Disclaimer: This is a critical review. If you like this game you will cry and rage. Eat it.
Assassin's Creed is like watching the Miss Universe contest.
It starts out hopeful, as you more and more enjoy the eye candy,
but after a while, the novelty party tricks or talents, and vapid shreds of wisdom blend together to form one boring repetitive mess until the eye candy is so over-run by sheer repetition and stupidity that you just have to turn off.
Now Assassin's Creed is hampered by hundreds of faults that become obvious after about an hour of play. The main fault, as such, is that the game is ridiculously shallow. Just like a Miss Universe contestant,
it all starts out well, but as soon as the game goes further than just pretty graphics and a cool, tactile environment (*ahem*) you run into trouble. Well, specifically, you run into nothing. And that's just it. Once you're past the amazing graphics, the beautifully constructed cities complete with bustling citizens there is absolutely nothing deeper. Every aspect of the game, when placed under the magnifying glass, falls down due to poor design decisions and amazingly, stunningly simplistic gameplay.
I was mistaken and fooled by the name. I thought that Assassin's Creed would focus on my being an assassin. How stupid I was. To be honest, I thought I was looking at a medieval Saint's Row in which I would use my environment to pull off amazing assassination feats as I decided who should live or die. How wrong I was. I want to state now that Assassin's Creed is the furthest idea of the traditional assassin - and again, not in a good way. I'll explain why;
The gameplay in Assassin's Creed is hinged solely on the ability of your character - Altair - to climb over and on every environment object in sight. The environment is the main event.
You can tell - it's done fantastically, as your seamlessly swing from beam to beam in an adrenaline packed parkour (or freerun) trip across 3 ancient destinations of the Holy Land.
This amazing environment - the sense of freedom as you roam the kingdom, is completely directionless though- with non of the beautifully constructed towns outside the cities having any significance other than to provide just another Templar, flag or viewpoint to complete. Actually, the only thing in the game that rewards you aside from the assassinations themselves is just that - killing Templar's, collecting flags and reaching view points.
They are also your only real point of interaction with the world outside of cities. But don't get your hopes up!
Cities themselves are almost more boring and repetitive, as you scale marked viewpoint after viewpoint to gather "information" on the city around you. Now this sounds cool, but in reality, you may as well replace viewpoints with the
pulling of a lever in order for several portals to appear, each containing one of 4 mini-games in which you basically do exactly the same thing with a very few exceptions. You're almost always going to end up fighting as well. You have no choice as to the path you take and the game seems stupidly limiting in your experience as an assassin. Whenever you reach one of 3 target cities, you scale a viewpoint, contact an informer, pickpocket someone and eavesdrop and off you go - taking your useless, ineffectual information and somehow trying to apply it to your assassination. It doesn't work. Non of it does.
In fact, it's almost laughable at how un-cool the whole process is. Climbing a viewpoint is good fun, as it has a practical outcome of helping you find your bearings in a new city, but after the 35th time, when all you're doing it for is to tick it off the map, it becomes stupidly tedious. The other minigames you're put through in order to gain enough information on your target is to contact an informer and complete a task. Now again, this is a really cool, practical idea, but it's absolutely ruined by the idiocy of the design department. Some flash games have better quests. Here I am in ancient Damascus, as master assassin, and I have to retrieve - no, not gold or jewels, but flags stolen by a local merchant, who has conveniently placed them in a race format across a series of roof tops in the surrounding area. I wanted gritty, deep quests complimented by otherwise simplistic fight gameplay and a tactile environment. I didn't want some ridiculous sort of flag rally better seen in The Simpson's game than a product with the word "Assassin" in the title! It would be okay if this was a one off, but every single task you must complete is exactly the same - repeat poorly designed task to have it book ended by some inanity. You get to the stage where you'll cut off previously saved rape-victim-to-be as she bleats some pre-recorded (and already heard) message in order to mark the next rape victim on your map until you've saved every rape victim or typical helpless scholar in Damascus and subsequently been rewarded by having the streets even more cluttered by almost pointless "helpful" groups of scholars or vigilantes. Note to city guard - groups of 5 scholars or more are suspicious. These groups are almost never used, or if they are it's in a very specific situation, as travelling over the rooftops is by far the more enjoyable prospect that suffering the packed streets.
The AI in Assassin's Creed is really quite fun - for the most part. While the city around you bustles with life - the guard AI is really very lazy.
If I was Al-Mualim, head master assassin, the first target I'd assassinate would be the city gym instructor, because they sure do a good job!
The AI's ability to follow a crazily fit killing machine as he bounds from light fitting to 50 ft beam is commendable, but also ruins any sense of uniqueness your abilities as an assassin. So many times I've run up a wall, bounced to an awning and back onto a beam only to turn around and watch as guards fearlessly follow my exact footsteps in Jet Li style. Apart from their strange acrobatic abilities, the AI is great to watch as each citizen grumbles and makes contextual comments as they go about their daily lives.
The combat system in Assassin's Creed is limited in the sense of an assassin, as you stab or throw your enemies to their death. And that's it. Aside from different types of perforation - be it with long, short, thrown or hidden blade - the only way to kill you enemies is to throw them to their death or punch them into unconsciousness. Just like the small tasks set along the road to an assassination, this starts out fun but after a while it becomes tedious in the extreme. I was expecting situational forms of killing, only suggested through the information gathered as part of the required tasks to unlock the assassination. I was expecting to poison the glutton or drop a heavy awning support on the black market dealer, only to make a stealthy getaway. It turns out every assassination is again, just like the rest of the game. You'll approach the target, not at your own choosing, but at a time designated by the information you've gathered - which essentially means having to approach the target just so he can give a long winded example of why he is a badass and why you should kill him. After that, you'll end up stabbing him or chasing him then stabbing him (you rarely have a choice), triggering a glitch (cutscene) in which EVERY single victim confesses of some higher, noble purpose.
This whole process of being locked into a cutscene completely breaks any planning you may have had, as you're forced to react almost immediately after. Fifty percent of the time, this action results in some sort of whole sale street brawl in which you butcher the target and make your getaway until you're safe, only going back to read the information you gathered and realising how it never would have helped you as there is actually no real indication of any effect of such information or help in the game world.
The storyline of Assassin's Creed is terrible to say the least. The problem lies in the bizarre sci-fi element that surrounds your work as an assassin. In reality, it appears, you are a very slow walking (you'll see what I mean) bartender named Desmond, taken captive in order for a large corporation to drill your memory for some past knowledge. Needless to say this would have worked well in a later title or a sci-fi game, but in Assassin' Creed it only helps to distance you further and further from your role as Altair. Mind you, playing Altair is a strange experience. It's as if an atomic bomb had a moral compass. The tale kicks off by revealing how much of an arrogant jerk Altair is. He drawls (in a strange American accent) that he "doesn't make mistakes" as you proceed to butcher anyone you please with little care for the world. He delivers Schwarzenegger worthy lines as he dispatches helpless and terrified interrogation victims who you've spent the last minute beating to a pulp - generally making you hate both your lack of choice and mercy as well as Altair. However, in another strange choice by the developers, Altair's moral compass only wavers as he cradles dying assassination victims (who you've been made to hate) in his arms.
There are so many bad points in Assassin's Creed that the list could go on and on - the stupid flag collecting, the minute "weapon upgrades", the way in which everything is so formulaic and linear etc. The positive aspect, as mentioned above, is the beautiful, tactile environments you can leap, bound and swing over. Just about every other aspect is a boring, inconsequential mini-game that precedes a limiting experience of an actual assassination, interspersed with clips of an over-confusing sci-fi storyline decked out with a fresh set of unlikable characters.
6.5/10
Assassin's Creed is like watching the Miss Universe contest.
It starts out hopeful, as you more and more enjoy the eye candy,
but after a while, the novelty party tricks or talents, and vapid shreds of wisdom blend together to form one boring repetitive mess until the eye candy is so over-run by sheer repetition and stupidity that you just have to turn off.
Now Assassin's Creed is hampered by hundreds of faults that become obvious after about an hour of play. The main fault, as such, is that the game is ridiculously shallow. Just like a Miss Universe contestant,
it all starts out well, but as soon as the game goes further than just pretty graphics and a cool, tactile environment (*ahem*) you run into trouble. Well, specifically, you run into nothing. And that's just it. Once you're past the amazing graphics, the beautifully constructed cities complete with bustling citizens there is absolutely nothing deeper. Every aspect of the game, when placed under the magnifying glass, falls down due to poor design decisions and amazingly, stunningly simplistic gameplay.
I was mistaken and fooled by the name. I thought that Assassin's Creed would focus on my being an assassin. How stupid I was. To be honest, I thought I was looking at a medieval Saint's Row in which I would use my environment to pull off amazing assassination feats as I decided who should live or die. How wrong I was. I want to state now that Assassin's Creed is the furthest idea of the traditional assassin - and again, not in a good way. I'll explain why;
The gameplay in Assassin's Creed is hinged solely on the ability of your character - Altair - to climb over and on every environment object in sight. The environment is the main event.
You can tell - it's done fantastically, as your seamlessly swing from beam to beam in an adrenaline packed parkour (or freerun) trip across 3 ancient destinations of the Holy Land.
This amazing environment - the sense of freedom as you roam the kingdom, is completely directionless though- with non of the beautifully constructed towns outside the cities having any significance other than to provide just another Templar, flag or viewpoint to complete. Actually, the only thing in the game that rewards you aside from the assassinations themselves is just that - killing Templar's, collecting flags and reaching view points.
They are also your only real point of interaction with the world outside of cities. But don't get your hopes up!
Cities themselves are almost more boring and repetitive, as you scale marked viewpoint after viewpoint to gather "information" on the city around you. Now this sounds cool, but in reality, you may as well replace viewpoints with the
pulling of a lever in order for several portals to appear, each containing one of 4 mini-games in which you basically do exactly the same thing with a very few exceptions. You're almost always going to end up fighting as well. You have no choice as to the path you take and the game seems stupidly limiting in your experience as an assassin. Whenever you reach one of 3 target cities, you scale a viewpoint, contact an informer, pickpocket someone and eavesdrop and off you go - taking your useless, ineffectual information and somehow trying to apply it to your assassination. It doesn't work. Non of it does.
In fact, it's almost laughable at how un-cool the whole process is. Climbing a viewpoint is good fun, as it has a practical outcome of helping you find your bearings in a new city, but after the 35th time, when all you're doing it for is to tick it off the map, it becomes stupidly tedious. The other minigames you're put through in order to gain enough information on your target is to contact an informer and complete a task. Now again, this is a really cool, practical idea, but it's absolutely ruined by the idiocy of the design department. Some flash games have better quests. Here I am in ancient Damascus, as master assassin, and I have to retrieve - no, not gold or jewels, but flags stolen by a local merchant, who has conveniently placed them in a race format across a series of roof tops in the surrounding area. I wanted gritty, deep quests complimented by otherwise simplistic fight gameplay and a tactile environment. I didn't want some ridiculous sort of flag rally better seen in The Simpson's game than a product with the word "Assassin" in the title! It would be okay if this was a one off, but every single task you must complete is exactly the same - repeat poorly designed task to have it book ended by some inanity. You get to the stage where you'll cut off previously saved rape-victim-to-be as she bleats some pre-recorded (and already heard) message in order to mark the next rape victim on your map until you've saved every rape victim or typical helpless scholar in Damascus and subsequently been rewarded by having the streets even more cluttered by almost pointless "helpful" groups of scholars or vigilantes. Note to city guard - groups of 5 scholars or more are suspicious. These groups are almost never used, or if they are it's in a very specific situation, as travelling over the rooftops is by far the more enjoyable prospect that suffering the packed streets.
The AI in Assassin's Creed is really quite fun - for the most part. While the city around you bustles with life - the guard AI is really very lazy.
If I was Al-Mualim, head master assassin, the first target I'd assassinate would be the city gym instructor, because they sure do a good job!
The AI's ability to follow a crazily fit killing machine as he bounds from light fitting to 50 ft beam is commendable, but also ruins any sense of uniqueness your abilities as an assassin. So many times I've run up a wall, bounced to an awning and back onto a beam only to turn around and watch as guards fearlessly follow my exact footsteps in Jet Li style. Apart from their strange acrobatic abilities, the AI is great to watch as each citizen grumbles and makes contextual comments as they go about their daily lives.
The combat system in Assassin's Creed is limited in the sense of an assassin, as you stab or throw your enemies to their death. And that's it. Aside from different types of perforation - be it with long, short, thrown or hidden blade - the only way to kill you enemies is to throw them to their death or punch them into unconsciousness. Just like the small tasks set along the road to an assassination, this starts out fun but after a while it becomes tedious in the extreme. I was expecting situational forms of killing, only suggested through the information gathered as part of the required tasks to unlock the assassination. I was expecting to poison the glutton or drop a heavy awning support on the black market dealer, only to make a stealthy getaway. It turns out every assassination is again, just like the rest of the game. You'll approach the target, not at your own choosing, but at a time designated by the information you've gathered - which essentially means having to approach the target just so he can give a long winded example of why he is a badass and why you should kill him. After that, you'll end up stabbing him or chasing him then stabbing him (you rarely have a choice), triggering a glitch (cutscene) in which EVERY single victim confesses of some higher, noble purpose.
This whole process of being locked into a cutscene completely breaks any planning you may have had, as you're forced to react almost immediately after. Fifty percent of the time, this action results in some sort of whole sale street brawl in which you butcher the target and make your getaway until you're safe, only going back to read the information you gathered and realising how it never would have helped you as there is actually no real indication of any effect of such information or help in the game world.
The storyline of Assassin's Creed is terrible to say the least. The problem lies in the bizarre sci-fi element that surrounds your work as an assassin. In reality, it appears, you are a very slow walking (you'll see what I mean) bartender named Desmond, taken captive in order for a large corporation to drill your memory for some past knowledge. Needless to say this would have worked well in a later title or a sci-fi game, but in Assassin' Creed it only helps to distance you further and further from your role as Altair. Mind you, playing Altair is a strange experience. It's as if an atomic bomb had a moral compass. The tale kicks off by revealing how much of an arrogant jerk Altair is. He drawls (in a strange American accent) that he "doesn't make mistakes" as you proceed to butcher anyone you please with little care for the world. He delivers Schwarzenegger worthy lines as he dispatches helpless and terrified interrogation victims who you've spent the last minute beating to a pulp - generally making you hate both your lack of choice and mercy as well as Altair. However, in another strange choice by the developers, Altair's moral compass only wavers as he cradles dying assassination victims (who you've been made to hate) in his arms.
There are so many bad points in Assassin's Creed that the list could go on and on - the stupid flag collecting, the minute "weapon upgrades", the way in which everything is so formulaic and linear etc. The positive aspect, as mentioned above, is the beautiful, tactile environments you can leap, bound and swing over. Just about every other aspect is a boring, inconsequential mini-game that precedes a limiting experience of an actual assassination, interspersed with clips of an over-confusing sci-fi storyline decked out with a fresh set of unlikable characters.
6.5/10
