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Let’s Talk: Assassin’s Creed

    • 342 posts
    October 31, 2012 8:27 AM EDT

    Assassin's Creed

    Desmond’s Story in the Beginning:  Desmond Miles a simple bartender, who is kidnapped by a powerful corporation known as Abstergo. While playing contained houseguest, Desmond is told that he will be used in a machine called the Animus, which was created by Abstergo so that people could relive their ancestors' memories (sounds a bit like the Goa’uld and their genetic memory to me). He is to use the machine to relive the memories of his ancestors, specifically a Syrian Assassin from the middle ages, Altaïr ibn-La'Ahad.

    Altaïr’s Story: though trained to be an assassin from birth and managing to achieve the rank of master assassin at only 24, Altaïr’s behaviour is just a bit too arrogant and impulsive which inevitability catches up with him when Altaïr along with a few other assassins are tasked with retrieving a supposedly powerful artifact known only as The Apple, not only does Altaïr fail to gain the artifact he also breaks all the tenets which the assassin’s live by, resulting in the death of one of his fellow assassins and leading the Templars (their sworn enemies) back to their hideout in Masyaf. Cast into disgrace Altaïr is demoted back to novice level and tasked with the killing of nine targets in the hopes that he can redeem himself and retake his place in the order.   

    Setting: Syria 1191 during the Third Crusade. The cities of Masyaf, Acre, Jerusalem, Damascus and Arsuf all connected by a middle zone known as the Kingdom.

    Combat: As a former master assassin Altaïr has proficiencies in a variety of ways for stabbing people including the Hidden Blade, Short blade, Longs word, throwing knives and good old fists, you could also preform attacks with your sword from a horse (always high profile, cause you can’t help but show off). Combat could be played out in two ways:

    Low Profile: mostly preformed with the hidden blade (throwing knives are also a viable option) and the foe unaware, a low profile kill is less likely to draw attention to your location (if say you kill a roof top guard) you can perform a low profile kill on ground guards but the dense amount of people not to mention the sudden collapsing of someone with bloody wounds in their chest will make this one less successful in escaping notice.  

    High Profile: for those situations where stealth is just not possible or you just wanted to rush the guards to see if they’d pee themselves. You’d most likely use your long sword or if you really wanted to show how badass you were your short blade works almost as well. In high profile you are going to constantly draw the attention and ire of nearby guards til you pretty much end up with a nice circle of corpses on the ground.

    During combat you can switch between your weapons if you think one would work better than the other, though not really necessary. Unfortunately combat is pretty basic and somewhat repetitive for most multi-foe fights you either be counter attacking their attacks because they haven’t grasped the concept of charging at you more than one at a time or dodging back from the brute attacks.

    To keep synchronized with Altaïr you must blend in, so if you find your health low after combat find somewhere to blend in, the lack of action with restore your health.

    See me not: part of your job as an assassin is to blend in with the crowd so you can move about passing the guards without having to stab them who are all under some misguided assumption that they could actually have any hope of kicking your ass. To help you with the blending in part there are several steps you can take to do this:

    1)      Walk your horse past guards, cause apparently nothing screams I’m an assassin!!! Quite like galloping past the guys with the pointy bits of metal.

    2)      Stick with your fellow white robe wearing aficionados. While these scholarly chums think the quill is mightier than then sword, they will part citizens and guards alike allowing you to walk through with them.

    3)      Take a load off and sit on a bench, not only can you pass the time but you will have a nice vantage point with which to eavesdrop on conversations.

    4)      Rooftop gardens are awesome, not only do they provide some much needed shade but quite convenient hiding places from the guards that patrol the rooftops, cause you know only guards and spandex spangled superheros are meant to use the rooftops as any serious mode of transportation.

    5)      Take a roll in the hay, the surprising versatile stuff will not only conceal you from passing guards it can also absorb the impact of say a full grown man jumping off the spire of a nearby tower with little to no disturbance or the hay itself and no damage to said jump-ee. 

    Sometimes things don’t always go according to plan and you have to make a break for it, to utilize one of these hiding spots you need to break the line of sight on the guards or they won’t accept the time out and want to keep playing tag.

    Missions: You can’t just go up and stab someone…. Well you could but where is the fun in that? What you need is info and your fellow assassins have just what you need there are several ways to collect the information on your target, the more you have the easier the assassination but you don’t have to collect it all to do the job. Some ways of collecting the information include:

    Informants: do a small task for your fellow assassin and he’ll tell you what he knows.
    Pickpocket: just make sure you put your hand in the right pocket.
    Eavesdrop: benches make great places to listen in on the gossiping guards.
    Interrogation: some people just need a little help in talking, a couple of gut punches will have them spilling the beans along with any info they hold.
    Bureau: the Assassin hideout in each city will always have a piece of information for you; it is also where you must return at the end of each successful assassination.

    Assassinations: Now that you’ve gathered all your little tidbits, it all comes down to tracking down your target, waiting for the moment and then going in for the kill.  

    Side stuff and Collectables:

    Viewpoint: Mostly found at the top of tall pointy spires and the guard watchtowers. Altaïr uses these to get the lay of the land. they also help you defog your map, fill in points of interest and as a bonus you get to jump off them when you are done. viewpoints are always made from a wooden beam and eagles just love to nest there.

    Templars and Templar flags: throughout the kingdom you will find both the flags and the knights of the Templar which are a beefed up version of the normal guards, if the normal guards were 200 pound gorillas to begin with. Taking these out aren’t important it more for the completionists and the principal of the thing.

    Vigilantes: the guards of the cities abuse their power over the people, take down the ones displaying such acts and you’ll have made yourself some allies that will come to your aid if you are being chased by guards in the future.

    Beggars, pots and loons oh my!: sometimes while navigating your way through the city you will be accosted by beggars these women swarm in packs and can be extremely annoying not only do they hamper your movement but they also draw attention to you, something you really don’t need. There are a few ways you can deal with them but the best way is simply climb for the rooves where they can’t follow. Another hazard of the streets are the pot carriers they freak at most things and drop their items causing everyone to look your way, use a low profile push to safely move pass them and finally you have the loons who will actually push you around before laying into you here’s the kicker if the guards catch them at it they join in, so just back pedal and find another way.

    As always you can find my other game reviews here So Let's Talk: Assassin's Creed.

    • 34 posts
    October 31, 2012 12:02 PM EDT

    This game had such an incredibly attractive trailer before it came out that made me really want to play it without any knowledge about the game, and really had a good attention to detail that you didn't really find in any other game at its release. The birds on the roofs in the game were great and had a very lifelike feel, and the horses felt so 1:1 compared to other games at that time, red dead redemption of course did a good job on the horses (though they had too). The game textures and the scale of the cities were just amazing. and a very compelling story/ This game is just perfect. Assassin's Creed is a fantastic series that deserves a play by any hardcore gamer. I can't describe it other than "Perfect"

    • 1913 posts
    October 31, 2012 1:35 PM EDT
    I love the assassin's creed series. Even though IMO the only assassin's creed game with good multiplayer was brotherhood, that doesn't stop me from enjoying the other games. AC3 multiplayer for me is... Ok. It's better than it was in Revelations, but the players still run around like chickens with their heads cut off (in a STEALTH GAME!!!). Can't wait to see the rest of the single player mode
    • 377 posts
    October 31, 2012 2:19 PM EDT

    I'm really confused... why are we talking about the original Assassin's Creed??

    If we're going to be discussing the AC series as a whole, then it should be noted that the main reason I play them is for the story. I like a story that doesn't conflict or contradict the past games in the series, unlike which was done shamelessly in Revelations. To me the series died at the end of Brotherhood.

    • 342 posts
    October 31, 2012 4:42 PM EDT

    yes I loved the trailer for the game too, though the song choice was a little..weird. I still haven't haven't found a game that has done horses better then RDR, AC horses were ok in the sense that they looked good but the fact that they could barely navigate anything but flat ground was a bit off putting. the scale of the cities has only grown with each game and I'm loving it! I wouldn't call it perfect, the combat left a lot to be desired (so glad its improved now) and some of the side quests got a little repetitive, but it was still overall a good game.

    • 342 posts
    October 31, 2012 4:49 PM EDT

    this one is about the original AC because I'll be doing one for each title in the series on it own.