Assassin's Creed Port Gets Mixed Reception

[Junaid Alam]

Assassin's Creed Port Gets Mixed Reception

Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed has been ported to the PC several months after appearing on the PS3 and 360, but the port has introduced more flaws than it has solved.

Although the PC version features a higher resolution for those with capable video cards and monitors (1680x1050 or 1900x1200), users have been complaining about a number of technical issues:


High graphics requirements
Graphics woes with Nvidia series 8 cards
Random crashes apparently connected to the game pinging a server
Tedious exiting procedure taking as long as 80+ seconds
Unskippable cinematics


For PC gamers used to customization and freedom, the constraints have been a disappointment, although many have emphasized they enjoy the core gameplay and free roaming aspect of ambling around Acre.

Sources: Ars Technica [http://www.gamespot.com]

Permalink

 

[Halfang]

I was LOL'ing so hard with the youtube video of the guy trying to exit the game (from Ars Technica).

Looks like they are trying to avoid players leaving the game, which funnily enough gets wasted when the game crashes every 20 minutes.

 

[Frederf]

It's a port, geniuses!

 

[JFork36]

I've been playing it almost non-stop since I downloaded it (yay Steam!). Aside from the rather inconvinient process of quitting the game, I haven't noticed any of the above mentioned problems.

And what cinematics are people trying to skip? Isn't one of the main points of interest the game's STORY?

 

[strangemusic]

I agree that the exiting-game procedure (and the save/load system, UI in general)are pretty horrible. I was showing a bit of Acre to my girlfriend, decided to quit, went through the arduous menus... she remarked "Just because of that, I'd probably have a hard time wanting to play this!"

However... what's all this about graphics issues and crashing? I just installed an 8800GTS 512 in my system (the sweet new 9800 series cards are too BIG to fit in an SFF case! Boo!) and I've had nothing but sweetness and no random crashes. As for the unskippable cut-scenes... I enjoy a good bit of cinematic detail in a game. But when you're going back through certain sections to try for more flags, more completion, etc... I'd rather not have to sit and listen to Al-Mualim for ten minutes. I agree with the OP, though, in saying that once you're actually in-game and jumping around on rooftops putting knives in the necks of inept guards and such ("You're not supposed to be he-URGH!!!"), you forget about most of the crappy design choices Ubisoft seems to have made.

 

[Halfang]

Now that made me think that unskippable cinematics is the main reason of why I stopped playing CoD3. Load game = 5 minutes of cinematics. Mix it with veteran difficulty, and enjoy your your frustration.