Assassin's Creed Review

                                              A Journalistic Review by DefiantParrot

                                                   *Warning: Contains Spoilers*

                                                                      02/12/2018

He's great at parties

                                                                                             

Developer:  Ubisoft Montreal

Publisher: Ubisoft

Platform: Xbox 360

Genre: Action-Adventure, Stealth

Release: November 13, 2007

                Oh Ubisoft… we haven’t always gotten along have we? You’ve been involved with some of my favorite games… and some I can’t stand. In fact when I talk about what is wrong with the video game industry yours is one of the first names that come to mind.

That being said not all of Ubisofts games are terrible and there is one that gave me one of my favorite video game heroes of all time, Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad and that game was Assassin’s Creed.

I HATE their new logo BTW

Now one of Ubisoft’s flagship franchises, Assassin’s Creed the first game was originally meant to be a Prince of Persia game featuring the historical figure Hassan-i Sabbah. However, Patrice Désilets believed that The Prince wouldn’t be an interesting protagonist (WHAT?!) so the game was turned into its own intellectual property.

So I have not played this game in a long time, I wanna say five years ago was the last time I replayed this, and I still remember enjoying it, it has its problems what game doesn’t? But there were many things in this game I really liked but let’s see if my critical eye can spot some greatness or missteps with the first game in this series, here’s Assassin’s Creed.

So let’s address the elephant in the room. This game depicts a young man named Desmond Miles being kidnapped and held against his will, his captors are members of a massive pharmaceutical company named Abstergo, and they tell Desmond that they are going to force him into the Animus.

This is Desmond... Desmond sucks

They tell Desmond that the Animus is a machine that allows people to relive the memories of their ancestors and that they need something from Desmond’s ancestor Altair, an assassin.

That is the plot of this game, Desmond reliving the memories of his ancestor Altair and the Desmond segments of this game are... well there’s good and bad.

Just when the main game is getting interesting being pulled back out to boring old Desmond can be irritating, however there are interesting segments to be found in the real world stuff too.

Learning more about Abstergo and how they’re connected to Altair’s enemies and others can be compelling to learn about.

So there’s that out of the way so let’s get to what this game is really about, Altair.

Altair’s story in this game is pretty compelling. When the game begins Altair is an overconfident and egotistical member of the Assassin Brotherhood. On a mission to Solomon’s Temple Altair breaks all three tenants of their creed.

Having failed his master Al Mualim, Altair must regain his rank and respect in the order by killing nine men, nine men who aid in the suffering and death that the crusades have brought.

Assassin’s Creed when it began tried to be historically accurate to an extent. The nine men Altair must kill…

Tamir - The Black Arms Merchant

Garnier de Naplous – The Grand Master of the Knights Hospitalier

Talal – A slaver operating out of Jerusalem

Abu’l Nuqoud – The Merchant King

William of Montferrat – The City regent of Acre

Majd Addin – The sadistic ruler of Jerusalem

Jubair – The Chief Scholar of Saladin

Sibrand – Leader of the Knights Teutonic

Robert de Sable – Grand Master of the Knights Templar

There's Waldo!

All of these men existed in real life and all of them disappeared under suspicious circumstances so Altair and his brethren fit into this world nicely. This is something that Ubisoft threw out the fucking window when they decided that this series wouldn’t end and would become a yearly series such as Call of Duty so they could milk the money out of this cash cow for as long as they could, but one step at a time here.

Altair’s growth in this story from arrogant cockhead and then humble and learned warrior was believable to me and actually touched me a bit when I was younger. And I still have to say that so far Altair is still my favorite protagonist in this series to this day.

During the game you are told that to do well you must follow the Assassin’s Creed which is as such.

‘Stay your blade from the flesh of the innocent.’

‘Let the people mask you such that you become one with the crowd’

‘Never compromise the Brotherhood’

All self-explanatory really except for the Creed’s maxim:

‘Nothing is true, everything is permitted’

Which when I was younger me and my friends debated what it really meant, and while it was explained later I thought it was fun finding what the Creed meant to me.

Health and Synchronization are one and the same

The gameplay in Assassin’s Creed was pretty unique for its time, as Altair you will travel between three major cities Acre, Jerusalem, and Damascus each recreated to be vast and lively. The game is open world to an extent and you can run from one end of the city to the next.

How you move in this game was the selling point for me when it came out. Altair can run, jump, and scale almost any building or rooftop he approaches; he can dive through vendor stalls or hide in bales of hay. There are so many ways to move, avoid or stay hidden in this game that when it works it’s just… sexy it feels so damn good.

But that’s when it works, this game and essentially all AC games following it can have this problem. Whether I am trying to avoid the pursuit of guards or reach an objective in a timely manner and instead Altair is either jumping off a roof or humping the shit out of a wall.

These moments are frustrating and controller breaking… believe me.

To explore these cities and gather intel for your assassination target there are synchronization points, high buildings that Altair can climb and use to survey his surroundings and find objectives.

I’m just glad that Ubisoft hasn’t overused these in almost every goddamn game that they’ve made since.

The combat in this game has a bit of give and take to it, for one this game’s combat is pretty cool again for its time. Battling with Altair’s sword, short blade, or the infamous hidden blade is really good and the game can be pretty gory with its kills although you can turn that off if you wish.

And yet… the game has a counter system and mastering that can break the combat. Wait for your opponent to attack, counter, watch the kill which there are so few counter kills they can get repetitive after a while, and notice that every other enemy just watches as you murder their allies and never step in and interferes… So yeah…

The game can still look pretty good today, it does seem a bit bland at times, like too much gray and white but there are moments where the game can take me back to 2008 and take my breath away.

However most of the time the game looks aged. That would be my tagline for this game ‘Fine, but aged’ and you feel that most in the gameplay.

You can also pickpocket throwing daggers

For much of this game you will be doing the same thing, travel to one of the cities, visit the Rafiq running the assassin bureu in the city and then begin collecting intel on your target.

You do this by pickpocketing important information

Listening in on important information from loudmouthed locals

Or by punching an informant over and over again until he tells you what he wants which I think is how Russian politics work.

There are also some tiny side missions you can find like assassinate these guards… or assassinate these guards but in a time limit. Riveting.

The game gets very repetitive very quickly and it can be short too I finished the game in almost 8 hours and that was with me hitting some extra Synchronization points or looking for some of the hundred fucking flags in this game.

The AI in this game is fucking terrible also, which I don’t remember it being as bad later on so hopefully I won’t have to deal with enemies this brain dead. There were countless times where enemies would step off a roof to die while fighting me, or fall into the water and drown of their own accord.

It’s no wonder the assassins are so successful, some of their targets literally do their job for them.

Eagle Vision is  helpful... yet hurts my eyes

One last thing I wish to point out and it is minor is that there are parts of this game that do not feel finished.

The one that stands out for me is early on, Altair is tasked by Al Mualim to locate a traitor in their midst one that helped Robert de Sable attack them. Altair finds the informant… and that’s it. It is never brought up again and yet you can use Altair’s eagle vision to locate the traitor. And kill him. With no negative effects. But he respawns. Every time you go back to Masyaf. WTF?!

Just feels like a mission that was cut from the game but never fully taken out, I don’t know if Ubisoft rushed this game out to meet a deadline before it was finished… But it’s Ubisoft it wouldn’t surprise me.

The ending was also pretty good both for Altair and Desmond, Altair having to face down his master and see the power of the Templars Treasure and Desmond the secret writings of someone in Abstergo’s HQ and somehow now having Altair’s eagle vision. It made me want to immediately put in AC II and that is what a game should do.

For when the Assassin's Creed cramps your style

So the verdict on Assassin’s Creed is my Bronze Seal of Acceptance

It’s still a pretty decent game to this day and the characters are memorable, its lore is pretty fascinating and when the game mixes up its formula it’s a lot of fun.

But the glitches, repetitiveness, and how much the game has aged keeps it at a Bronze for now.

And so begins my dive back into the series, not sure how the rest will hold up for me but one thing is for sure… I’ll get plenty of chances to insult Ubisoft, and that my fine friends, is always a win.