Assassin's Creed 3: Again, Ubisoft?

[Kopikatsu]

As a Brit.

To be honest I couldn't give a shit if Connor was totally "AMURICA! FUCK YEA!" let me slay thousands of English .... I have slain millions of Russians and I have never read an article in which Russians complain about always being the baddies.

What Happened to the British stiff upper lip? We are starting to get like stereotypical America "WAAAAH! Somebody did something mean to me! I am sooo offended! I will sue!" just get over it.

I wouldn't even care ubi said "Connor will be totally neutral" then proceeded to be the biggest killer of British ever, while no so much as giving a dirty look to an American. Even if they made the British look like bloodthirsty, baby killers and Americans to be the right hand of god, who never did a wrong and instead of killing us, they led us to the righteous path ....

The accent the people I am killing has no effect on my enjoyment of me massacring them.

Thing is, when was the last time America was the baddies? It seems that we forget America has been a villian as often as it has been the good guy. You know, Vietnam, that whole thing in the Middle East, that thing with the atomic bombs... yet, nope. America are never the bad guys! Variety is the spice of life, folks.

[sup]Plus, from what I saw in that trailer, they gave the English guys reeeeally bad accents. I mean, christ they were bad.[/sup]

But this is the Rev war. This isn't America during Vietnam and the Middle East. Honestly you would have really stretch it to make America be evil and the Brits being good during this war. Imo it was basically as black and white as World War II was.

Americans being gigantic assholes is what set off the revolutionary war.

They were being changed a TWENTIETH of the taxes that British citizens were, and most of the laws weren't strongly enforced because of the giant ocean between the two places. (There were British officials living in the colonies that saw that the King's will be done, but most weren't super hard-assy about it.)

I don't see how you could make America out to be the 'heroes' of the rev war.

 

[jackinmydaniels]

As a Brit.

To be honest I couldn't give a shit if Connor was totally "AMURICA! FUCK YEA!" let me slay thousands of English .... I have slain millions of Russians and I have never read an article in which Russians complain about always being the baddies.

What Happened to the British stiff upper lip? We are starting to get like stereotypical America "WAAAAH! Somebody did something mean to me! I am sooo offended! I will sue!" just get over it.

I wouldn't even care ubi said "Connor will be totally neutral" then proceeded to be the biggest killer of British ever, while no so much as giving a dirty look to an American. Even if they made the British look like bloodthirsty, baby killers and Americans to be the right hand of god, who never did a wrong and instead of killing us, they led us to the righteous path ....

The accent the people I am killing has no effect on my enjoyment of me massacring them.

Thing is, when was the last time America was the baddies? It seems that we forget America has been a villian as often as it has been the good guy. You know, Vietnam, that whole thing in the Middle East, that thing with the atomic bombs... yet, nope. America are never the bad guys! Variety is the spice of life, folks.

[sup]Plus, from what I saw in that trailer, they gave the English guys reeeeally bad accents. I mean, christ they were bad.[/sup]

But this is the Rev war. This isn't America during Vietnam and the Middle East. Honestly you would have really stretch it to make America be evil and the Brits being good during this war. Imo it was basically as black and white as World War II was.

Americans being gigantic assholes is what set off the revolutionary war.

They were being changed a TWENTIETH of the taxes that British citizens were, and most of the laws weren't strongly enforced because of the giant ocean between the two places. (There were British officials living in the colonies that saw that the King's will be done, but most weren't super hard-assy about it.)

I don't see how you could make America out to be the 'heroes' of the rev war.

It doesn't matter how much the colonists were charged, just because they weren't being charged as much as the actual citizens of the empire doesn't make taxing the life out of the people under you any less morally wrong. The only difference was that the Colonies decided to fight for that, yes they were the good guys, sure there were assholes on both sides but the same can be said for every war. That and I'm pretty positive that most of this 'MERUCA FUK YER!' trailers and the like probably have nothing to do with the actual theme of the game, it's just marketing bullshit.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Okay. Here's how I will interpret your notion of "black and white": That history and the people of that time would have been worse off if one specific side won over the other. Which, yes, in that context and without any true idea of the full effects of changing history in such a way, I will concede to that notion, and I'm giving you a lot of leeway with that one. Just be careful with how you word that in the future, or people might take it pretty badly.

No, Black and White would be like this: I was home alone and some robber comes in and begins to assault me and I fight back. That is black and white.

The situation for the Rev war: The colonies were part of the British Empire and existed for many reasons, but they also eventually became simply there to benefit British with taxes and such. So the newly found Americans (who at the time were also essentially British) decided to rebel back so they could become an independant nation.

That is black and white situation, they had all the rights to rebel and fight for their freedom. Unless your going to tell me that it was horrible and the Americans are evil for wanting to be seperate from the British empire.

I didn't say that, and my interpretation still applies to your example anyway.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Americans being gigantic assholes is what set off the revolutionary war.

They were being changed a TWENTIETH of the taxes that British citizens were, and most of the laws weren't strongly enforced because of the giant ocean between the two places. (There were British officials living in the colonies that saw that the King's will be done, but most weren't super hard-assy about it.)

I don't see how you could make America out to be the 'heroes' of the rev war.

Yes, yes, the British were a bunch of taxing "oppressor" assholes, and the Americans were a bunch of filthy "anarchist" assholes. Heard it all before, both extremes make me slap my forehead at the shear childishness of the notion that we've been reduced to the "they started it" argument.

 

[Wargamer]

So no. They aren't that bad of writers for all we know. They just made the unpopular choice of making the British empire (who owned a good chunk of the world by 'righteous' conquest) more or less the bad guys.

No no no, you've completely missed the point.

This is not about Britain being made to look like bad guys. I don't have a problem with a game that makes the British look evil (let's face it, Americans have done it for years; they're threatened by intelligence).

The problem is that the game paints the Americans as heroes. There's been absolutely nothing to suggest the Americans are in any way a 'grey morality' in the way everyone else in the Assassin's Creed universe was.

The rest of the world is sick and tired of America being painted as the greatest, most morally-flawless nation in the historyof mankind. We don't need AC3 joining in.

 

[spartandude]

But this is the Rev war. This isn't America during Vietnam and the Middle East. Honestly you would have really stretch it to make America be evil and the Brits being good during this war. Imo it was basically as black and white as World War II was.

"History is written by the victor" has never been more relevant. No war is black and white, the revolutionary war was certainly far from a simple battle of good vs evil. Both sides did things we'd sooner rather erase from history. Hell, WW2 certainty wasn't black and white. I mean, there was that whole thing with American nuking those civilians and the bombing of Dresden.

Yet another person who doesn't understand why the bombs were needed.

An early estimation for the amount of American soldiers that would have died during a mainland invasion of Japan: 250,000.

An early estimation for the amount of Japanese soldiers and civilians that would have died during a mainland invasion of Japan: Almost 1,000,000.

The soldiers were entirely devoted to General Tojo, Tojo proved he would rather die than lose, and the people have always (and will always) react with ultra violence to anyone that invades Japan. It saved them many times before, and it would have made Stalingrad look like a playground.

A lot fewer people died in the bombings than would have died during an invasion.

and yet another person who doesnt understand why the bombs were used, ok heres the thing Japan did actually offer a conditional surrender, America rejected it and then later accepted a surrender allowing US troops to be stationed in Japan, but the main reason however was not to make Japan submissive, it was to show the USSR that america has rather large boom machines

and heres one thing i ask you, if it were to make Japan surrender, surely bombing military bases rather than civillian centres would have had just as much impact

 

[JoesshittyOs]

This is not about Britain being made to look like bad guys. I don't have a problem with a game that makes the British look evil (let's face it, Americans have done it for years; they're threatened by intelligence).

Spoiler

Really? Do I need to point out the ironic stereotypical flaws throughout this post?

The problem is that the game paints the Americans as heroes. There's been absolutely nothing to suggest the Americans are in any way a 'grey morality' in the way everyone else in the Assassin's Creed universe was.

The rest of the world is sick and tired of America being painted as the greatest, most morally-flawless nation in the historyof mankind. We don't need AC3 joining in.

Let me stop you right there. The game is made by the French. The only real case of them painting Americans as the "heroes", was the revolution trailer they released on July 4th. Other than that, it's just showed our Assassin killing Brits, and being passive towards the Americans.

And I'll go ahead and throw this out there as an American. The majority of us are sick and tired of people claiming we think that we're "morally flawless". Wanna go check out that approval rating on that war we have right now? Hell, we all sure as shit loved that Vietnam, didn't we?

You're sickeningly stereotypical, along with the rest of the vocal people from across the pond who sit back on their high horses choosing to pick through the stories of what they see on the internet and television about what us Americans clearly all think, since we're apparently a fucking hivemind.

You're becoming much like the beast you claim to despise.

 

[Gizmo1990]

As a Brit.

To be honest I couldn't give a shit if Connor was totally "AMURICA! FUCK YEA!" let me slay thousands of English .... I have slain millions of Russians and I have never read an article in which Russians complain about always being the baddies.

What Happened to the British stiff upper lip? We are starting to get like stereotypical America "WAAAAH! Somebody did something mean to me! I am sooo offended! I will sue!" just get over it.

I wouldn't even care ubi said "Connor will be totally neutral" then proceeded to be the biggest killer of British ever, while no so much as giving a dirty look to an American. Even if they made the British look like bloodthirsty, baby killers and Americans to be the right hand of god, who never did a wrong and instead of killing us, they led us to the righteous path ....

The accent the people I am killing has no effect on my enjoyment of me massacring them.

As a Brit I have no problem killing other fake Brits. Unlike other countries (cough, America,cough) we Brits have never had a problem with our past. We went to other people countires, shot anyone who looked at us funny and made the rest our *****. The issue I have is that this game will make the Americans and the French look like saints and us as baby eating Skeletor's when in fact all 3 did many bad things.

 

[General Twinkletoes]

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/118582-Assassins-Creed-3-Novel-Tells-Connors-Origin

Now, as you can see in the link above, a novel is to be released, written by Oliver Bowden, which details the origin of Connor, the main protagonist of Assassin's Creed 3. While reading it, i couldn't help but notice a specific sentence:
"Set during the American Revolution," said the developers in a press release, "Connor has sworn to secure liberty for his people and his nation..."

So, it appears that despite Ubisoft's devs continually telling us the Connor is going to be at least somewhere neutral, killing on both sides, he is now apparently fighting on the side of the revolutionaries. This is despite being half-British, and half-Mohawk, who fought with the British.

Can Ubisoft ever make their minds up?

Also, apologies for mini-rant. I just want them to go one way or the other.

Anyway, post your thoughts below.

I think they said hes he's fighting fore the americans, but he's not happy about it. I don't think there was any doubt that he was on the revolutionaries side.

And anyway, doesn't stuff like this happen all the time in assassins creed where you have to fight against your own guys/seperate from them/side with an enemy?
I think the point is conner can't make up his mind.
They are certainly cutting it close, and they might royally fuck it up, but I think they're probably going to do it well.

"I just want them to go one way or the other. " I sorta don't, I want there to be a moral dilemma on his part. Would make the story much more interesting.

 

[Alandoril]

we are now getting angry about the out of character behaviour of a character from a novel that doesn't exist yet based on a videogame that doesn't exist yet.

No sane individual is angry about whether or not the behavior is "in character" for Connor. The discussion here is about the portrayal of the British in the game. Watch the Independence Day (American Independence day, that is, July 4) trailer to see what we mean.

[sup]Although the discussion has quickly deteriorated into a debate about the morality of the use of atomic weapons in WWII, which I will be withholding comment on for fear of making a fool of myself.[/sup]

The point still stands though, no one knows how that will turn out since the game and book aren't out yet.

Also, I'm just guessing, but the trailer was trying to stay with the theme of fight of independence for the US since it was released on the 4th of July, a little appropriate, no?

I happen to agree with you. I don't think the advertising so far is necessarily indicative of the ultimate game, but (as I said in a previous post) it does make me nervous.

I still hate that trailer though. "Refusing to learn the history of a country you will never see" doesn't make that kid a patriot. It makes him a willfully ignorant jackass.

I just took that line to mean, 'why should I care about learning about these guys since they're being such dicks to me?' I mean, that's typically the attitude of people when people from other countries and the like do that sort of crap, and besides, hindsight is 20/20, and we may know that, but they probably didn't. Plus, it's a kid, probably like a 10 year old, I'm giving the benefit of the doubt to him since they would probably have that sort of attitude if something like that is happening to them.

I'm more concerned about the whole 2012 thing that they've made a big deal about from the previous games than this.

Except it isn't a ten year old, it's a writer putting those words into a ten year old's mouth.

 

[Wargamer]

Let me stop you right there. The game is made by the French. The only real case of them painting Americans as the "heroes", was the revolution trailer they released on July 4th. Other than that, it's just showed our Assassin killing Brits, and being passive towards the Americans.

Yes... and let's look how every other Assassin has behaved...

ALTAIR:
Altair is a Muslim, as far as we can tell. He spent most of his time killing Templars, and their predominently Christian allies. Same situation, right?
Wrong. Altair was not 'Muslim'. He was from a Muslim nation. He was not fighting Christians, he was fighting Templars - an organisation that used the Christian faith to its advantage, but had Muslim members as well.

Let's go ahead and look at the intro to AC1 again for confirmation: Altair appears at a public execution, kills several men in Templar uniform, and then runs off. He escapes by losing himself amidst a crowd of Christian monks. During this fight scene we see something that we haven't since, but is very important - Altair closes the eyes of the Templar commander he executes. That is a sign of respect, and tells us a great deal about Altair and his beliefs.

Nothing about this source material suggests the game is actively trying to paint Christains in a bad light.

EZIO:
On the most bland level, AC2 (and Brotherhood) is a game about Italians killing Italians. Hence why nobody cries foul of racism.

On a more complex level, the game is a house fued taken to the extreme. In his quest to crush the Borgias, Ezio (a Florentine) winds up fighting just about everyone; other Florentines, Venitians, Romans and even some foreign mercenaries.

At no point does AC2 try to claim "everyone from here is an asshole!" or "all members of the Catholic Church are evil!".

Once again, let's talk trailers. AC2 has a clear motive; Ezio is tracking two Borgia family members, kills one, kills the guards who try to stop him, and then hunts down and kills the second. There is no sense that he is just getting stab-happy because "fuck these inferior races!"

Brotherhood? More or less the same; Ezio wants to kill another Borgia, and only kills other people when they're likely to get in the way.

Finally, Revelations. One last trailer for us all... Ezio goes on a journey, turns up at Altair's old place, and gets ambushed. Epic fight, epic ending, epic trailer all the way.

All round, it keeps the theme and tone AC1 set - this is a game series about hunting down specific enemies and taking them out.

CONNOR:
Roll up, roll up! Let's commit indescriminate slaughter in the name of the Greatest (and/or only) Nation on Earth!

Instead of showing us what being an Assassin is all about, we get minutes of Pro-American propaganda speech, including that classic "it's my right as a Yank to be ignorant!" line.
We then end with a shot of Connor stood in the middle of a group of British soldiers, all dead or dying, and the Americans rushing to his aid.

This is hardly a trait unique to that trailer; most of the source material thus far can be described as either "America! Fuck yeah!" or "Hi, I'm Connor and I love killing Brits!"

It is a radical shift in tone compared to what they have done previously, and it's a shift in entirely the wrong direction.

Addendum: I did find a proper AC3 trailer whilst writing this. I will share it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pUhraVG7Ow
Again, note the very clear theme that has been so utterly lacking in the rest of their bullshit promotional material. We establish a mark - a British officer. We see Connor enter play, ignoring the Americans (note that he doesn't treat them as allies - merely bystanders). He then rushes the British line in a rather ludicrous display of "this should never have worked", kills the soldiers between him and his target, confirms the Templar allegiance of the officer, and kills the bastard. Then he buggers off and leaves both sides to carry on their unimportant little war.

Great trailer. Fair, impartial, inkeeping with the series. Why the fuck do they let this kind of thing go under the radar in favour of racist Pro-American bullshit?

And I'll go ahead and throw this out there as an American. The majority of us are sick and tired of people claiming we think that we're "morally flawless". Wanna go check out that approval rating on that war we have right now? Hell, we all sure as shit loved that Vietnam, didn't we?

You have a constitution that was written after the Revolution that embodies the ideals of why you rebelled from British rule.
You have a government that ignores that constitution, or else rewrites it to suit corporate agendas and those of the rich elite.
You have guns.

Do what your fuckng laws demand, then we'll stop with the Team America crap.

 

[Da Orky Man]

"I just want them to go one way or the other. " I sorta don't, I want there to be a moral dilemma on his part. Would make the story much more interesting.

By that I meant that they should make up their minds of whether or not he's neutral or a revolutionary. The devs are saying he's neutral, marketing is saying he's revolutionary.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Just a reminder, the American Revolution is a vastly neglected period of time in the gaming industry, as are many great historical conflicts, but it's just nice to see something other than WWII or modern day combat make its way into the mainstream. Making it into a controversy like this is the reason it gets ignored. Ever think of that?

Assassin's creed has been very good about historical accuracy, people. Calm the hell down.

 

[BNguyen]

But this is the Rev war. This isn't America during Vietnam and the Middle East. Honestly you would have really stretch it to make America be evil and the Brits being good during this war. Imo it was basically as black and white as World War II was.

"History is written by the victor" has never been more relevant. No war is black and white, the revolutionary war was certainly far from a simple battle of good vs evil. Both sides did things we'd sooner rather erase from history. Hell, WW2 certainty wasn't black and white. I mean, there was that whole thing with American nuking those civilians and the bombing of Dresden.

yeah, the Japanese didn't do anything bad, just bombed and killed hundreds of civilians and invaded China, committed genocide in numerous areas, and supposedly conducted numerous inhumane experiments, but what was bad about that? the Japanese just wanted an empire of their own.
(I don't hate today's Japanese, just what their ancestors did in the name of nationality and pride)
when you do bad, expect bad things to be done unto you
the British wanted the colonials to pay taxes for British expenditures in war, something the American colonials weren't involved with, so the colonials rebelled, then the British imposed numerous laws to force the colonials to pay and later on, shot into a crowd of protestors, killing 6

 

[Nami nom noms]

I still hate that trailer though. "Refusing to learn the history of a country you will never see" doesn't make that kid a patriot. It makes him a willfully ignorant jackass.

Isn't that the definition of a patriotic American?


Joke!

OT: I'm still on the fence about this. I don't think I could stand an overtly glorified setting, but at the same time I really like the AC games... Guess I'll have to wait and see.

(at least RE6 will keep me going until I hear the first reports on AC3)

 

[robhop]

Half-British is a rather imprecise description. This could mean half-English, half-Scottish, half-Welsh, or even, given the political realities of the revolutionary period, half-Irish. Connor is an Irish name and if the character's antecedents came from an Irish republican background that could explain his proclivity for dissecting unfortunate redcoats with a tomahawk.