Shixx
01-29-2010, 08:31 PM
http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/8657/assassinscreed2s.jpg
Intro-
Assassin's Creed 2 is the long awaited sequel to 2007's Assassin's Creed. While the first game was certainly not awful, it left a lot to be desired in many areas, the biggest of which is repetition. The biggest criticism it received was that there was just not a lot to do, and became very boring after time. Is Assassin's Creed 2 repetitive...or good?
Story-
Players of the first game might remember that there were two stories to follow. The story of Desmond and the story of Altair. While Desmond's story was pretty intriguing, Altair's story, the one you mainly followed through the game, was shallow and filled with “saw-it-coming” plot twists. The sequel begins moments after the first one ended. Lucy, Desmond's sole friend in the first game, comes in and tells you that you need to get your ass in gear and leave – but first, take a seat on the Animus(the machine that allows you to relive your ancestor's memories.) You witness the birth of your ancestor – Ezio Auditore de Firenze.
Ezio is a cocky teenager belonging to a noble family during the Italian Renaissance. He has his own gang, is charming with the ladies and values his family. You have to figure out what goes wrong for him to go from that to a life-ending extraordinaire. I won't *****foot around it – I love the story in this game. It really gripped me and had me interested throughout the entire experience. It has a great combination of drama, humor and action. There's quite a few twist and turns throughout the game that will keep you on your toes and just the overall narrative is awesome.
http://img692.imageshack.us/img692/8064/assassinscreed2flight55.jpg
The characters in AC2 are extremely likable. Ezio is fun to play as and watching him mature and develop really connects you to him. He is also fits the perfect “badass” description. The game is also littered with historical figures and places, all of which are portrayed perfectly, or at least how I expected them to behave. Leonardo Da Vinci is nothing short of awesome. His enthusiastic behavior and brotherly love for Ezio really makes you feel like you have a strong ally on your journey. Other historical people of importance include Machiavelli, the Medici's and Caterina Sforza.
A minor gripe I will mention about the story is the fact that as you progress through the it time passes. This is actually sort of confusing. You'll approach a mission marker at dawn, and when the mission starts it'll be night. Another confusing aspect of this is when Ezio will be talking to someone and mention “10 years ago I started my journey” or something along those lines, and it's sort of a “Wait a second...what?” It's a nice touch that Ezio himself grows older, but none of the supporting characters or settings change appearance.
Gameplay-
So the biggest complaint about the first Assassin's Creed was that it was very repetitive. This game has done everything in its power to make sure that doesn't happen again. They do a great job of switching it up. You could be doing a stealth section, then five minutes later beating up someone's cheating husband, then five minutes later platforming in a tomb, etc. Another thing to mention is that all of the missions are laced so tightly with the story, that it almost doesn't matter. Your father tells you to deliver things in the beginning, which are essentially “run here and back” missions, but because on each end there is someone to talk to, it's nowhere near as bad. So as far as repetition is concerned, you will rarely be doing the same thing over and over, and if you do, the reason for doing it is different, and that goes a long way.
Aside from the main story, there are four different types of side-quests available to you. These can generally be described as: races, assassinations, beat-ups and courier missions. They are all different enough and fun. I don't particularly like the racing because the platforming is not up to snuff for my likings, but it still provides some entertainment if you somehow manage to get bored with the other features. The best part about these side missions is that most of them at least tie into the story if not offer their own small story arc.
Combat remains largely unchanged from the first game, and some people will hate this. It's true – the combat is simplistic, but I never really thought it was bad. As in the first game, you can pretty much make a living off of counter attacks. However, some wrenches are thrown in the gears. You now have three different enemy types. Agiles are your cannon fodder guards that will flee from you when a higher-up has been killed. They're obviously built for speed and can catch up to you if you aren't careful while running. Brutes are hulking soldiers in full plate armor that carry a “big” weapon, such as a two-handed sword or axe. They're slow, but can string a combo together that will really knock you for a loop – you also cannot counter them right away. You'll have to dwindle down his health a little bit by just dodging in and out of his swings and landing a hit. You could also defeat him by disarming him; a brand new technique for AC2 that allows Ezio to pull the weapon from his enemy's hands and use it against him(Awesome). The last guard type is known as the Seeker, and what this guy does is walk around the city poking hiding spots in case you're hiding in them; he uses a spear or lance.
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/6305/assassinscreed2review1.jpg
So the enemies are switched up, but what about Ezio? Well, you have a whole new bag of tricks to pull from. Say the Seeker is coming to the hiding spot that you are in. What you'd do is lunge out, stab him in the face, and drag his body back into the hiding spot with you. You can also do this if you're hanging from a ledge on a building and there's a pesky archer above. Ezio also now has two hidden blades, one on each wrist, which is extremely awesome. Not too mention that Leonardo hooks you up with all kinds of add ons for your blades.
It's worth mentioning that in the first game, stealth was really kind of a waste. You could be as sneaky as you want and it would end up with you being in a brawl with thirty guards before you'd kill your target. I'm happy to say that in AC2 I managed to kill all of my targets in a sneaky or stealthy way, and this enhances the feel of the game for me a lot.
Ezio also has a few “get out of jail free cards” that I really loved during the game. You have the ability to throw sand into people's face to blind them, throw a coin on the ground to distract them or just chuck a smoke bomb at your feet – by the time the smoke clears, you'll be halfway across the city. This leads into another new aspect the game has – hiring groups. Throughout the game, you can hire three groups of people: Courtesans, thieves and soldiers. The soldiers are pretty self explanatory, they'll just help you fight. The thieves will do much of the same, but they are agile and able to follow you along the rooftops. Courtesans will entice the guards to come talk or flirt with them while Ezio slips by the “Do Not Enter” sign.
Ezio is able to swim in this game, which is pretty handy since a lot of Venice is water. On one particular assassination, I managed to kill the target and then everyone freaked out. I dropped a smoke bomb, sprinted up onto a ledge and down into the water; while people were panicking back at the corpse of my target, I was pulling myself up out of the water across the river. Moments like that just make you feel awesome. The swimming mechanics don't feel bad, and you can speed up your stroke by pressing A/X. You can also use boats to get across sections with water, but they handled pretty badly so I usually preferred to just swim.
The free running is exactly the same as in the first game, but I personally prefer it that way. Many people were turned off by that aspect in the first, so you will probably still dislike it here. You hold down the right trigger and the A/X button and move. That's all there is too it. It's simple but I found it very satisfying. He just looks cool doing stuff.
However, platforming really shows how inaccurate it can be when you enter an assassin tomb. These tombs contain the bodies of other members of your order, and also “seals” that you can collect to unlock Altair's armor. These tombs usually consist of very little combat, stealth and a lot of Prince of Persia-esque platforming. There are a lot of “pull this lever then hurry up all these crazy ledges to get into the gate on time” things in the tombs.
Speaking of collecting seals from tombs – holy **** are there a lot of collectibles. Six seals, 100 feathers, 20 glyphs, 30 Codex pages, god knows how many treasure chests, and a ton of things for your villa. Your villa is kind of like your home base. When you get there, it is absolutely trashed, but as you progress through the game you can upgrade it. Upgrading works by talking to the architect who will rebuild something like the brothel or the thieves guild for money. You can also upgrade all of the shops, the bank and other similar things. The main building in the villa also houses an armory so every weapon you purchase will go on display there; the same can be said for armor and paintings that you can purchase from the different cities. Upgrading or adding to the villa increases its worth, and every 20 minutes you'll get money from your villa – think of it just like the Fable 2 real estate feature. I am always a sucker for stuff like this in games where I get to either customize or rebuild something, so I love this part. It genuinely felt good when you'd walk in there and notice “Hey, all the ivy that was on the windows is gone now.”
This unfortunately unfolds into another minor gripe I have with the game. Money is way too easy to get. You could easily have the entire villa running before you get anywhere near the end of the game, and after that there's almost no point to having money. Ezio can pickpocket citizens which is fun at the beginning, but becomes pointless near the end. The only vendor I even touch anymore is the doctor for health potions (unlike the last game, your health does not simply regenerate, you must use a health potion from the doctor.)
Subject 16, the subject before Desmond, managed to hide all of these glyphs in the animus. When you find one, you will be given a puzzle to solve (varying from fun to stupid) and once it is completed shown a very brief video clip of...something. I certainly won't spoil it, but it makes the entire Assassin's Creed backstory that much more interesting. The puzzles can be confusing, like they aren't being specific enough about what they want you to do, but it is kind of cool to see how they work conspiracy theory aspect of Assassin's Creed into all types of history.
The last thing I'd like to mention about the collectibles is that they all reward you for something. Sure, you get achievements or trophies, but you actually get something in game as well.
Graphics-
The scenery in Assassin's Creed 2 is some of my favorite I've seen in any game. When you get to the top of a viewpoint (a high point in the city where you can survey the surrounding area) your jaw will probably drop off your head. It's funny, because I did the same thing in the first one and didn't think it would have the same impact in the sequel, but it really did for me. The Italian architecture is perfectly translated to the AC world.
At a specific point in the story, it is night and during a festival in Venice. The fireworks, costumes and decorations really created a small environment that I fell in love with. I spent a lot of time just hanging out in that area, and was genuinely bummed out when the story progressed past it.
The characters all look very cool and unique, specifically Ezio. They really went all out with the assassin costume this time, and it just looks very cool. The historical characters are very easy to pick out, and they look quite a bit like their real life counterparts.
The voice work is very authentic. A complaint I had with the first game was that it was just weird to hear Altair having an American accent in the Middle East. Ezio and everyone else speaks with an Italian accent and even use the language now and then (mostly while swearing, but it adds to the effect.) and of course Nolan North as Desmond Miles.
http://img704.imageshack.us/img704/6391/assassinscreed2scan.jpg
One of the coolest things visually this game does is that it really takes advantage of the whole phase in/phase out of the Animus loading. They have a really cool effect where everything will slow down and the environment will start to break apart and shrink or disappear in a very “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” kind of feel.
I did not experience any graphical hitches or game breaking bugs while playing through Assassin's Creed 2, nor have I heard from anyone else that they have experienced them.
Downloadable Content: Sequence 12: Battle of Forli
Cost: 320 MS Points/ $3.99(PS3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fc1tx4uNTf8
The Battle of Forli reconstructs one of the memories that were damaged in the base game. In it, Ezio and his friends decide to take the piece of Eden to Forli, where Caterina Sforza would look after it. Of course things don't go as planned. The Orsi brothers, hired by Rodrigo Borgia, are in town and plan on causing trouble. The actual gameplay of the DLC consists of many large scale battles and two assassinations (guess who.) While the mass fighting isn't AC2's strong point, the extended story and free mission of using Leonardo's flying machine (no mission attached) are very much worth your four dollars.
Downloadable Content: Sequence 13: Bonfire of the Vanities
Cost: 320 MS Points/ $3.99 (PS3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boW_JzAulzw
Bonfire of the Vanities takes place nine years after sequence 12, which ends somewhat poorly for Ezio. You are now tracking down Savonarola, a corrupt priest preaching anti-Rennaissance mumbo jumbo. With the piece of Eden, however, he is having success. Ezio devises that the best way to end this is to take out Savonarola's lieutenants, of which there are nine. This DLC offers nine unique assassination missions (all of which are very fun) and a new section of Florence. There are now these little flags that hang off of buildings that Ezio can use to propel himself very far. It's kind of useless, but it looks cool. Once again, buy this DLC if you care about the story. Ezio gives a monologue at the end that is very powerful - don't miss it!
It's Good!
Final Thoughts-
-I think everyone owes it to themselves to try this game. Even if you hated the first.
-Replayability isn't the strongest, but there are quite a few moments I'd play through again just to re-experience them. *cough* Glider *cough*
-Has an awesome Platnium trophy name.
-I'm one of those people that LOVE the Combat system
9/10
Intro-
Assassin's Creed 2 is the long awaited sequel to 2007's Assassin's Creed. While the first game was certainly not awful, it left a lot to be desired in many areas, the biggest of which is repetition. The biggest criticism it received was that there was just not a lot to do, and became very boring after time. Is Assassin's Creed 2 repetitive...or good?
Story-
Players of the first game might remember that there were two stories to follow. The story of Desmond and the story of Altair. While Desmond's story was pretty intriguing, Altair's story, the one you mainly followed through the game, was shallow and filled with “saw-it-coming” plot twists. The sequel begins moments after the first one ended. Lucy, Desmond's sole friend in the first game, comes in and tells you that you need to get your ass in gear and leave – but first, take a seat on the Animus(the machine that allows you to relive your ancestor's memories.) You witness the birth of your ancestor – Ezio Auditore de Firenze.
Ezio is a cocky teenager belonging to a noble family during the Italian Renaissance. He has his own gang, is charming with the ladies and values his family. You have to figure out what goes wrong for him to go from that to a life-ending extraordinaire. I won't *****foot around it – I love the story in this game. It really gripped me and had me interested throughout the entire experience. It has a great combination of drama, humor and action. There's quite a few twist and turns throughout the game that will keep you on your toes and just the overall narrative is awesome.
http://img692.imageshack.us/img692/8064/assassinscreed2flight55.jpg
The characters in AC2 are extremely likable. Ezio is fun to play as and watching him mature and develop really connects you to him. He is also fits the perfect “badass” description. The game is also littered with historical figures and places, all of which are portrayed perfectly, or at least how I expected them to behave. Leonardo Da Vinci is nothing short of awesome. His enthusiastic behavior and brotherly love for Ezio really makes you feel like you have a strong ally on your journey. Other historical people of importance include Machiavelli, the Medici's and Caterina Sforza.
A minor gripe I will mention about the story is the fact that as you progress through the it time passes. This is actually sort of confusing. You'll approach a mission marker at dawn, and when the mission starts it'll be night. Another confusing aspect of this is when Ezio will be talking to someone and mention “10 years ago I started my journey” or something along those lines, and it's sort of a “Wait a second...what?” It's a nice touch that Ezio himself grows older, but none of the supporting characters or settings change appearance.
Gameplay-
So the biggest complaint about the first Assassin's Creed was that it was very repetitive. This game has done everything in its power to make sure that doesn't happen again. They do a great job of switching it up. You could be doing a stealth section, then five minutes later beating up someone's cheating husband, then five minutes later platforming in a tomb, etc. Another thing to mention is that all of the missions are laced so tightly with the story, that it almost doesn't matter. Your father tells you to deliver things in the beginning, which are essentially “run here and back” missions, but because on each end there is someone to talk to, it's nowhere near as bad. So as far as repetition is concerned, you will rarely be doing the same thing over and over, and if you do, the reason for doing it is different, and that goes a long way.
Aside from the main story, there are four different types of side-quests available to you. These can generally be described as: races, assassinations, beat-ups and courier missions. They are all different enough and fun. I don't particularly like the racing because the platforming is not up to snuff for my likings, but it still provides some entertainment if you somehow manage to get bored with the other features. The best part about these side missions is that most of them at least tie into the story if not offer their own small story arc.
Combat remains largely unchanged from the first game, and some people will hate this. It's true – the combat is simplistic, but I never really thought it was bad. As in the first game, you can pretty much make a living off of counter attacks. However, some wrenches are thrown in the gears. You now have three different enemy types. Agiles are your cannon fodder guards that will flee from you when a higher-up has been killed. They're obviously built for speed and can catch up to you if you aren't careful while running. Brutes are hulking soldiers in full plate armor that carry a “big” weapon, such as a two-handed sword or axe. They're slow, but can string a combo together that will really knock you for a loop – you also cannot counter them right away. You'll have to dwindle down his health a little bit by just dodging in and out of his swings and landing a hit. You could also defeat him by disarming him; a brand new technique for AC2 that allows Ezio to pull the weapon from his enemy's hands and use it against him(Awesome). The last guard type is known as the Seeker, and what this guy does is walk around the city poking hiding spots in case you're hiding in them; he uses a spear or lance.
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/6305/assassinscreed2review1.jpg
So the enemies are switched up, but what about Ezio? Well, you have a whole new bag of tricks to pull from. Say the Seeker is coming to the hiding spot that you are in. What you'd do is lunge out, stab him in the face, and drag his body back into the hiding spot with you. You can also do this if you're hanging from a ledge on a building and there's a pesky archer above. Ezio also now has two hidden blades, one on each wrist, which is extremely awesome. Not too mention that Leonardo hooks you up with all kinds of add ons for your blades.
It's worth mentioning that in the first game, stealth was really kind of a waste. You could be as sneaky as you want and it would end up with you being in a brawl with thirty guards before you'd kill your target. I'm happy to say that in AC2 I managed to kill all of my targets in a sneaky or stealthy way, and this enhances the feel of the game for me a lot.
Ezio also has a few “get out of jail free cards” that I really loved during the game. You have the ability to throw sand into people's face to blind them, throw a coin on the ground to distract them or just chuck a smoke bomb at your feet – by the time the smoke clears, you'll be halfway across the city. This leads into another new aspect the game has – hiring groups. Throughout the game, you can hire three groups of people: Courtesans, thieves and soldiers. The soldiers are pretty self explanatory, they'll just help you fight. The thieves will do much of the same, but they are agile and able to follow you along the rooftops. Courtesans will entice the guards to come talk or flirt with them while Ezio slips by the “Do Not Enter” sign.
Ezio is able to swim in this game, which is pretty handy since a lot of Venice is water. On one particular assassination, I managed to kill the target and then everyone freaked out. I dropped a smoke bomb, sprinted up onto a ledge and down into the water; while people were panicking back at the corpse of my target, I was pulling myself up out of the water across the river. Moments like that just make you feel awesome. The swimming mechanics don't feel bad, and you can speed up your stroke by pressing A/X. You can also use boats to get across sections with water, but they handled pretty badly so I usually preferred to just swim.
The free running is exactly the same as in the first game, but I personally prefer it that way. Many people were turned off by that aspect in the first, so you will probably still dislike it here. You hold down the right trigger and the A/X button and move. That's all there is too it. It's simple but I found it very satisfying. He just looks cool doing stuff.
However, platforming really shows how inaccurate it can be when you enter an assassin tomb. These tombs contain the bodies of other members of your order, and also “seals” that you can collect to unlock Altair's armor. These tombs usually consist of very little combat, stealth and a lot of Prince of Persia-esque platforming. There are a lot of “pull this lever then hurry up all these crazy ledges to get into the gate on time” things in the tombs.
Speaking of collecting seals from tombs – holy **** are there a lot of collectibles. Six seals, 100 feathers, 20 glyphs, 30 Codex pages, god knows how many treasure chests, and a ton of things for your villa. Your villa is kind of like your home base. When you get there, it is absolutely trashed, but as you progress through the game you can upgrade it. Upgrading works by talking to the architect who will rebuild something like the brothel or the thieves guild for money. You can also upgrade all of the shops, the bank and other similar things. The main building in the villa also houses an armory so every weapon you purchase will go on display there; the same can be said for armor and paintings that you can purchase from the different cities. Upgrading or adding to the villa increases its worth, and every 20 minutes you'll get money from your villa – think of it just like the Fable 2 real estate feature. I am always a sucker for stuff like this in games where I get to either customize or rebuild something, so I love this part. It genuinely felt good when you'd walk in there and notice “Hey, all the ivy that was on the windows is gone now.”
This unfortunately unfolds into another minor gripe I have with the game. Money is way too easy to get. You could easily have the entire villa running before you get anywhere near the end of the game, and after that there's almost no point to having money. Ezio can pickpocket citizens which is fun at the beginning, but becomes pointless near the end. The only vendor I even touch anymore is the doctor for health potions (unlike the last game, your health does not simply regenerate, you must use a health potion from the doctor.)
Subject 16, the subject before Desmond, managed to hide all of these glyphs in the animus. When you find one, you will be given a puzzle to solve (varying from fun to stupid) and once it is completed shown a very brief video clip of...something. I certainly won't spoil it, but it makes the entire Assassin's Creed backstory that much more interesting. The puzzles can be confusing, like they aren't being specific enough about what they want you to do, but it is kind of cool to see how they work conspiracy theory aspect of Assassin's Creed into all types of history.
The last thing I'd like to mention about the collectibles is that they all reward you for something. Sure, you get achievements or trophies, but you actually get something in game as well.
Graphics-
The scenery in Assassin's Creed 2 is some of my favorite I've seen in any game. When you get to the top of a viewpoint (a high point in the city where you can survey the surrounding area) your jaw will probably drop off your head. It's funny, because I did the same thing in the first one and didn't think it would have the same impact in the sequel, but it really did for me. The Italian architecture is perfectly translated to the AC world.
At a specific point in the story, it is night and during a festival in Venice. The fireworks, costumes and decorations really created a small environment that I fell in love with. I spent a lot of time just hanging out in that area, and was genuinely bummed out when the story progressed past it.
The characters all look very cool and unique, specifically Ezio. They really went all out with the assassin costume this time, and it just looks very cool. The historical characters are very easy to pick out, and they look quite a bit like their real life counterparts.
The voice work is very authentic. A complaint I had with the first game was that it was just weird to hear Altair having an American accent in the Middle East. Ezio and everyone else speaks with an Italian accent and even use the language now and then (mostly while swearing, but it adds to the effect.) and of course Nolan North as Desmond Miles.
http://img704.imageshack.us/img704/6391/assassinscreed2scan.jpg
One of the coolest things visually this game does is that it really takes advantage of the whole phase in/phase out of the Animus loading. They have a really cool effect where everything will slow down and the environment will start to break apart and shrink or disappear in a very “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” kind of feel.
I did not experience any graphical hitches or game breaking bugs while playing through Assassin's Creed 2, nor have I heard from anyone else that they have experienced them.
Downloadable Content: Sequence 12: Battle of Forli
Cost: 320 MS Points/ $3.99(PS3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fc1tx4uNTf8
The Battle of Forli reconstructs one of the memories that were damaged in the base game. In it, Ezio and his friends decide to take the piece of Eden to Forli, where Caterina Sforza would look after it. Of course things don't go as planned. The Orsi brothers, hired by Rodrigo Borgia, are in town and plan on causing trouble. The actual gameplay of the DLC consists of many large scale battles and two assassinations (guess who.) While the mass fighting isn't AC2's strong point, the extended story and free mission of using Leonardo's flying machine (no mission attached) are very much worth your four dollars.
Downloadable Content: Sequence 13: Bonfire of the Vanities
Cost: 320 MS Points/ $3.99 (PS3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boW_JzAulzw
Bonfire of the Vanities takes place nine years after sequence 12, which ends somewhat poorly for Ezio. You are now tracking down Savonarola, a corrupt priest preaching anti-Rennaissance mumbo jumbo. With the piece of Eden, however, he is having success. Ezio devises that the best way to end this is to take out Savonarola's lieutenants, of which there are nine. This DLC offers nine unique assassination missions (all of which are very fun) and a new section of Florence. There are now these little flags that hang off of buildings that Ezio can use to propel himself very far. It's kind of useless, but it looks cool. Once again, buy this DLC if you care about the story. Ezio gives a monologue at the end that is very powerful - don't miss it!
It's Good!
Final Thoughts-
-I think everyone owes it to themselves to try this game. Even if you hated the first.
-Replayability isn't the strongest, but there are quite a few moments I'd play through again just to re-experience them. *cough* Glider *cough*
-Has an awesome Platnium trophy name.
-I'm one of those people that LOVE the Combat system
9/10