finished Assassin's Creed II...
Aug. 10th, 2010 07:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lyntekMost of the things I didn't like or was dissatisfied with in AC1 were pretty much fixed and then improved upon in AC2. Love, love, love the game, despite the simplistic story arc and the ninja ending.
The following review is a little spoilery, btw.
First, the bad...
I wish they'd get better writers. Seriously. When Minerva started talking to the fourth bloody fucking wall, that was the height of lulz for me. The entire concept for the game isn't terrible, but it's coming across as very noobish with the lack of subtlety and the unnecessary musings (since when did Altair sound like an emo 14-year-old, complete with criminal abuse of ellipses?) and the dissatisfying and simplistic motives behind the assassination targets. The longer speeches after being assassinated in AC1 were way more humanizing than the wham-snikt-kthnxbye assassinations in AC2. It says a lot that I can't distinguish one target from another -- I just kept following the game's nudges in the right direction without the slightest emotional investment in the antagonists.
After a long and satisfying introduction into Ezio's life and character, I was praying for a similarly long and satisfying ending. Sadly, this wasn't the case. D: Enduring several challenging assassinations just leads to a kind of meh finale that was Sequence 14 (seriously, I didn't even have to pop a Medicine), and an equally meh final battle with Rodrigo Borgia (counter attack fisticuffs ftw). Although WTF at Rodrigo agreeing to a fist fight. :/
Also, why are most of the villains grumpy old men? I'm all for vintage meat, but I wish they were a little more spread out. Most of the strapping young hot stuff are with the Assassins. WTB someone younger and more nefarious for an enemy that Ezio canhave wild angry sex with have a better connection with on some level.
The game's treatment of religion and established beliefs leaves a lot to be desired (which just leads back to WTB better writers, really). I'm all for a historical conspiracy theory, but unless it's going to be as well thought-out as Gabriel Knight II and III, I'm not gonna get into it.
The Assassins suddenly shifting their focus from the Templars to saving the world from an upcoming solar flare (or return of Those Who Came Before?) was just so...erm. No idea how to feel about that. I know they want to leave the foundations for a bigger, badder sequel, but, really. I kind of wish they'd just kept the intrigue to history (SO much more they could explore -- am hopeful they'd dig into Ancient Egypt at one point, or as the sibling entity said, run around a bit in China), but guess I'll just have to wait and see.
QTEs are evil. I turn my head for a split second while someone's talking and I return to the tail end of a vanishing prompt telling me to PRESS HAND TO INTERACT. Missing these prompts results in sitting through a slightly lamer version of the cutscene (except for one time when one of these prompts actually results in someone's death). THIS RESULTED IN ME NOT HAVING HUGGED BACK LEONARDO, WHICH UPSETS ME TO NO END. It was a good couple of days of gameplay and collecting by that point, so restarting the entire game just for a hug was as palatable as spoilt rice, but he looked so freaking disappointed and I felt so freaking bad Dx. Ezio's such a leech, the least he could do was hug the poor guy. The worst part is, one can't restart a segment 'cause Ubisoft is evil like that, and it's autosave. Grrrrrrr.
Then the good...
Characters sooo much better this time around (although Altair and Malik will always be the original badasses). I adore most of the side characters (especially Leonardo ♥). Also much better dialogue.
Sdsldkfjslafjk Ezio. He got kind of too rambo at the end, but omggg the first 3/4ths of the game was lovely. I love that the game started slow and eased the player into his life, with his adorable family and his utterly wibble-worthy Italian nomness.
THE ITALIAN. IT HAS SUBS. ♥ One of the things I was really iffy about on AC1 was the authenticity of the language they used.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
summerbreeze21 has been enlightening in this respect -- AC1 was riddled with mistranslations and poor Arabic accents. Still have to read up on AC2 impressions, but sldjflasdjf they even employed such adorable hand gestures. Could not help but melt.
Instead of just enduring a mission, I found myself actually having fun in most of them -- big leap from AC1. Figuring out how to kill one target on a boat, surrounded by soldiers, while not being detected, etc. etc. was actually enjoyable with all the options Ezio had at his disposal.
The graphics ♥. Gorgeous in-game environments and lovely cutscenes. Couldn't ask for more (well, I could -- I still want a hotter arch enemy).
More reasonable checkpoints, even toward the end. One of the biggest fears of autosaves is spending thirty minutes trying to accomplish the mission then slipping up, falling to your death, and then respawning miles away from where you originally were. Not something to worry about in AC2, thank goodness.
3+ hours of cutscenes, although a good part of it was just people wondering how to go about killing the new threat to free will.
SO MANY MORE THINGS TO DO. A villa to renovate, weapons to unlock, viewpoints to hunt, codex pages to collect, etc. The downside is that it all kind of runs out midway, and if you've been investing in the villa, you're left with nothing to spend the tons of money you finally have.
A few quotes I loved...
"Luridi codardi! I'll take you all on! At the same time! With one arm -- no BOTH arms -- tied behind my back! You must be wondering how this is even POSSIBLE. Only release me and I'll gladly demonstrate, miserabili pezzi di merda!"
~ Bartolomeo d'Alviano
"Let me out! Let me out! I swear, once I'm free of this cage, I'm going to make it my mission to sever each and every one of your fucking heads and shove them up your fucking asses! And I've no intention of matching heads to asses either!"
~ Bartolomeo d'Alviano
"You must help him! That pretty face is his only asset!"
~ Federico Auditore da Firenze, while talking to a doctor about Ezio's messed up face
Maria: "You need a more creative outlet."
Ezio: "I have plenty of outlets."
Maria: "I mean besides vaginas."
~ Ezio and Ezio's mum. XD
"Requiescat in pace, you bastard."
~ Ezio Auditore da Firenze
Ugh, missed a few that I wanted to jot down, mostly from Caterina Sforza. Anyway...
A few in-game caps...
♥ Leap of Faith ♥
Also shameless use of these two promo images as my celphone's wallpaper and screensaver respectively:
My system couldn't run the game at full graphics all the time, especially with large crowds or in grassy areas. So no caps of action scenes or more interesting events :/ Lots of those around the Net already, anyway.
There's a prequel in the form of movie shorts that Ubisoft released recently called Assassin's Creed: Lineage, totaling 35 minutes. The story shows scenes of Ezio's father, Giovanni Auditore, and his life as an assassin. ♥
Ubisoft's developing Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, a direct sequel to II with Ezio still the main protagonist (more Ezio! And Leonardo's still there ♥). They've announced that Assassin's Creed III will have a new protagonist though, so Ezio's story will end with Brotherhood.
ETA: fixed the broken image links, sorry about that
The following review is a little spoilery, btw.
First, the bad...
I wish they'd get better writers. Seriously. When Minerva started talking to the fourth bloody fucking wall, that was the height of lulz for me. The entire concept for the game isn't terrible, but it's coming across as very noobish with the lack of subtlety and the unnecessary musings (since when did Altair sound like an emo 14-year-old, complete with criminal abuse of ellipses?) and the dissatisfying and simplistic motives behind the assassination targets. The longer speeches after being assassinated in AC1 were way more humanizing than the wham-snikt-kthnxbye assassinations in AC2. It says a lot that I can't distinguish one target from another -- I just kept following the game's nudges in the right direction without the slightest emotional investment in the antagonists.
After a long and satisfying introduction into Ezio's life and character, I was praying for a similarly long and satisfying ending. Sadly, this wasn't the case. D: Enduring several challenging assassinations just leads to a kind of meh finale that was Sequence 14 (seriously, I didn't even have to pop a Medicine), and an equally meh final battle with Rodrigo Borgia (counter attack fisticuffs ftw). Although WTF at Rodrigo agreeing to a fist fight. :/
Also, why are most of the villains grumpy old men? I'm all for vintage meat, but I wish they were a little more spread out. Most of the strapping young hot stuff are with the Assassins. WTB someone younger and more nefarious for an enemy that Ezio can
The game's treatment of religion and established beliefs leaves a lot to be desired (which just leads back to WTB better writers, really). I'm all for a historical conspiracy theory, but unless it's going to be as well thought-out as Gabriel Knight II and III, I'm not gonna get into it.
The Assassins suddenly shifting their focus from the Templars to saving the world from an upcoming solar flare (or return of Those Who Came Before?) was just so...erm. No idea how to feel about that. I know they want to leave the foundations for a bigger, badder sequel, but, really. I kind of wish they'd just kept the intrigue to history (SO much more they could explore -- am hopeful they'd dig into Ancient Egypt at one point, or as the sibling entity said, run around a bit in China), but guess I'll just have to wait and see.
QTEs are evil. I turn my head for a split second while someone's talking and I return to the tail end of a vanishing prompt telling me to PRESS HAND TO INTERACT. Missing these prompts results in sitting through a slightly lamer version of the cutscene (except for one time when one of these prompts actually results in someone's death). THIS RESULTED IN ME NOT HAVING HUGGED BACK LEONARDO, WHICH UPSETS ME TO NO END. It was a good couple of days of gameplay and collecting by that point, so restarting the entire game just for a hug was as palatable as spoilt rice, but he looked so freaking disappointed and I felt so freaking bad Dx. Ezio's such a leech, the least he could do was hug the poor guy. The worst part is, one can't restart a segment 'cause Ubisoft is evil like that, and it's autosave. Grrrrrrr.
Then the good...
Characters sooo much better this time around (although Altair and Malik will always be the original badasses). I adore most of the side characters (especially Leonardo ♥). Also much better dialogue.
Sdsldkfjslafjk Ezio. He got kind of too rambo at the end, but omggg the first 3/4ths of the game was lovely. I love that the game started slow and eased the player into his life, with his adorable family and his utterly wibble-worthy Italian nomness.
THE ITALIAN. IT HAS SUBS. ♥ One of the things I was really iffy about on AC1 was the authenticity of the language they used.
summerbreeze21 has been enlightening in this respect -- AC1 was riddled with mistranslations and poor Arabic accents. Still have to read up on AC2 impressions, but sldjflasdjf they even employed such adorable hand gestures. Could not help but melt.Instead of just enduring a mission, I found myself actually having fun in most of them -- big leap from AC1. Figuring out how to kill one target on a boat, surrounded by soldiers, while not being detected, etc. etc. was actually enjoyable with all the options Ezio had at his disposal.
The graphics ♥. Gorgeous in-game environments and lovely cutscenes. Couldn't ask for more (well, I could -- I still want a hotter arch enemy).
More reasonable checkpoints, even toward the end. One of the biggest fears of autosaves is spending thirty minutes trying to accomplish the mission then slipping up, falling to your death, and then respawning miles away from where you originally were. Not something to worry about in AC2, thank goodness.
3+ hours of cutscenes, although a good part of it was just people wondering how to go about killing the new threat to free will.
SO MANY MORE THINGS TO DO. A villa to renovate, weapons to unlock, viewpoints to hunt, codex pages to collect, etc. The downside is that it all kind of runs out midway, and if you've been investing in the villa, you're left with nothing to spend the tons of money you finally have.
A few quotes I loved...
"Luridi codardi! I'll take you all on! At the same time! With one arm -- no BOTH arms -- tied behind my back! You must be wondering how this is even POSSIBLE. Only release me and I'll gladly demonstrate, miserabili pezzi di merda!"
~ Bartolomeo d'Alviano
"Let me out! Let me out! I swear, once I'm free of this cage, I'm going to make it my mission to sever each and every one of your fucking heads and shove them up your fucking asses! And I've no intention of matching heads to asses either!"
~ Bartolomeo d'Alviano
"You must help him! That pretty face is his only asset!"
~ Federico Auditore da Firenze, while talking to a doctor about Ezio's messed up face
Maria: "You need a more creative outlet."
Ezio: "I have plenty of outlets."
Maria: "I mean besides vaginas."
~ Ezio and Ezio's mum. XD
"Requiescat in pace, you bastard."
~ Ezio Auditore da Firenze
Ugh, missed a few that I wanted to jot down, mostly from Caterina Sforza. Anyway...
A few in-game caps...
♥ Leap of Faith ♥
Also shameless use of these two promo images as my celphone's wallpaper and screensaver respectively:
My system couldn't run the game at full graphics all the time, especially with large crowds or in grassy areas. So no caps of action scenes or more interesting events :/ Lots of those around the Net already, anyway.
There's a prequel in the form of movie shorts that Ubisoft released recently called Assassin's Creed: Lineage, totaling 35 minutes. The story shows scenes of Ezio's father, Giovanni Auditore, and his life as an assassin. ♥
Ubisoft's developing Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, a direct sequel to II with Ezio still the main protagonist (more Ezio! And Leonardo's still there ♥). They've announced that Assassin's Creed III will have a new protagonist though, so Ezio's story will end with Brotherhood.
ETA: fixed the broken image links, sorry about that
