Unskippable: Assassin's Creed Unity - Who Are the Bad Guys Again?

Graham_LRR

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Nov 13, 2008
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Assassin's Creed Unity - Who Are the Bad Guys Again?

Abstergo Industries - "We're not at awful as Umbrella Corporation."

Watch Video
 

leviadragon99

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Jun 17, 2010
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So I have to ask... was the whole "pieces of Eden" element of the Ass Creed story ever NOT completely batshit as a concept and in execution?

I mean it's never going to be resolved at this rate, with how much Ubisoft loves sequel-milking the series, so it's just an ongoing "okay... what?" part of the internal mythology.
 

zerragonoss

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Oct 15, 2009
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Ok unskipable watchers, I think its time we hammer out all these weapons puns.

Axe you a question

Have a knife day

We can sword this out

Want to hammer a good time

Do you have a spear moment

Arrow you feeling alright

Thoes are the best I have for the moment but several of them could cerntily be better, and thier are also more weapons. Like I have no idea what to do for staff. (Also not claiming all, or any are orginal.)
 

CrazyBlaze

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Jul 12, 2011
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leviadragon99 said:
So I have to ask... was the whole "pieces of Eden" element of the Ass Creed story ever NOT completely batshit as a concept and in execution?

I mean it's never going to be resolved at this rate, with how much Ubisoft loves sequel-milking the series, so it's just an ongoing "okay... what?" part of the internal mythology.
I found intresting with the first three games but after that meh. The Pieces of Eden have really just become the main reason why the characters seem to fight and not the difference between their doctrines. It also gives them a lazy reason as to why you should kill so and so and not you know an actual reason as to why they have to die. Its why I consider the first three games in the series as the best. You have actual reasons to fight and kill most of your targets and not just because they are after or hold yet another magical mcguffin.
 

Sofox

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Jan 3, 2014
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zerragonoss said:
Ok unskipable watchers, I think its time we hammer out all these weapons puns.

Axe you a question

Have a knife day

We can sword this out

Want to hammer a good time

Do you have a spear moment

Arrow you feeling alright

Thoes are the best I have for the moment but several of them could cerntily be better, and thier are also more weapons. Like I have no idea what to do for staff. (Also not claiming all, or any are orginal.)
Zerragonoss, nice, but there's also:

Do you get my point?

I'm backing you up to the hilt.

Allow me to make a cutting remark.

Don't worry, you're getting your cut.

If you're bored, I thought I'd give you something with an edge.

Knowing I could take you like this was pretty sharp of me.

It's raw deal for you whichever way you slice it.

EDIT: Oh, and since you were wondering what to do with staff: I cleaned this before hitting you with it, so you don't need to worry about getting a staff infection.
 

Kenjitsuka

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Sep 10, 2009
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Ehm... so now DNA memories have VOICE OVERS too?
Next to those super handy white letters hovering over the ancestor's view that display the exact date etc *sometimes*.
Everyone was REALLY big on the exact date back in 1307! Good thing they all used Abstergo Calendar on their smartphones to keep up with the rush of everyday life!!!

Well, at least these memories are not from multiple third person camera angles that shift to show us stuff as cinematically as possible! Oh, wait... :(
 

Therumancer

Citation Needed
Nov 28, 2007
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CrazyBlaze said:
leviadragon99 said:
So I have to ask... was the whole "pieces of Eden" element of the Ass Creed story ever NOT completely batshit as a concept and in execution?

I mean it's never going to be resolved at this rate, with how much Ubisoft loves sequel-milking the series, so it's just an ongoing "okay... what?" part of the internal mythology.
I found intresting with the first three games but after that meh. The Pieces of Eden have really just become the main reason why the characters seem to fight and not the difference between their doctrines. It also gives them a lazy reason as to why you should kill so and so and not you know an actual reason as to why they have to die. Its why I consider the first three games in the series as the best. You have actual reasons to fight and kill most of your targets and not just because they are after or hold yet another magical mcguffin.
Well, my ongoing problem with the series is that especially in the later games I'm becoming increasingly convinced that the Assassins are the bad guys despite the intent of the series.

As a general rule The Templars are ruthless, but they more or less want order and peace. A lot of their basic objectives (but admittedly not all of them) when you whack a Templar are laudable and in a quite a few cases it seems like where by killing a Templar you made things a heck of a lot worse, with various historical events being explained as "things would have been okay, but then someone ran out with a hidden blade at a crucial moment". I look at say Assassin's Creed III as an example where by killing one of the Templars you pretty much started the dominos falling for later genocide of the Native Americans (save a few people in the extreme short term, doom a lot more later).

Of course this is a comparative thing as well, because part of my opinion comes from looking at the Assassins themselves. They seem to have no real plan, except to run around and kill Templars on general principle, vaguely justified by the existence of this precursor technology. Heck, they even admit this in Black Flag where Edward is talking to Captain Kidd about the philosophy, and what we get is a literal quote from the Satanic Bible "and the only law shall be do as you will", to which Edward asks what is supposed to keep everyone from preying on each other and the response is a "well, it's a work in progress". This also comes up briefly in "Unity". The Assassins seem to run around killing people left and right "because their bad" and justifying everything "because freedom".

Even the somewhat laudable things the Assassins seem to do are kind of tainted. For example in "Black Flag" I run around looting ships and press ganging people to replace crew. Basically I take a ship and say "join or die", which seems to be a more frequent way of recruiting than hiring or saving people. I also run around and raid ships including merchant traffic simply to obtain resources so I can become richer and upgrade my personal mansion/cover/ship. Yet at one point when chasing a slave ship we have Adewale sitting there going "Noes, remember this ship is full of innocent people", either the guy being a reverse racist, or he hasn't been playing the same game I have. Of course this is a guy who gets his own spin off game and them come "Rogue" gets called an epitome of the Creed "because reasons". The "noble Assassins" are even doing this stuff as Assassins come "Rogue" in general. The Assassins obviously think becoming pirates and terrorizing the seas is a great way to prove how benevolent they are, and of course freedom only applies when someone else is enslaving people, when the Assassins do it, then it's A-Okay (join my crew or die... and notice I never once paid any of these guys). This is entertaining mind you, but if you actually sit down and think about it occasionally it becomes a matter of sitting there going "WTF am I actually fighting for again".

The funny thing is that the more they developed the game the less evil Abstergo tends to seem as well, again very ruthless, but where it's kidnapped people and stuff the Assassins seem to be doing worse. What's more in say kidnapping Desmond they apparently did their research and did have the right guy, he was trained by the Assassins and did have key memories encoded in his DNA. They are fighting a war, and largely we're simply assuming that Rebecca and company are better than they are and haven't continued their historical trends one way or another. To be honest I don't think any of the modern people have actually explained what their plan is other than stopping the Templars, which pretty much means even centuries later this is still a work in progress.

Of course then again I don't think your supposed to think about it that hard, Ubisoft games do tend to be rather shallow. We are simply supposed to accept that the Assassins are the good guys because they wear the white hats... err hoods, and the narrative tells us they are the good guys, and we're supposed to look at only parts of what's going on in the short term.

To compare the two I do tend to think Umbrella and Abstergo are entirely different beasts, Umbrella seems largely motivated by making money and accumulating power. Abstero's Templars at least have the objective of trying to make the world a better place. In some kind of hypothetical crossover I'd imagine both The Assassins and Templars would hate Wesker and want him stopped as neither side would likely see any "big picture" benefit in bioweapons that animate mutated corpses on a massive level.
 

shrekfan246

Not actually a Japanese pop star
May 26, 2011
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Abstergo: "At least we're not Weyland-Yutani."

I don't recall lightning-swords being a part of earlier Assassin's Creed games. In fact, of all the multitude of useless weapons they've crammed into the franchise since the first one, lightning-sword is of the few that has remained conspicuously absent; presumably because it would actually change the combat system in some way.

Also, I'm pretty sure even Ubisoft doesn't know who's supposed to be the "good" or "bad" guys anymore.
 
Jan 12, 2012
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"Time to go to sleep. Good-knife!"

But yeah, that's kind of silly. And the Abstergo marketing to the average joe is kind of interesting, but I can't imagine that most people would want to experience getting knifed in the stomach or the other horrible fates of their ancestors. Maybe sell an "adjustment kit" that lets the Helix only take you back to that time that your great-great-grandfather found a puppy?
 

Darth_Payn

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Aug 5, 2009
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shrekfan246 said:
Abstergo: "At least we're not Weyland-Yutani."

I don't recall lightning-swords being a part of earlier Assassin's Creed games. In fact, of all the multitude of useless weapons they've crammed into the franchise since the first one, lightning-sword is of the few that has remained conspicuously absent; presumably because it would actually change the combat system in some way.

Also, I'm pretty sure even Ubisoft doesn't know who's supposed to be the "good" or "bad" guys anymore.
Swords of Eden were brought up before, in Subject 16's hacking puzzles in II. Joan of Arc was said to have used one (maybe that same one in the video?) before she was burned at the stake.

Abstergo sounds like the most successful fictional evil corporation, since they're still humming along, and doing gangbusters selling movies and video games made out of people's genetic memories, and finding Precursor relics to boot. Sure, there was that setback in 2012, with the launch of their mind-control satellite being canceled due to the murder of the guy who ran the Animus Project, but they bounced back from that with their Animus console and the release of that Pirate game last year. I know there's a list of evil corporations in fiction, and most of them are massively incompetent failures, with Umbrella being the dumbest.

Also, I'm sure Yahtzee pontificated on the "who's good, who's bad" dynamic in his Extra Punctuation column.
 

Lightknight

Mugwamp Supreme
Nov 26, 2008
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So... in this scenario, how is playing as the guy that died possible? He clearly didn't have time to make a child unless there was a woman hidden in that tomb. I thought the whole concept was magic bloodline memories.

zerragonoss said:
Ok unskipable watchers, I think its time we hammer out all these weapons puns.

Axe you a question

Have a knife day

We can sword this out

Want to hammer a good time

Do you have a spear moment

Arrow you feeling alright

Thoes are the best I have for the moment but several of them could cerntily be better, and thier are also more weapons. Like I have no idea what to do for staff. (Also not claiming all, or any are orginal.)
Or, specific to this particular situation:

Knife of you to let me in...
 

Evil Smurf

Admin of Catoholics Anonymous
Nov 11, 2011
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For the record, I see the templars as the good guys, with order, control and peace, they are suited to those who play Azorius in MTG, whereas the assassins are mono red, reckless, violent, chaos, no control. I'm not the bad guy here, you are!
 

JagerBombastic

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Mar 3, 2014
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No but seriously guys, A FUCKING LIGHTING SWORD! Why, how, it literately doesn't make any sense at all, what? How dose it even work? I mean do they just think it and it shoots lightning, is it like a spider sense type deal where they have to be in danger for it to work. I mean come on that is pretty poor on Ubisofts part, lets all be honest.
 

Link Satonaka

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Mar 1, 2012
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Thunderous Cacophony said:
"Time to go to sleep. Good-knife!"

But yeah, that's kind of silly. And the Abstergo marketing to the average joe is kind of interesting, but I can't imagine that most people would want to experience getting knifed in the stomach or the other horrible fates of their ancestors. Maybe sell an "adjustment kit" that lets the Helix only take you back to that time that your great-great-grandfather found a puppy?
Wait you're going to have to explain this to me- the animus allows you to relive the memories of a distance relative who died before procreating, but somehow the final memories are teleported into the surviving relative's DNA? Or similarly, existing offspring get the final memories of parents encoded into *their* DNA by some remote power?

I haven't played anything but AssCreed 1 so I don't know the extent of ridiculousness in the following sequels.
 
Jan 12, 2012
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Link Satonaka said:
Thunderous Cacophony said:
"Time to go to sleep. Good-knife!"

But yeah, that's kind of silly. And the Abstergo marketing to the average joe is kind of interesting, but I can't imagine that most people would want to experience getting knifed in the stomach or the other horrible fates of their ancestors. Maybe sell an "adjustment kit" that lets the Helix only take you back to that time that your great-great-grandfather found a puppy?
Wait you're going to have to explain this to me- the animus allows you to relive the memories of a distance relative who died before procreating, but somehow the final memories are teleported into the surviving relative's DNA? Or similarly, existing offspring get the final memories of parents encoded into *their* DNA by some remote power?

I haven't played anything but AssCreed 1 so I don't know the extent of ridiculousness in the following sequels.
I'm not sure how it works either, but in the Ezio trilogy (#2, Revelations, and Brotherhood) you follow him right up until his death. Somehow you get to know everything that a person did with their life, regardless of the time when they actually became your ancestor. I suppose it has as much basic in real genetics as the rest of the plot.
 

Mydnyght

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Feb 17, 2010
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Hasn't this game been mocked enough already?
Anyway, see you next week for part 2.