For three straight games the Assassin's Creed series had a very strong upward trajectory- the first game, Assassin's Creed focused on Altair and wasn't all that fun but set up the series well enough; Assassin's Creed 2 blew the original out of the water by introducing tons of cool new missions and a more fun protagonist in Ezio Auditore; after this came Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, a direct sequel that continued Ezio's adventures and was basically flawless. I especially loved the revamped economic system that changes the city around Ezio as you progresses through the game. Ezio's story came to an end in Assassin's Creed Revelations, which is a solid game up there at the level of AC2, but a notable step down from the series' peak. There were few changes made between Brotherhood and Revelations, but most of them weren't for the better- I probably would have been very happy with just more of the same. A lot of the game is more of the same, though- Ezio travels to Constantinople in search of the five MacGuffins- er, Masyaf Keys that Altair had hidden throughout the city hundreds of years prior, in order to open a vault that contains the Super MacGuffi- I mean, the Apple of Eden. Of course Constantinople has been overrun by Templars, so Ezio needs to complete missions to reinvigorate the city's dieing brotherhood of assassins. This was all mostly fun, but as I mentioned before a few new things were attempted and most of them didn't add all that much to the game. Let's take a look at each one individually!
Hookblade- Ezio's hidden blades now come attached with an extending hook- this allows him to extend his reach while scaling walls, as well as zipline around the city for quick travel. I liked the hookblade!
Tower Defense- I hated the tower defense mini-game. Like in Brotherhood Ezio can reclaim Templar zones for the assassins, which is awesome, but if Ezio remains notorious for too long then the Templars will launch a counterattack which can only be quelled by playing a tower defense game- properly positioning your allies on rooftops, placing blockades on the ground, stuff like that. Strategy gaming just didn't fit in with the Assassin's Creed gameplay to me.
Bomb-Making- Using bombs isn't all that important in this game, and yet early on as you're getting acclimated to the new environment a huge difficult bomb-making system is thrust upon you. After a while I got it all sorted out but the whole thing seemed needlessly complex- you can make bombs that stink, that distract, that release smoke, that cause damage; your bomb can vary in potency; and you can set it to explode on impact, seconds later, or stick to walls and people. The system works fine enough after a while, but wouldn't it have made sense to make different bomb types available as the player progresses so they can take their time with each one?
The Framing Device- Desmond, still unconscious from the previous game, is put into the Animus in a sort of safe-mode and runs into an old friend inside. Because of this he's able to jump back and forth between Ezio's memories and this weird island setting whenever he wants; in addition, Ezio will discover new things about Altair throughout the game which prompts Desmond to experience his memories as well for the first time in two games. It is kinda cool how the whole thing works out and caps Altair and Ezio's stories- my only problem with this is that the aformentioned 'old friend' was the one who left the bizarre hidden riddles around that only Desmond could see in the past two games. He didn't leave any in this one, and they're sorely missed- the riddles were pretty freaky and added a ton to the atmosphere of the game.
Still though, the Ezio trilogy seems to be the height of the series- the sequels coming out annually could have been cheap cash-ins, but they were not at all. Everything came together wonderfully in Revelations and I'm sad to be done with Ezio (okay I got to check up on what Ezio was up to after retiring in the short film Assassin's Creed: Embers on Youtube). Reactions to Assasin's Creed III were mixed to say the least, and the recent announcement of Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag made it clear that we're staying with a similar time and location for a while. Hopefully those games can live up to the high level of their predecessors.
Desmond's storyline is the only thing really carrying me through this series. Yes, I did like "Brotherhood", but dreading wasting time on "Revelations". Also, ACIII just doesn't seem that interesting to me at all. One of the biggest complaints I've heard, other than early American/forests not being a great environment to parkour-assassinate people, is that you spend a 1/3 of the game getting your Native American protagonist to the point where he's a full-fledge assassin.
ReplyDeleteI just want to know about Desmond, and cannot wait till the series builds up to the point where we finally can play in the future with Desmond now as the assassin. Unfortunately, I'm hooked in for the long haul to get his full storyline. For better or for worse.
Some minor spoilers- yeah, Desmond isn't really conscious for most of the game so obviously the present-day plot doesn't move forward at all. It really just occurs during voiceovers from other characters talking around Desmond during brief bouts of half-consciousness. Still though this isn't the Ezio-fest that Brotherhood was, although I'm surprised you've got no love for Ezio. I think he's awesome! You get plenty of info on Desmond in Revelations though- he regains some suppressed memories from his childhood in some weird side-levels that may or may not be available before you beat the game (it glitched on me every time I tried to access it before the end). It ends on another cliffhanger, not quite as good as the last two, but whatever. My guess is Desmond's story still isn't even close to done yet. Maybe AC5 will be the adventures of Desmond?
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