Game Stooge

REVIEW: Assassin’s Creed II (360/PS3)

• Scribbled on November 21st, 2009 by Jonah Falcon
• Filed in Action, Microsoft Xbox 360, Reviews, Sony PlayStation 3

The original Assassin’s Creed was one of those games that gamers would have loved, but had enough issues to earn it mediocre reviews and gamers venting frustration (review.) Developer Ubisoft Montreal heard the complaints, and took great pains to amend them, making one of the best games of the year.

Asassin’s Creed II takes place immediately after the first game. Desmond Miles has just finished living the life of Altair, an Assassin living in the time of the third Holy Crusade in 1191, and has escaped the clutches of the modern Templars, spirited away from their base of operations by fellow Assassin Lucy Stillman (fetchingly voiced by Kristen Bell once more.) The Assassins need to find out vital information about the location of some ancient, curiously advanced technology called Pieces of Eden, and the location of a mysterious cache called The Vault. They need Desmond to keep looking in the past, and they have him inhabit another Assassin, this one living in the time of the Italian Renaissance in the late 15th Century, Ezio Auditore.

This time, you literally live his life. You experience his birth, then live his young adult life as a carefree young adult in Florence. Much of it is a tutorial, but it also serves to allow the player to invest emotional involvement with Ezio. Unlike Altair, you get to understand why Ezio becomes an Assassin. Altair was a cipher; Ezio is in it for revenge and passion.

You also get to learn more about Desmond himself, as well as Lucy and new conspirators. While both are Hollywood Spunky Assistants (once is the Snarky Geek Brit, the other is the Wisecracking Tough Valley Girl), they, too, become familar characters. Desmond gets more to actually do this time around, even though you sparingly see him this time around after he gets in the Animus 2.0™.  During the end credits, he gets to do stuff you’d been waiting for him to do for the past two games; it’s a true “hell yeah” moment.

Experienced Assassin’s Creed players will appreciate the old and new gameplay mechanics. The biggest change are the light RPG additions. For one, money is now a part of the game. Ezio, unlike Altair, is a paid Assassin. He can earn florin by completing missions, pickpocketing citizens, finding treasure chests scattered around the cities, and taking money off incapacitated foes; it’s fun to watch the horrified reaction of passerby when you loot dead bodies. Ezio in turn uses the money to buy weapons, ammunition such as throwing daggers, and other things that will improve his estate. It’s particularly fun to upgrade the estate in that it slowly goes from a boarded up, dilapidated mansion to a shiny, marble home that rivals most museums. The better your home, the more money it generates, so buying Lady with an Ermine by Leonardo da Vinci isn’t just scenery – it’s necessary. So go ahead and renovate the brothel in your town – it’ll pay for itself.

One of the side effects of having mission based gameplay is that assassinations are no longer restricted to just bosses. You now have Assassination missions that task you into taking out certain targets. In fact, all assassinations, boss or otherwise, no longer have the prelude of having to scope information about the target – you just go and do it. The game now takes a series of linear, if relatively lengthy, missions before going after the main guy, but in true open world style, you can take your time before doing it. Some of the missions are basic, like beating up unfaithful husbands, while others are time trials. Also, some special missions have you delving into six dungeons to grab seals that allow you to unlock the most powerful armor of all: Altair’s.

There’s a ton of exploration to be done in AC2 as well. The cities, three in all including Florence and Venice, are massive, in comparison with the cities from the first game. There’s never any lack of things to do or sights to see. The city of Florence itself is a marvel to behold, as it includes some of the most famous architecture in history, such as Santa Maria del Fiore whose dome was built by Filippo Brunelleschi, as well as the Ponte Vecchio and the Piazza della Repubblica. Venice has its landmarks, but don’t compare to the beauty of Florence; it does have its trademark canals, though, and Ezio can actually swim, unlike his predecessor; fortunately, enemies can’t swim.

As before, combat is basically a ballet of attacks, counters and dodges, with some finishing moves given some brutal closeups. Ezio can now disarm opponents while fighting barehanded, often dispatching the now weaponless enemy easily. It’s the only way to fight with polearms, whose length makes them particularly effective in combat with multiple enemies. Ezio will discard enemy weapons, but he can now purchase multiple types of weapons, such as swords, maces and daggers. Each weapon is individually rated for speed, damage and parrying ability. With each weapon comes new coupe de grace animations; maces, for instance, feature head-flattening finishing moves.

Ezio now has new methods of sneaking and hiding as well.  For one, Ezio can join any group of people and blend in, at any time, unlike Altair’s limitation of joining a group of monks. Ezio can even hire a group of people to blend with; if he hires prostitutes, he can have them distract enemies. Thieves will distract guards and draw them away, while mercenaries will simply run up and fight the enemy. Ezio can use other methods as well – he can toss coins on the ground to cause greedy citizens to pounce on the area, grabbing for money. Ezio can discreetly poison armed enemies, which will make them swing their weapon wildly before dying. AC2’s best comedy comes from tossing coins near a group of guards, then poisoning one or two of them while they’re distracted. They’ll start swinging and killing nearby citizens and other guards; it’s fun, assassin-style. It’s also amusing to watch citizens watching a spectacle; they’ll circle around the action, keeping a safe distance, and shout appropriate comments.

There are some negatives, however. One of the problems that remain from the first game is the clumsy context sensitivity. Often, Ezio will dive into a nearby haystack or jump on a horse without the player wanting to at all. Wall jumping can be clumsy, and sometimes deadly when Ezio decides to rebound off a wall rather than jump straight up. The game occasionally suffers from graphic pop-in as well. The tomb raiding sequences can be particularly frustrating, since the game’s controls are not intended for the kind of acrobatics seen in Tomb Raider or Prince of Persia. In addition, a lot of Ezio’s resources and the new method of assassination make the game fairly easy. Having the entire city guard on your ass in the first game was incredibly difficult to escape at times; in AC2, sometimes just running straight away will get the guards off your back. The boss assassinations can be embarrassingly easy, as well.

Rome looms over the game, and it’s disappointing when Rome consists of a single, linear hallway – though it’s extremely fun to do as you dispatch hapless guards one by one. Any hope of mounting the Sistine Chapel or visiting the Coleseum are dashed, though one can easily see a Rome DLC coming from Ubisoft.

Fortunately, the game provides a ton of gameplay, providing 15-20 hours of single player campaign, while the post-game has a ton of collection to do. Unlike the first game’s flag hunt, the sequel’s collection is pretty fun. Finding glyphs result in finding videos and engaging puzzle minigames. Eagle feathers form the new flag hunt, but fits within the plot regarding a grieving mother and her slain young son.

Overall, the game is one of the surprises of the year. While it was generally assumed to be good, no one thought it would be a candidate for Game of the Year. Despite some of its lingering faults, Assassin’s Creed II is a superbly crafted improvement over the first game, with an affecting story that will leave gamers hungering for III.

[Postscript: By the way, something I didn't initially note in the review: I'm a little disappointed they only briefly mentioned and essentially skipped over The Bonfire of the Vanities and Girolamo Savonarola. He'd have been a perfect villian. He was executed in 1498; you could have had Ezio assassinate him.]