Assassin’s Creed 2

Assassin’s Creed 2

I told erastes I would give this game a shot and the good news is I finished it in a week. I loved the wandering around in history part of the storyline. I also loved that they had totally re-engineered the game play from the original.

I even loved the fact that unlike the last game this was not just a more “historically accurate” Prince Of Persia ripoff that turns into a slow moving you must sneak everywhere or else “GOTCHA!” game.

Now the first Assassin’s Creed was unfortunate in that if you moved quickly or got noticed at any given moment the game would immediately smash you like a small bug. It was frustrating in repetition, slow in movement, and thus was of limited enjoyment. In fact I liked Assassin’s Creed 2 so much more I went back to “try” and play the first game again despite it’s problems and still found it a solid FAIL.

The good news is Assassin’s Creed 2 is nothing like the frustrating first game but it does have it’s moments.

The controls in Assassin’s Creed 2… ARGH! OK, let me explain. Take the B button for example which can be used to grab an object or drop down from a ledge. Now if you are in the game playing along doing your thing and you happen to find yourself on a ledge trying to grab an object… Most likely the B button is going to do the very thing you do not want it to do. This happened again and again and again and with other button combinations too. So the overlapping controls that had to be used in the same scene were pure garbage.

Earning money in Assassin’s Creed 2… WTF? OK I am an experienced player in these type of games so very early I figured out the best bet was to go around making as much money as I could to buy all the art that was available so the villa starts generating an income I could use to get through the game. That way I did not have to repeatedly try to pull off the pickpocketing which would probably become harder later on in the game when they start trying to penalize you for the slightest infractions by killing your ass. So eventually I started making BUCKETS OF MONEY far too easily.

I ended up quickly revamping the entire villa and then some and that architect dude kept hanging around for no good reason. Why not have him at least take money for the upkeep of the villa or let you buy another villa or go farm something to keep him busy? I was expecting to buy something else with all that money because I bought every weapon and hired people for no reason but to follow me around not doing anything in particular but nothing ever came up that really cost that much so it became sorta a disappointment.

I must say again I liked the history part of the story and I found that historical detail original and did not feel like I was being lectured to on those aspects at all. It was the sci-fi/secret world controlling conspiracies that were cliched and boring. The static picture puzzles and the whole Adam and Eve video deal ended up being pretty hokey. I like my puzzles as part of the game play not something so simplistic and static that it stops the whole game to look like some Nintendo DS mental challenge no matter how many classic paintings and photos are used.

So it was a mixed bag for me and maybe it is unfair that I ended up comparing it to Prince of Persia since that game has a purely myth based storyline with more latitude. I still kinda like Prince of Persia a bit better for it’s controls and more interactive puzzles but I admit I found Assassin’s Creed 2 a much improved and interesting sequel and worth the time spent despite the obvious flaws. Let’s face it things could have only gotten better and they did.

Grade A

Tags: Grade A, Video Games