Assassin's Creed®: Director's Cut

hth

A perfectly good engine that has some fairly unimpressive stabs at a game thrown into it. Possibly worth owning for the hilarity of needing between 70 and 80 seconds to quit (as opposed to hitting 'Esc' and clicking on 'Quit') : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwOvuY0UbFM As GOG are relaunching and trying to shake the values that gave them their acronym originally, I can think of no better game to help them with this than Assassin's Creed - a game that is neither old nor good.

Why do I say the above? The concept is great. Makes you want to play, but then you get into the meat of the game. You have use a machine to take over the bodies of your past relatives... So the writers clearly do not understand time paradoxes for one, and this is just a dumb concept for another. Who comes up with this stuff? No one religious should play this as its story is a blatant attack on multiple religions. So much so, the game gives you a warning about it at the very beginning that we are not to be offended. Interesting. Then comes the repetitive game play. Same thing over and over and over again. Not any real creative ways to play your craft. Mostly running away, climb something, drop on target, rinse and repeat. On the positive side, the locations are interesting to explore... Just that the core game itself isn't.

Note: This review is based off a playthrough done on the Xbox Series S Truly one of the most infuriating, painful gaming experiences I've ever played. The level of world simulation is awful, navigating crowds and trying to remain the "Blade in the crowd" that the Order of Assassins claim to be is near impossible with how the various pedestrian NPCs interact with Altair. There is almost no creativity, no real thought required in the assassinations, they almost all end with either hand-to-hand combat (which is awful) or with a chase sequence. The story is pretty good, actually, the conversations Altair has with his targets after assassinating them are well written, and seeing how he changes from these conversations is interesting. Anything set in the modern day Abstergo facility is boring and mostly pointless, but don't tend to last very long.

I had forgotton just how unbelivably frustrating and insulting the begining of this game was. Ive had it on steam since launch etc, and was so very glad to see it here on our beloved GOG for peants in yet another great GoG Sale. However the breathtakingly over long Lab scence and the worst dumming down and tiresome "traing" sequence in gaming history BEFORE you are ALLOWED to play the game properly, should earn this game the WORST and most patronising start to any game in History! WHY the "makers" could not have included a simple "SKIP" button at any stage is beyond me? Such was the arrogance and mindlessmness of the "Team" that sat around a table and decided the structure of this thing, and unfortunatly this spread to the rest of the series, ie Black Flag etc. I would love to meet the people that created this nightmare, preferably in a dark alley, WTF were they thinking, and worst of all why did "gamers" put up with it? (Still) The Historical concpt and graphic were brilliant, the stories belivable and interesting but the whole is ruied by the constant interuption of the "Lab" sequences which only serve to break the immersion of the main plot and game. Thanks to GOG for thir on going brilliance and Attitude toward gaming, the game is made slightly more playable due to the simple fact that GOG don't make you junp thru hoops to play tthe bloody thing or insisit you go via the pointless UPLAY nightmare. which is why i now buy ALL my games exclusively with GOG! I Love GOG but hate this games makers. and at 3.39 euro !!! was worth the rant!