EGX 09: Assassins Creed 2 Hands-On
The original Assassin’s Creed split opinions like Marmite. I was a fan of it but agreed that it needed more variety. Luckily, Ubisoft seem to have listened to the fans and critics and have expanded AC in almost every aspect in the sequel.
The lighting looks great during the day.
The most notable improvement is one that I couldn’t fully appreciate in my playtime at the expo, more mission types and structures. There are 15 individual mission types and Ubi Montreal have set up a mission system that allows them to seamlessly flow one type of mission into another, allowing over 200 unique side missions. Old bores like eavesdropping and pickpocketing have also been removed and replaced with things like archer assassination and robber. There are also catacombs and caves to explore in a more enclosed, Prince of Persia style of gameplay. There is also an economic system with you buying better equipment and even repairing your villa hideout and hometown. From what I saw the game seemed to flow from one mission to the other without leaving you wondering where to go next. There was a lot more interaction with supporting characters and obvious reason as to why you were taking on these tasks, the whole thing seemed a bit less contrived.
The lighting looks great at night.
The game giving you more to do is great, but the second main improvement is that it gives you more ways to do it. Ezio has many more moves than Altair in both combat and traversal. Ezio can swing around corners on hanging baskets or ropes, it may not sound like much but it’s a key move that connects free-running paths at angles through the cities and essentially means you only ever have to slow down if you want someone dead. There is also the highly publicised ability to swim which in a city like Venice, is vital. Ezio is also a lot more handy in combat than Altair, he can can use a far wider arsenal than his predecessor and can expand this arsenal further by disarming enemies and using their own weapon against them. Overall the combat felt a bit more varied but it still fell into the basic pattern of dodge or block then counter is still present. As well as weapons to use in direct combat you also have weapons and gadgets to help you get to and assassinate your target. You can use hookers or beggars to lure guards away from their posts; poison guards so that they collapse dramatically causing a distraction or you can drop a smoke bomb so that you can disappear like a ninja.
I feel that I should mention that the build I was playing at the expo was a month old and had some frame-rate issues. If these issues make their way into the final game then they could severely hurt the overall experience but with AC2 being Ubi’s biggest game of the year I doubt that they would let that happen.
Overall AC2 is a sequel that plays it safe, with improved graphics, gameplay, presentation, far more variety and twice the hidden blades it looks to be what we expected, one of the best games of the year.
Figured I’d re-read this and then compare it with the way the game turned out, I’m glad they fixed the frame-rate issues