Not quite: Assassin's Creed Revelations

Goodwill is a valuable and finite resource. Assassin's Creed is a franchise that is dangerously close to exhausting mine. Bringing out a title for a popular property every year makes great fiscal sense, but it seems to me the quality always suffers. I was amazed that Ubisoft were able to manage this incredible feat, until I saw the truly global breadth of their talent pool. Studios from Budapest to Montreal were involved in churning this bad-boy out,  and it’s a testament to the creative direction from the top that the studios have managed to create a cohesive package. Ish. Assassin's Creed is still amazing when it sticks to its core appeal, parkour and stylishly bringing death to corrupted historical characters. Its deviation into other avenues are both ill-thought out and superfluous and have bloated a game that was more or less perfected in Assassin’s Creed II.

They do make excellent, if a little misleading trailers don't they?

If you’ve read this blog at all then you know the story to Assassin’s Creed, if not, well what are you doing here? This is literally all it is. Our contemporary protagonist Desmond Miles, following the token jaw-dropper ending is now in a coma, trapped in the depths of raw software where his mind meets the memory melding machine that is the Animus. It seems in the process of breaking the Animus he’s also undergone what appears to be some peculiar plastic surgery, his big bright naïve Disney eyes have gone, replaced by a more drawn looking face. Although I’m aware that a graphical overhaul is the done thing with sequels, this complete remodelling of the character’s visage is a little off-putting. I wouldn’t mind so much if they hadn’t messed with the handsome face of one of my all time favourite game-characters Ezio Auditore. Ezio has aged in this instalment, his hair chased with a dignified grey. Unfortunately he hasn’t aged like a fine wine, when he flops his iconic hood up he looks a tad like a miserable camel, not a good look for ex-lothario/master assassin, saying that, the visual upgrade allows for some incredible environments and great character design.

Ezio?

Though no doubt not of any interest to the average gamer, I personally found the costume design and modelling of this Assassin’s Creed to be one the best yet. The detailing is both remarkable and beautiful, the attention to historical accuracy whilst retaining it’s sci-fictional twist makes for some gorgeous characters. Were it a film it would surely be in the running for the Oscar for best costume.

Sartorial deviations aside there’s the plot to consider. Desmond is seemingly up shit-creek without the proverbial water moving implement. He’s trapped in his own mind and in danger of losing his identity amongst his ancestral memories, well so says the bonkers Subject 16 anyway. This is the same Subject 16 whose been leaving us cryptic puzzles in previous instalments, so I called into question his reliability. In order to get things back on track he has to delve back into his assassin ancestors’ memories, namely Ezio’s but back from the first game is Altair. I admire Ubisoft’s commitment to wrapping up the tales of their protagonists before their climatic end-game, but the execution isn’t as satisfying as the narrative journey of AC 2.

So Ezio is very much aware that he’s in his twilight years and is getting a bit old for this Assassin caper. Having begun his journey all those years ago as a hot-headed youth avenging his family, and then again as a more moderate middle-aged man, he’s starting to wonder whether it was all worth it. If he cannot reconcile himself with his bloody vendetta, then he can at least learn the “truth” behind his Order. To that end, he heads to Masyaf, ancient stronghold of the Assassins and haunt of Altair.

Unfortunately for Ezio his nemesis the Templars are equally interested in Masyaf and old Altair’s mysterious library. To get through its impenetrable door he must collect the “keys” glowing CDs that contain Altair’s memories, dotted around the cross-road of the world. Constantinople.

Like the Renaissance cities of Italy, Istanbul is a perfect environment for Ezio to faff around in. In Constantinople Ubisoft has crafted one of its most beautiful and fun locales yet, mist drifts across the Golden Horn, sparrows chirrup merrily unseen in the Great Bazaar, and moths drift lazily around street-lamps.  Oh and the smoke and sparks in an exciting flight from the catacombs of Cappadocia were also once of the best examples of smoke I’ve ever seen. While Rome certainly contained its fare share of famous and wonderfully realised landmarks, it was a pain in the arse to get around. The city was too spread out across the legendary seven hills, and I spent most of my time fast-travelling in sewers. Removing the incentive for doing parkour is like hamstringing a race-horse in its prime, cruel and pointless. Constantinople in contrast is nice and self-contained, and the free-running has been spiced up with a few new elements, most exciting of which are the zip lines which send you tearing along at exhilarating speeds.

Weeee!

Unfortunately like Brotherhood before it, you need to clear out the local Templars before investing shops to earn cash. If anything this is somehow less fun than before, a fact exacerbated by the fact they can take their hidey-holes back if you let your notoriety get to a certain level. This prompts an utterly perplexing and incredibly dull tower defence game, in which Ezio stands on a rooftop like a peculiar football manager popping assassin’s around the place watching as waves of mindless Templars vandalise your beautiful barricades and get capped for their trouble.  This doesn’t exemplify Ezio’s mentoring skills so much as give the impression that every assassin but you are completely unqualified. Probably doesn’t help that you recruit from a pool of citizens who get themselves in a fix and need rescuing.

Ezio in the course of helping out the Istanbul branch of Assassincorp meets the as yet uncrowned Suleiman the Magnificent, and dabbles in a bit of court intrigue. Its not particularly intriguing intrigue, and as in Brotherhood I end up getting more involved in Ezio’s romantic distractions. The Sofia memories in Brotherhood were my favourite part of that game, and Ezio’s romantic dalliances are equally in this game are almost as entertaining. This time he’s courting the improbably attractive Sofia Sartor, a fellow Italian and a female antique book-seller of all things. She leads you to an Asscreed staple and highlight, secret tombs and chambers. These almost purely platforming sections really showcase the fluidity of Ezio’s movement and the creativity and beauty of the level design, be it a puzzle involving giant weights that alter water levels or navigating the bowels of a famous landmark. My epic scale of the inside of the Hagia Sofia was a personal highlight, the audiovisual design, replete with shafts of sunlight and satisfying echoes create an excellent sense of place and scale, harking back to my original ascent of the inside of Florence’s Duomo.  However it was Ezio’s pursuit of a boatful of gunmen as you hop skip and leap across decaying architecture bullets whistling and pinging around you was a real treat.

A situation easily avoided through proper team delegation

Aside from the tedious management of your inferiors, there are yet more additions that have come back from Brotherhood. Faction Challenges serve as an incentive to diversify your game-play, and reward you with weapons, unfortunately fan favourite Da Vinci is still in Italy and his utterly charming optimism, coupled with the zany invention missions are sadly absent. Collectible still pepper the rooftops, fortunately these now have a tangible rewards, pages left by Ishak Pasha giving you the location to one of the most intricate and beautiful armour sets yet, and the “data fragments” unlocking levels back on “Animus Island.” These levels are played, perplexing from the first person and involve bizarre Daliesque plat-forming as Desmond reflects on his earliest memories and his personal journey as an assassin. Though I didn’t detest this as much as other reviewers, I nevertheless mourned the wasted opportunity to take the excellent plat-forming levels and give Desmond something imaginative and meaty to do. Instead the end result is an occasionally frustrating and imperfectly engineered First Person Platformer in a Third Person Action game. Confused, you bet I am.

Also new to this instalment is a slightly more difficult combat system, right trigger and x no longer equals win game. To balance this are bombs, a whole myriad of bombs designed to work in conjunction with the revamped Eagle Vision.  These bombs can be used to poison, distract or incapacitate your enemies, but like the ability to call on Assassins to help you out, the feel like an unnecessary crutch that undermine your sense of being an awesome hooded hit-man. It’s these experimental and seemingly nonsensical additions which hold Revelations, like Brotherhood before it, back from being exceptional.

Read my story exclusively in tomorrow's Sun

 Games work best when their thematic and narrative content are served, improved and reflected by the game-play. Assassin’s Creed 2 played this delicate balancing game perfectly, AC Brotherhood and Revelations, well…So in Brotherhood you suddenly become the responsible leader of a whole band of murderers, unfortunately rather than exemplifying his mentoring skills, Ezio became an office based HR manager, delegating Assassins here and there, hiring fresh recruits should the originals carelessly die. Revelations carries on in this vein, recruiting locals from the populace and sending them on missions across the Mediterranean. It’s a telling sign that the achievement related to doing this well is called “Armchair General,” mmm thrilling. While Revelations goes someway to improve this by having you go on a few missions with some of your more remarkable recruits, the whole Brotherhood aspect never serves as anything more than a distraction, lengthening, but not improving your game-play. Had Ezio a single apprentice to train in a series of missions would have given a great opportunity to highlight his narrative as a character able to grow and develop, whilst also trimming a sizeable amount of unwelcome fat.

When the final credits rolled, I was left a little disheartened, the title lead me to believe that the game would provide some, well, revelations. Unfortunately I didn’t learn anything I hadn’t figured out already, aside from the fact that, content as Ubisoft were to revisit Altair, they were not ready to take us to new and exciting places, merely spend a lot of time wandering up and down the hill to Masyaf. Not unlike the first game really. I’m going to miss Ezio, and it’s a shame his final send off was not quite as fitting as I’d like for a protagonist who has echoes  of Dumas’ D’Artagnan at his literary best.

Ultimately my ardour for all things Assassin’s Creed is still unquenched, but I’m looking forward to a new historical period, a new fun and fascinating location and a fresh new face. Preferably without the mopey-camel mug.