Assassin's Creed

"It's the Little Things That Make All the Difference"

Assassins are underrepresented in video games. It's just a sad fact. Up until now, the only other real assassin gamers have been able to control has been the slick-headed Agent 47. But now, gamers will be able to control a real killing machine (sorry Mr. 47, I am not impressed by shining cranium or your little red tie). But the real question is, was this a flawless execution?

STORY
The story is basically a two-part deal, but both are intricately connected. The main story is that of Altair, a Middle Eastern assassin in the time of the Crusades. He is charged with eliminating several key figures in order to save his homeland from the invaders. It is a relatively simple setup that gets interesting very quickly.

As for the second part, it is quite different. While only a tiny sliver of your time will be spent with this part, it contains more revelations and shady allusions than the other half of the story. Unfortunately, as the game comes to a sudden halt, you'll be left with more questions than answers (and most of the questions only come up in the last twenty minutes of gameplay).

I would like to commend everyone at Ubisoft for having the guts to do a story like this, especially in the day and age that we live in. While many might have focused on a European hero, they decided to show the more unique perspective of someone living in the Holy Land. It is very interesting to see this era from the eyes of a native, instead of the invader, as is most common with anything dealing with the Crusades. While they took a lot of risks with the story, it paid off big time.

GRAPHICS
This may just be the best looking game I've ever seen. My first real glimpse of the beauty of this game was when I came over a cliff and saw the entire city of Damascus lying below me. An endless sea of squat, sand colored buildings sprawled out to the horizon, and in places towering minarets seemed to pierce the sky. To say my jaw hit the floor would be an understatement.

Once I actually started walking around in the city my sense of wonder only increased. The cities seem incredibly realistic because of carefully programmed architecture and the endless number of citizens. There was also another effect that caused me to become immersed in the world, but it took quite a bit longer for me to figure out what it was.

Light is portrayed in a startlingly realistic way. Unlike many games, where a light source is fixed, here the light shifts as clouds pass over head making the shadows dance around the environment. When walking through a narrow alleyway, it may be bright one second and then dark another, which creates an unreal sense of actually being in the game. It would have been absolutely mind-blowing if there had been a cycling day and night cycle, but given the beauty of what's been done here I won't hold it against Ubisoft.

SOUND
While the amazing attention to graphical detail helps the cities stand out, the sounds incorporated into them create an even further sense of realism. Street vendors cry out trying to attract customers, preachers and politicians stand on corners spreading their propaganda, the homeless beg for money and soldiers harass the citizens.

There is an almost complete lack of music in-game, but most of the time it is barely missed because of everything else that is going on. When the music does actually kick in, it is usually in cases where Altair is being chased by guards or some other dramatic moment.

The voice actors do a great job with their parts, even those who just voice minor parts, like the citizens. However, the pool of voice actors is relatively small, so you'll constantly be hearing the same voices. The number of available comments for the citizens is even smaller so you'll often hear two or three people saying the same thing within a few seconds of one another.

GAMEPLAY
The first thing that needs to be discussed is the actual control scheme used. Instead of going with the traditional “this button does this and that button does that” route, Ubisoft went with a context specific approach. That is to say, instead of one button being a jump button, and another being a run button, the buttons in Assassin's Creed correspond to a body part. Y is for the head, X and B are for the hands and are used for attacks and grabs, and A is for the feet, used for running and jumping. In addition to that, holding down the right trigger makes all commands modified. In combat this means all primary buttons that are used for offense become defensive. It sounds very complicated, and it does take a little bit of practice, but in effect it actually makes everything much more fluid. For instance, in most games if you wanted to jump, you'd have to gauge your distance and decide how hard to press on the button. Here, you just line it up and press it. Altair adjusts accordingly. Or if trying to jump over something, he automatically gets on top of it.

Using that system, combat becomes a hypnotic dance of death. Even though you'll often be facing off against upwards of ten enemies, you'll always know what does what and what you need to do to survive. That's not to say that combat is easy, because you still have to dodge and counter but it is wonderfully intuitive. Counter moves are also delightfully brutal, with Altair running enemies through with his sword, or slitting throats with his knife. There are numerous animations for his counters and even after hours with the game, I never got tired of seeing them.

Another big part of the game is exploration. You'll have to climb towers and other high places to fill in your map. Ubisoft originally claimed that any object that stuck out more than two inches would be able to be used as a handhold for Altair to climb, a claim that evoked an immensely sarcastic, “Yeah right” from me. But against all odds, Ubisoft has done just that, meaning that pretty much anything that isn't flat can be climbed. Once you've scaled the building and your map has been filled in, you can jump off the side and down into a conveniently placed wagon of hay. These death-defying leaps never ceased to cause my stomach to clench up (I was just waiting for Altair to go splat).

The coolest thing I can say about the fighting, as well as Altair in general, is that his motions have been animated perfectly. In fact, I can honestly say, Ubisoft has made the most realistic character I have ever seen. When climbing a building, he moves just like you would expect a real person to, and when he fights, it is always fluidly. It never seems as if you are pressing buttons, and he is just jumping to pre-animated moves. It always feels as if his movements are being strung together on the fly.

Since you are tasked with taking out some high-profile targets, there's a lot of work to do before you actually get to kill anybody. In any mission there are a number of sub-missions to complete before getting the contract. You only have to do a few, but the more you do, the more information you'll have. These missions consist of pick-pocketing people, eavesdropping, interrogations and informers who need you to kill people or collect flags. Unfortunately, the formula never changes and you'll be doing the exact same things over and over until you finally beat the game. It would have been nice if there had been variation to these missions instead of the same thing just with different information.

When you go after the target, you'll have to contend with any security he has in place. Once you kill him, he'll reveal a little about the plot, and then you'll have to run for your life. At first, I really felt cool every time I swooped in and killed someone, then vanished without a trace. Unfortunately, as the game went on I started to feel like a rookie, mostly because there doesn't seem to be any way to kill your target stealthily. On one mission I tried nearly a half-dozen times, before giving up and just stabbing him to death with my sword. The main reason for this is that the game bottlenecks you into points you have to see to proceed and half the time, you are ambushed leaving you no choice but to fight your way out. For most of the assassinations, I wondered if there actually was a stealth option. Other times, I would be looking for something that my information told me was there, such as scaffolding, but never find it, which makes me wonder if there ever was any option as to how to tackle a mission in the first place.

THE VERDICT
I was really looking forward to this game, but I can't say I never had my reservations about it. Come on, how many people actually believed Ubisoft could make good on all their claims? I sure didn't. Unfortunately the abnormal amount of repetition you'll have to endure does have its ill effects. To prove my point, I was originally going to give this game a perfect score, but for every extra hour I had to endure the same mindless tasks, I became a little less impressed with the game. Still, Ubisoft has made some major innovations and they've put some hard work into this title and I commend them for doing so.

HIGHS
- Absolutely gorgeous with great lighting effects
- Fluid combat system
- Flawless animations
- Unique, precise control scheme

LOWS
- Lots of repetition in missions
- Late game assassinations are near impossible to do in stealth mode
- Story ends abruptly and with lots of unanswered questions

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/22/08, Updated 06/23/09

Game Release: Assassin's Creed (US, 11/13/07)