Assassin's Creed (Limited Edition) (Xbox 360, 2007)

Assassin's Creed is a bloody dive into a beautiful world of warriors and the assassins who hate them. Beautiful animation, stylish low-saturation graphics, and city-wide chases are all fundamentally wonderful in Creed. There really isn't another game quite like it. Unfortunately, there isn't another game with issues quite like Creed's, either. Assassin's Creed tries to be a stealth game, an action game, a stealth kill game and a platformer, and to innovate in each category. But for each amazing step forward, Creed takes a half-step back.

Quietly Killing Time

Assassin's Creed revolves around the assassinations of nine key targets in the Third Crusade (as well as some "other" points in history). Acre, Jerusalem, and Damascus are rendered in beautiful grays and earth tones, creating the effect of free-running across a giant tomb. It's in the free-running that you'll find the game's most original and satisfying gameplay, tearing across cities as medieval hitman Altair.

By holding down a trigger and the action button, Altair can nimbly ascend anything. Once you're free-running, gameplay becomes about maintaining a perfect line of motion rather than hitting the jump button at just the right time. There's a very steep learning curve, because these free-running portions look more like platforming than they actually play. The basic idea is to hold down the free-running buttons and point Altair in the right direction. Your job isn't to micromanage jumps; your job is to point Altair towards his victims and make sure they die cleanly.


In order to secure your targets' deaths, you have to climb a few "synchronization points," the tallest buildings in a city's district. Each district has half a dozen or more of these, with each city divided into three districts. Climbing to the very highest point of these structures is really fun. There isn't any other game that quite captures the heart-pounding pleasure of simply ascending, endlessly, with nothing but your wits and fingertips to guide you.

Each sync point unveils a roundup of choices on your mini-map, including citizens to rescue (who'll then help you later) and various clues you'll have to unlock in order to earn permission to kill your target. You might have to interrogate an enemy agent, pickpocket a map, or simply kill a few Templars without being caught -- and within a time limit.
While that sounds like a forgiving, interesting way to represent "investigating" your target, the mission types all blur into a homogenous mix of unskippable introductory cut-scenes and difficulty that is always too hard or too easy. Until mission seven, the toughest job you're likely to have is to go to your HUD marker, sit at the bench, and hit the Y button to listen in on a conversation.

I've Never Run

But once you hit the seventh mission, the timed stealth murder sprees become trial and error, simply hoping you can make your hits before some random guard bumps into you, forcing you to redo the entire mission. They're not long, but it's an irritant to repeat the same mini-mission over and over again. More disappointing, chances to explain why your target deserves to die are passed up for simple chatter. Each mini-mission's cut-scene is merely exposition, always telling instead of showing.

Missions in free-roaming, open-world games give the player a sense of direction, a sense of not being lost in the world.
Overall Rating- 10/10

Gameplay: 8.0
Altair’s stylish combat moves and graceful acrobatic steps make him a most formidable assassin but the missions can get a bit repetitive. The story would have been epic but it’s a bit confusing and the ending will have you scratching your head. The timeframe is well represented in the game and there’s a lot of ground to cover.

Graphics: 8.5
At times the game will make gamers drool at the carefully detailed environments and character models. Then again, the Shenmue-styled pop-in, framerate stutters and a few other graphical glitches just doesn’t fail to give the impression that the graphics could have looked better.

Sound: 9.0
You will be surrounded by sound whether it’s the various vendors, desperate beggars and outspoken scholars. There’s also a great voice-acting cast and a gorgeous soundtrack that is just so wonderfully cinematic.

Difficulty: Medium
Altair can swing a sword or dagger with the best of them so combat can be a nice challenge. Your enemies run pretty fast but thankfully Altair is acrobatic enough to jump from rooftop to rooftop to find a place to hide.

Concept: 8.0
There’s a wide open world for you to explore and the time period definitely adds a new element to the stealthy assassinations. The number of extras, secrets and side missions should offer gamers plenty to do but aside from this there’s very little to come back to when you finish the game.

Overall: 8.0
Confusing plotline and ending aside, Assassin’s Creed is still an original and profound experience that shouldn’t be missed by any gamer looking for something different. It might not be an achievement in game design either but there is way too much to love about this stealth game.

THE STORY:
Assassin’s Creed is a two sided story that takes place in the present, but affected by the past. You play as a young character that finds himself waking up within some strange device, which at first made you think you were an assassin. You find that within you lies a great secret, which could possibly change the world. Will you be able to escape and find the secrets?

Once finishing the game, your opinion of the overall rating of the game will change and ask for a sequel.

GAMEPLAY
The game is split into different sections, but is very repititious. You will carry the same moves from beginning to end. This game starts off with missions. You travel around with missions to kill certain characters. You will get in contact and communicate at an assassin base where they will provide info for your next target.

Before making a hit on the target, they require you to go on missions to gather more information about target. Once enough information is gathered, you will be granted the assassination. You are required to gather about three pieces of information before anything.

The method and style of killing your final hits will vary. Some victims will be an easy quick kill, but some will require patience and strategic moves.

You will go through the game jumping around buildings, tackling people, and performing a variety of discrete moves.


GRAPHICS
Very sharp graphics with a great color scheme. The character models look clean. However, after playing the game for hours, the color scheme will make the game seem like everything is blending together and you will not see contrast because there are different shades of one color all throughout the game. Definitely use an HDMI Or component cable! They could have improved the AI for computer characters.


IN CONCLUSION
Assassin’s Creed does not live up to the hype, but it’s still a really great, unique game. The game includes some imperfections, but still deserves much attention due to the unique color scheme, graphics, and game play style. If Ubisoft plans to make a sequel, they better go back to the drawing bored and improve the game from being so repititious. This is Average Creed.

Graphics: Breathtaking 9.5/10
The player movements, backgrounds, cities, landscape and scenery are thorough and breathtaking. The dreary colors and drab buildings give a sense of this era. The graphics in this game immersed this game reviewer.

Sound: Good – 7/10
The sounds, music, effects, and voices take you immediately into the game, then right back out. It is great to hear the dialogue between all the citizens and soldiers, but it grows tired and repetitive. The score is decent, but it does not carry, nor make up for the faults in the area of sounds.

Gameplay: Spectacular – 8/10
Smooth animations, large levels, smart enemies and A.I., different possibilities for battles and puzzles – makes this game fun and interesting. The controls, camera angles, and finicky battle controls sticks out and hurts the gameplay.

Replay Value – Above average 6.5/10
Without multiplayer, this game is going to have a hard time getting someone wanting to play again without wanting to go back to get all the flags. With over a million copies sold, something tells me there are going to be a lot of copies for sale soon.

Overall – Great 8/10
This has some great story telling and is pretty edgy for what it is trying to say (message wise) for a game. Though once you go through and do everything you want to do in this game, it will sit on your bookcase like a forgotten trophy. This game will not appeal to everyone though.

Let me begin by saying that this game is not for everyone. This is one of those games you are either going to love or hate. Assassin’s Creed is a mix of a sandbox adventure game with RPG elements. The reason the reviews on this game have been mixed because it depends on how you play through this game.

I played through this game going through almost every quest/side mission, minus finding all the flags, and must say that this in an involved and fun game. More fighting than assassinating, this game shows that a lot of minor details were looked during development. The big assassinations come when you take down each “levels” end target, and doing this the right way makes the game that much more fun. My biggest gripe was the last 1/10 of the game. Gameplay wise, it was disappointing, story wise, it was awesome.

I like story telling and this game hit it in a new direction, but I must say, either buy it used or rent it.

You play Altair, an assassin assigned to eliminate nine historically prominent figures from 1191, The Crusades. The way you approach these assassinations is partially up to you, and I say partially because it may seem that you have total control of your actions when you first play but as the game progresses, you quickly learn that it gets to become pretty linear with a dash of freedom.

To view the map, you essentially press the "back" button but not everything is revealed immediately. In order to truly see what your surroundings consist of, you must climb high structures (usually mosques, towers, etc.) and this is truly an exhilarating experience. You run up buildings by holding down the right trigger and holding down the A button. Climbing buildings is very easy and Ubisoft made it very fun. As soon as you reach the top of these structures, you synchronize with your surroundings and everything in that radius is revealed to you.

Before you assassinate your target, you must complete 3/6 investigations and this can be done through eavesdropping, pick pocketing, or interrogation. None of these can be done at random, there are set targets for each action and they are all very well done. Once you are actually ready to assassinate your target, you must retreat the Assassin's Bureau (and every town has one,) from which you will rest before you assassinate your target.

Once you reach your target, an elaborate cut-scene/interaction occurs (with optional different angles!) and you have the choice of approaching your target quietly or openly.

There are numerous plot twists and a dissonant back story to the game which cannot be revealed and essentially, this game is the first in a trilogy so don't expect to have all your questions answered. All in all, Assassin's Creed is not a perfect game although it is very well done.