GamingCrazy’s Assassins Creed Review Can you keep to the creed? 
Story
It’s 1191 A.D. Your name is Altair, You’re an Assassin. After failing to stick to the creed and disappointing your leader on an important mission, you pay penalty of losing all your weapons and you find yourself demoted to a student as you were when you first joined the brotherhood. To gain the trust of the leader and the brotherhood you must carry out nine assassinations against threats of the brotherhood and the Holy Land and slowly work your way up the ranking to prove your loyalty as one of the best assassins of the brotherhood.
Presentation
With the big spoiler given out straight from the beginning, I’ll try my best to describe Assassins Creed’s abstract presentation without giving too much away. As you boot the game you’re welcomed by the infamous Assassins Creed symbol that you can find on the limited edition case. The menu itself is very simple and abstract to give it that unique look. I won’t go into details as even menu contains spoilers as the game is constantly based around this feature that you will uncover. Useful hints from combat tips to Gameplay controls are given out from time to time to keep you aware of your controls. The game uses a bar meter for health. The hits you receive from enemies or a fall of a building is calculated and then removed from your health meter. Just like the splinter cell series, a stealth icon is used to measure how suspiciousness you are around a guard. Cut-scenes are always smooth and interesting to watch as this game is very heavily story driven. A new feature is given where in all cut-scenes you have the feature to observe them from different angles and rotate the camera to give you the best view. Overall Assassins Creed manages to keep the essentials in without cluttering the screen which is what we as gamers love to have.
Graphics
Although games like Crysis have infected our minds and given next-gen graphics a whole new meaning, Assassin’s Creed definitely proves to be one of the best visual titles on the Playstation 3 thus far. With amazing detail from the Altair’s robes to astounding sky high towers, theirs noting more beautiful than to climb up on the highest tower in the city and gaze around you. Assassins Creed is the first true title to bring beauty to the medieval ages. Animations play fluidly and you really feel the next-generation when you see Altair swiftly do his every so thrilling leap of faith. The game uses fantastic use of lighting with building and other objects to cast great shadows. You really feel like you’re walking through Jerusalem in 1191 A.D.
Gameplay
Now how many games have you played, that lets you become a medieval bad ass assassin? Almost none, which is what, makes this game so unique. Ubisoft has made a fantastic decision of moving away from the guns and into the past with good old swords and daggers. Because of your terrible attitude towards the creed, all your weapons are striped from you and you must earn them back along with your rankings. Within the first 30 minutes of gameplay you’ll be given back the sword and the dagger that slips up your sleeve, which you’ll find sufficient to help you advance through the first city. Slowly you’ll get other abilities back such as your counter attack with gives you almost full control when fighting a group of enemies.
One of the biggest areas the game lacks of is its A.I. While the combat fighting at first might seem exciting it can be repetitive at times and almost too easy once you’ve unlocked the counter-attack ability. Also you never find yourself fighting more than one enemy at time, but you do occasionally find a guard striking immediately after the first to catch you off guard. Occasionally at times you can also get away with murders in front of other guards when you’re using the blend feature. All in all, the A.I is good, but it’s not impressive. A few issues need to be ironed and a patch for the game later down the road might do the trick.
Note there are frame rate issues. It all depends on how picky you are. The frame rate drop can be felt, but if you’re not picky with your Gameplay then you should overall be fine. Also the Playstation 3 version of this game has reported to have many cases of freezing. During my review, I have only experienced one case of this.
Sound
While, sections such as the presentation and graphics can be a big plus for the game, the sound on the other hand can be a letdown. While the soundtrack has some great addition in the correct areas, the soundtrack is only heard at certain time in the game and most of the time you find the chatter of crowds talk over it making the soundtrack almost useless. Also if your near someone giving a lecture to a crowd, you’ll often hear him say the exact same lines over and over again, which can be quite frustrating. On the other hand, the sound of swords clashing and the swift sound of a dagger stabbing your victim do sound great and makes the game all the more better to have.
Replay Value
When it comes to replay value, it all depends how much of a difference you’re looking for. While Assassins Creed is a free roaming game giving the player a choice to do what you want when you want, you’ll still going to get the same objectives with the same results. The game may have many different forks in the road, but in the end you’re still going to come to the same conclusion.
Presentation: 9/10
Graphic: 9.5/10
Gameplay: 9/10
Sound: 8.5/10
Replay Value: 8.5/10
Overall: 8.9/10