So is it any good? And how does it compare to previous sneaky games, particularly Thief 3?
the SO got a copy but says he’s not going to play until he finishes Hellgate:London…
I can hear the poor unopened plastic container whimpering for some attention - it’s torture, i’m tellin ya!
Wonder if the SO would accept the “what’s yours is mine and whats mine is mine. Besides, someone had to pay attention to the poor neglected thing” ? =)
I’ve been playing it for a few days now. The game’s pretty awesome, as far as I’m concerned. To be honest, it feels more like a really good casual gamer’s game, though. The difficulty level isn’t that high, and the storyline, while appreciably interesting, is advanced rather simplistically.
All that’s great if you only have an hour or so to play after work, but if you’re more into hardcore sneaking, Dark Project was definitely better.
Also, AC is simply not that fun of a sneaking game if you only sneak. It’s possible to do it, but the zones you are able to run around in are simply too large to warrant keeping covert the entire time. Plus, you’ll want to start fights in order to save citizens.
Personally, I like the combat system so much that I start fights at almost every opportunity. Once you master the counter, dodge, and knife throwing system you can take down literally dozens of guards at a time. It’s quite exciting and responsive, actually. And, considering how hard they hit, it’s also thrilling for the risk.
Mostly, though, AC is just a beautiful, stylish game. The combat system is ace, and the story ain’t bad. I recommend it, but if you’re looking for another Thief, you’re going to be disappointed. In Thief you snuck around decent sized mansions. In AC, you run across the rooftops of huge cities. The hero of AC is definitely more of a sword-wielding assassin action hero.
I’ve been tempted to get it for the PC because I wanted it when it came out for consoles, but sadly I don’t own a PS3 or 360 yet. I think my computer can handle it. I have Orange Box and I can play Portal, albeit a teensy bit laggy but nothing that completely ruins the game.
I don’t know if I should wait until I get a PS3 (which I will in the future) and play it on the console, or just buy it now for the PC. Are the controls drastically different, easier/better, etc.?
I’ve played it on both PC and PS3. I can’t really tell the difference, actually. I like the extra camera control I have with the PC, though.
I was hoping for a cross between Hitman and Oblivion, if that makes any sense, and was initially disappointed. It’s pretty much impossible to play the game stealthily unless you completely ignore a bunch of objectives, and for all that it’s a huge game with relatively few restrictions on your actions, the story proceeds in a very linear fashion.
But, I’ve completely gotten over that, and am just enjoying it for what it is. I mean, scale the cathedral in Acre and perch on the very tip of the cross, and just try not to get vertigo.
I do wish the dialog weren’t so horribly repetitive, though.
Yeah, there’s quite a few repetitive sequences (read: citizen rescues) that I wish I could skip over. I’ve actually had guards attacking me while unable to defend myself due to being informed for the 1,000th time that vigilantes can help me escape.
The PC version does let you skip more running around than the X-Box 360 or PS3 versions, though! More Fast Forward points!
And, being afraid of heights, it really freaked me out climbing up that cathedral.
My two thoughts (I have only seen videos of people playing the game, I’ve never played it myself.)
One: In the videos I’ve seen, the player character would engage a group of knights and start fighting them, and he’d be fighting with one knight at a time, while the rest of the knights just stood around holding their dicks. That’s right, the assassin and the one knight would be hacking away at each other with swords, and all the other knights would just be standing there, watching one of their comrades, someone they probably were good friends with and spent many an evening joking and reminiscing in taverns and trained together, get slaughtered. And THEN the next knight would jump in and engage the player, while the others continued to stand around.
Maybe this was just a shitty, early version of the game that I saw. Is this what it’s actually like? Because in real life, three knights would be lunging at the assassin and holding him down while a fourth knight cut his throat. None of that one-at-a-time bullshit.
Two: Why does everything have to have such a drab, washed-out looking brown-grey color scheme? If they’re going to set the game in a Mid-Eastern setting, why can’t they put beautiful colorful tapestries and tents and bright vivid colors everywhere and stuff? Why does everything have to look so dull and dusty?
On the first point, this does happen at the beginning of the game. I think it may be to get you acclimated. However, things change pretty quickly.
Right now I’m in part 4 of the game. Most fights now, I have people shooting arrows at me, I’m blocking three attacks in a row from different knights, etc. Overall, though, the knights do seem to hold back from just bum rushing you.
I think there’s a very valid reason for this. At this point in the game, the knights know about you. They’re also familiar with your brotherhood of assassins. Quite rightfully, they’re just a bit scared of you. Especially when you take down the first two of them in under 3 seconds in fantastic, bloody style.
Also note that when you kill someone with one of the combos, you often blind other knights with the blood spray.
The combat is a little boring if you just sit back and try to counter their attacks for easy kills. I don’t do that. I shift my attacks fluidly between one guard to the next, blocking when needed. I have guards try to get me in the back all the time, but if you’re quick, you just dodge+counter+cut the poor sob’s throat in a second. Then, with the extra room you’ve managed to get, throw a knife into another guy’s face.
These knights SHOULD be afraid to rush you.
Eventually, guards start running away from you. It’s your choice whether or not you want to chase them down.
As to the second question, I think it has to do with the “memory” quality of the game. Things are washed out a bit because of the memory aspect. Also, you’re talking about the Middle East here. I think a lot of people expect it to be dusty there. People didn’t harp about the cleanliness of everything quite so much back then, I’ll wager.
You only see the really vivid colors, tapestries, statues, etc. when you start assassinating more important people. For example, the last guy in Block 3 lives in a very ornate palace. And for a breathtaking landscape view, go to the guard tower viewpoint closest to the beach in Block 3 or 4.
I enjoyed Assassin’s Creed okay, but while I was playing it, I kept thinking, “I love the climbing mechanic, but I wish it had the stealth system from Thief.” When I finished it, I loaded up Thief II, and found myself thinking, “I love the stealth system, but I wish it had the climbing mechanic from Assassin’s Creed.”
So I bought it, and it’s gorgeous. I’ve only played for twenty minutes or so, but am having a really hard time getting used to the controls. Am I the only one?
Also, is there an easy way to exit the game? From what I can tell, it takes about ten mouse clicks through various menus to just exit the damn thing.
One of my biggest complaints about the game is exactly that and the autosave scheme which sucks. I want to be able to save my game when I’m done playing, not be told by the devs when I have to play to. I really don’t know what the devs were thinking!
I usually wait until I do something that saves the game, then kill the app (ALT + F4)
As for the control scheme, it’s not very well laid out, though you cna customize it in the options. I ended up just using my xbox 360 controller.
It’s very much a console game ported to PC, and it shows in those respects. The exiting thing drives me batty too. I moved the keyboard controls a bit (just swapped Shift and Space, really) because I’m used to Shift modifying run/walk type stuff in other games, but other than that I haven’t had any real trouble with the control scheme. Except that it would be nice if you could map specific commands to keys/buttons instead of everything being contextual, but that’s just a console thing. For example, I very much wish that I could map blend to Ctrl and sprint to Shift, instead of them both being the same key dependent on whether I’m holding the right mouse button.
When does it save my game? I thought it was whenever it says “checkpoint reached,” but that doesn’t seem to be the case after all. It keeps returning me to this point just before I talk to a bureau leader, even though I hit a few checkpoints after my discussion with him.
I’d like to stop talking to this bureau leader.
-FrL-
Yeah that’s another thing, it’s not clear when or where you’ll end up since it’s not clear when the game actually saves. Sometimes you get the “saving” message, and sometimes you don’t, but it still saves – but nto all the time. Damn confusing.
I did notice that even if you do save, you don’t pop back up at the same spot, you are usually dumped back to the bureau, and if you didn’t finish an assassination or a particular informer task it resets that assassination/task to the time before you received it. However, everything else you did is saved. So if you killed a templar, reached a look out point, or captured a flag, those will still be gone from the game world.
FWIW, on the console version, that’s exactly how it behaves. It saves your accomplishments (interrogations, high points, pickpockets, citizens in distress, etc), but always starts you back at the bureau after you quit & restart. It’s part of the whole “reliving memories” business. You don’t have to talk to the bureau chief each time, you can just leave.
In the PC version, apparently, you do have to talk to the bureau guy. I don’t have an assassination mission anymore unless I talk to him again.
:mad:
There’s not some way to skip through dialogues is there? Also, is there a way to do subtitles? I haven’t found one.
-FrL-
So I beat the game.
Using lots of ALT+F4 to exit, and skipping the mind numbingly boring side quests and completing only the necessary ones actually had me enjoying the game for the most part.
It took about 12 hours or so. I suppose if you went around trying to cpature all the little flags or doing all six informaiton missions per assassination it might take longer. But why do that? There are no achivements in the Pc version so the flag thing is rather pointless, and the information missions, unfortunately, do not in any way affect how the assassinations play out.
The story itself was rather interesting if you ignore the silliness that is the animus itself. Although I was getting Davinci Code flashbacks on occassion. The ending wasn’t as satisfying as I would have liked, but that might have to wait until the end of the trilogy.
The moment that really took me into the game was when assassinating Talal (I think that was his name). He isn’t looking for a direct confrontation and sends his men after you while he makes an escape. Chasing him through the rooftops and streets of the city was so damn cool. There was one moment when I lost sight of him an there was two ways he could have gone, just by looking at the pattern and reaction of the people on the street I was able to correctly guess which way he had taken. So cool.
Unfortunately none of the other missions were as exciting as that one.
Be sure to log back in to the animus when the game is over (and the credits finish rolling) for a little synopsis on Altair.
That’s interesting, I have almost the opposite feeling. I completed the first assassination or two by doing the minimal amount of investigation, and once I had done the investigations, I climbed no more buildings, saved no more citizens, etc, thinking it would be boring because repetitive. This, however, left me with a distinct feeling of “Is that it?”
So I started doing all the tower climbs, all the citizen saves, all the informer quests, all the investigations and so on. It’s repetitive in a sense, but somehow I get a kick out of it nevertheless. One thing is that different instances of these kinds of quests often present unique challenges–what’s my best escape route if things go badly?–How am I supposed to get to that tower?–and so on.
Plus there’s the fact that completeing the side quests increases your health bar, which you’ve shown isn’t necessary to win but it’s a nice “badge” anyway.
-FrL-
True, and it’s the only game mechanic reason for collecting the flags in the PC version (I completed the game on the XBOX and did all sidequests so I got a bunch of achievements). The extra investigations give you a little more info on strategies to take when performing an assassination. The viewpoints open up the map for you. The flags do nothing other than increase your bar.
However, there are more sidequests than life bar increases. Eventually, your life bar just stops. So if you really don’t want to do the flag quests and the kill all templar quest (which also gives you no in-game benefit aside from life bar increase), you can probably still maximize your life bar.
BTW, if you want a really good site that gives the location of all the flags and templars overlaid on the in-game maps, as well as screen captures of each when you mouse over the locations, check out here: http://www.assassinscreed-maps.com/
I always use maps like these for “find the hidden flag/frog/etc.” side quests. I enjoy the fact that I get to see the various scenery built into the game, but I really don’t have the patience to look in every nook and cranny to find everything.