. People who actually played it and went thru her dream saw she was a good likeable person who really just acted out due to being alone and unloved. I think your problem is it was open world, I think if it was more linear you may have liked it better.
Oh no she's bad. Very unlikable even before you add on the bad dialogue. The game could have been quite good with a good protagonist
For all the people like synner. Shes actually half white lol. Inferior complexity is a hell of a thing. You'll be ok.
Most of these aren't even that bad. Especially comparing to others like Squall "Whatever" Leonhart, Forspoken's Frey, and the guy from Atomic Heart.
Squall is one of the best developed main FF characters so...
People talk about his "whatever" thing thats at the start of the game, not the character he eventually becomes in the end.
No amount of "character development", (especially the ones that for me feels sudden and undeserved like Squall's), will justify him being a d**k to my girl Quistis. Even if he found the cure for cancer, from that moment on, I would never like him.
The article is about being unlikeable, and he was indeed unlikeable for at least half of the game.
the "watever" is only present in the english localisation.
so your argument doesnt rly ... stand imo.
Good for you that you could enjoy the japanese version. That's not the case for me and the majority of people here, though.
i had to stop reading after the "blatant misogyny" in the Dantes inferno section.
i actually liked Max haha.
the forspoken chick is missing tho
Unfortunately, the open worlds in games like Middle-Earth: Shadow of War, Halo Infinite, and the original Assassin's Creed do more harm than good.
I legitimately loved Halo's switch to open world. They made traversal of the map entertaining, and everything involved just tied into the (what I consider) awesome gunplay.
The entire time I really felt the slow takeover of the map, and all the little steps forward felt satisfying.
I don't know what more people really want there, considering the setting and story. A handful of soldiers hunkered down on enemy territory; slowly trying to win the battle.
I agree I liked the switch to the open world, it was large with beautiful land scapes. However, it did feel a bit empty, and wasn’t as action packed as I would have liked. A lot of the bases felt like fillers instead of something of wonder. Let’s see what 343 under new management does from here cause Halo needs some updating
I'm surprised they scrapped the Slipspace engine. I thought the graphics looked great, the sandbox physics were as good as ever, and the AI worked well. Clearly a lot of work went into it and it appears to have been optimized for the new generation of GPUs. The only issue I had with it was the lack of environments, would have been cool to have different biomes on the ring to explore. A bit more variety in missions would have been nice, maybe some timed events where you have to manuever a banshee through forerunner architecture or some mongoose speedruns would have spiced things up.
I think R* are the only ones who have made compelling open worlds. I can’t stomach most open world games and how boring they are with busy world. It’s like a flex to make this massive environment, but it’s extremely boring to traverse and play in. GTA V and Red Dead Redemption 2 blew me away with how incredible their worlds were. Elden Ring was the only other game to give me that sense of awe.
GTA V and unfortunately, Saints Row the original have had some of the most aggressive open world features where the world doesn’t feel so bland. To me what makes GTA V so special is the way the characters react to the world around them vs how the world reacts to them. For example, in GTA when you switch to Franklin and he walked past an attractive female he responded “ damn you fine” or in Saints row you can run up in the pawn shop flash a gun and watch them respond by raising their hands in the air, or they press the silent alarm making you have to run away from the cops. Halo infinite doesn’t have those kind of moments that make you feel apart of the world it just feels like it’s there.
Trevor talking to random vegan npc: "You suck c*ck, but you don't eat meat.... It don't make sense to me "
Classic. Such a shame we won't get that humour again now that R* have gone all in on virtue.
AC Odyssey with the next gen patch is pretty incredible, especially if you like a sea shantie. Lol.
I’m back on an open world kick after Horizon. I don’t know what clicked in me but exploring the map and seeing the detail work has me loving open worlds again. Playing AC Odyssey on hard and really enjoying it and the map. Reinstalling RDR2 tonight because damn, that map is just incredible for sightseeing.
Halo Infinite felt off. It's like the developers didn't know what they really wanted to do
Depends on which open world titles u play, most of em are shitty AF, but I honestly admire open world genre, sometimes to just take a break from fighting and missions you explore n see details you haven't noticed before cause you were too busy body at first, then boom finding some dope equipment or things to sale
Driven by profit, Ubisoft is doing what’s best for its margins instead of what’s best for players.
Ah man they finally announce a Japan setting title and they find themselves in this turmoil.
I liked Valhalla but it has some serious underlying issues and the series is in a creative slump.
i miss the actual stealth elements of the early games. its just turned in to an action rpg at this point. I want feel the chase and escape, the assassination that no one saw, and the thrill of obtaining a new gadget. not just swinging my weapon until the next cutscene.
best review written so far.
You are my hero Pirate!
:D