I'm meh about AC3 at the minute. Loved the first one and enjoyed the second, however 2.5 left me with a raised eyebrow regarding the lack of innovation and 2.7 I haven't even completed, since I saw the ending when my flatmate went through it.
I think people are a little jaded with the seies to be honest. It needs a total overhaul gameplay wise as it's just so bloody stale. Not to mention the shit regarding Desmond as he becomes the AC version of Neo. What they need to do is spend some time on a decent sequel, not rush out a yearly re-skin which adds fuck all to the gameplay and story.
I'd like a change in the climbing controls, they are far too simple to be accurate.
Sure, it would slow the game down, but holding the same buttons all the time gets boring.
I'm just worried it's going to feel the same, the free running element was great, but the story just keeps going on and on... And that's what shits me, can't we use another person rather than Desmond? He won't have many ancient relatives left soon.
Though I'm sure if it was an American Indian killing Americans it'd never get released.
I thought they confirmed that they were going to be very open minded with the setting, as in the character is kind of "neutral" to each side and has to make difficult decisions, I don't think they're going with the EVIL OF THE WHITE MAN path either, apparently one of the things they worked really hard towards with this game is being as historically truthful as possible.
I'd like a change in the climbing controls, they are far too simple to be accurate.
Sure, it would slow the game down, but holding the same buttons all the time gets boring.
To be fair, the boredom would probably be worse if it took you an while to get anywhere. Really, the fluidity of the game is one of the most enjoyable aspects, and getting rid of it would upset a fair few fans of the franchise. Running up a bunch of crates, swinging on a hanging flowerpot, and leaping onto a rooftop in a fluid series of movements is very satisfying. I can't imagine any alternative will work quite as well.
3) Overly powerful character: All the AC games have been far to easy. AC:Bro attempted to fix this with the "50% Synch/100% Synch" system, however I just felt this limited one's ingenuity in playing. Counters and Combos need to be removed, completely this time, and the "health bar" (they do sometimes call it that in the sequels; it annoys me because it was always supposed to a "synch bar", which is different) should be much smaller.
There should be either be much greater consequences for carrying lots of weapons (like people see you're armed and treat you suspiciously in certain areas) or the number of weapons should just be reduced by a large amount, forcing the player into more tactical decisions in equipment.
I can't really wrap my mind around this, because I both agree and disagree with you. One one hand, I the games are easy. Like, seriously; reading about the Janissaries in the database (really interesting shit), they were described as elite soldiers, and I was like "Oh, I guess that explains why they're a pain in the ass sometimes."
But then I was like, wait, what? The hardest enemies in the game are just a pain in the ass. I tried explaining it by thinking, "Well, Assassins are like, the best soldiers in existence." But that didn't cut it, because even while mowing down Janissaries, I didn't feel particularly skilled. The game is simply too easy, and as a result, the Assassin's don't feel like elite, Spartan-esque warriors who've spent their lives training; they feel like the only guy who knows how to hold a sword properly.
I don't think combos and counters need to be removed, necessarily, they need to be harder to do and less easy to utilize. Turtling, anyone? It's like the only way to actually win fights, though, because all the enemies can parry your attacks (that's what challenging means to Ubisoft apparently). I heard they're making Connor more aggressive in ACIII, making him more mobile, getting rid of turtling and whatnot, so I think Ubisoft understands it as well as we do and are working on it at least. High hopes for ACIII, which is more than I can say about much anything else.
Well to be more specific about a combat overhaul:
Counters should be reserved for swords and knives, not hidden blade or fists, and only usable when an enemy goes in for a "heavy attack"; one of the big slow sword swings they do sometimes but not often. There should be a lot more emphasis on the Step and Dodge mechanics, which have barely been used but make for very interesting gameplay.
I do maintain, the combos/killstreaks introduced in AC:B need to disappear forever though. Those were just ridiculous. Finishing moves can stay, they were pretty cool, but the combos where you can just keep pressing one button and instantly dispatch a random foe, those need to go.
The enemies you can only kill by kneeing them in the groin repeatedly need to go, or be altered, though as people aren't really going to be wearing suits of armour in revolutionary America they shouldn't be a problem anyway. Tough enemies should play more like the Templars from the first game: they were very tough because they were just as fast as you, could dodge your attacks, couldn't be countered very easily and would take the initiative in fighting.
I think being an aggressive fuck on AC should be very difficult, and if you get into a straight up fight with more than 4 people, you should have to flee the scene or die: the first game had this mood better; the emphasis was, often, more on assassinating and then having to flee rather than just mowing down hundreds of guards with ease, though towards the end it became this anyway. Hopefully, with the introduction of guns on a larger level, this can be the case, or at least it can be the case that if you are spotted from a distance you are FUCKED.
One more thing:
PLEASE, Ubisoft, PLEASE, NO MORE CITY-RENOVATION-MINI-GAMES. NOBODY LIKES THEM.
On counters: Rather than getting rid of fist counters, I move to make them disarm-only, because there are some missions, or at least portions, where the object of the game is not to kill. Assuming you've played Assassin's Creed: Revelations:
There's the part where old Altair returns to Masyaf, and a few of the Assassin's didn't want you back and would strike as you climbed, slowly, up to the castle. 100% Synch required you to kill none of these, which may sound arbitrary, but actually matched the scene perfectly as Altair skilfully disarmed any dissenters, clearly with no intention to kill, after which they would kneel.
To watch, here. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBRYi7fzhRE&feature=player_detailpage#t=324s]
If not, then the example I offer (though also from Revelations, is optional and not really a spoiler) is the Romani thief that silently kills a dissenter in public; she drops to the ground, and as the other Romanis rush to her aid, the guards assume they they killed her and try to attack. Ezio must fend them off without killing the guards, because the guards didn't actually deserve to die. Basically the point is that part of being an Assassin is knowing how to kill, as well as when to kill. There are times when your aggressors do not deserve to die, in which case the disarm function comes in handy.
What should be eschewed is the ability to steal their weapon and then, as they're incapacitated, instakill them, and then make a combo out of it and instakill everyone else; you're right on that. If Ubisoft insists on keeping the combos in, though, at least limit it to only a few enemies.
Completely agree in that regard. Again, the Janissaries are such enemies. The developers of Brotherhood and Revelations apparently didn't understand that "difficult" and "hard to kill" aren't necessarily the same thing. If you've noticed, the only strategy really available in Revelations is on the Janissaries, they're susceptible to counter-steals, and then left open for an attack. The speedy footsoldiers are susceptible to counter-grabs, which kill them instantly. Everyone else is just open for straight fucking up. This needs desperately to change. In the first Assassin's Creed, killing 40 or so enemies at once without getting hit was an achievement (literally): In Brotherhood/ Revelations it's a goddamn sidequest.
Well, I've heard both. The aggressive part was mostly to bring you out of turtling, which is what combat in Assassin's Creed up to this point has been; shielding and waiting for an opportunity to counter. They're supposed to be making your combat more fluid and aggressive to make this not an option, so to my understanding, you have to actually have your wits about you and be skilled to survive, which is key: I agree that there need to be points where your first option should be to run (in short: More emphasis on stealth, and therefore more punishment for not being stealthy), but it shouldn't be impossible to fight your way out, just incredibly difficult. Luckily, though, they also seem to be putting emphasis on escape/ freerunning, by allowing Connor to keep stride while vaulting over, under, through, around anything and everything. In AC up 'til now, going over an obstacle meant jumping on and then off; this means more like sliding over like a boss: The emphasis on escape (I must assume) is because it will necessarily come in handy. The fluidity is being revamped everywhere, from combat to freerunning, which is mostly why I have high hopes for the game.
Reginald said:
To be fair, the boredom would probably be worse if it took you an while to get anywhere. Really, the fluidity of the game is one of the most enjoyable aspects, and getting rid of it would upset a fair few fans of the franchise. Running up a bunch of crates, swinging on a hanging flowerpot, and leaping onto a rooftop in a fluid series of movements is very satisfying. I can't imagine any alternative will work quite as well.
Exactly. Have you ever played The Saboteur? It was a neat little game where you play as an Irishman, Sean Devlin, in France during the Nazi occupancy. A different, refreshing take on WWII games, this was a freerunning sandbox game, and as an Irishman, you had no national motives whatever, you just really hated Nazis. Also, awesome soundtrack. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvOlJAS7POA] Anyway, freerunning/ climbing in that game was functional, but not fluid at all, and it just wasn't fun like in Assassin's Creed: Fun, but not swing on a flowerpot for a sharp turn, dive from the highest point around into a haystack fun (though you could survive leaping off the Eiffel Tower if you fell into the pond below, which scored a 'chievo). Funnest way to get around in that game was the ziplines, like in Revelations, but Sean didn't have a hookblade, or even gloves, so as you railed down he'd go, "Ah, fuck me, my hands!" Good times. But yeah, you need to maintain that fluidity in Assassin's Creed. The more fluid the better.
My biggest concern is WHAT THE FUCK WILL THERE BE TO CLIMB????
I don't know much about that time period in America, but I do know that there were nowhere near enough amazing architecture in America back then. The other games had ancient Castles forts prisons stately home etc. America had none of that back then. Rocks and tree's will not be enough to make exploration good.
Personally I don't understand why they dont set the game in Egypt far more interesting time period, more interesting events, more interesting buildings and generally just better everything for an AC game.
As for the Americans vs British thing who cares? I am British and I certainly don't. America always casts British people as the stereotype villain, and we think of the average American as an obesity time bomb (not all of us obviously). We all have our harmless stereotypes.
I was under the impression Ubisoft was French though.
I 'unno, jumping and climbing between massive redwoods, using caves as hiding places, the challenge of obscuring yourself in open plains, early frontier towns, it has its possibilities.
An ancient AC would certainly be interesting, but unless they're going to ride the franchise to the logical conclusion, there are too many possibilities to account for everything that could be interesting.
Also, what exactly is implying an Americans v British vibe here? AC1 had targets on both sides of the crusades, surely they wouldn't try to work the assassins/templars thing into such large scale conflicts?
Surely not?
I'm hopeful, because there's nothing wrong with being hopeful.
I'm not too worried about the historical portrayal of events in AC3. I mean, the AC series hasn't been all that faithful to history anyway. I just hope they do something to compensate for changing to a much less awesome location. I mean, the colonies and the frontier are nice, but we're losing the gorgeous architecture of places like Jerusalem and Rome. The old locations made it felt like playing through a piece of history, while I can't imagine colonial forests being too different from modern forests.
James Joseph Emerald said:
Saladfork said:
I'm actually more worried that it's going to be a different cliche; that of the saintly natives vs the evil whitey (Similar to Avatar). This trope is, I think, more common than the first, and quite frankly, it drags down pretty much any work I've ever seen it in (Again, such as Avatar).
I mean, the only real difference between the Nazis and the British Colonial Empire is that the Brits wrote the history books. The horrors they inflicted on entire nations and races of people have had a drastic effect that has lasted to this day.
Imagine someone starting a thread saying that they're worried some WW2 game set in Germany will fall into the "cliché" of portraying Nazis as evil, and the whole Jew-killing thing is boring and they shouldn't dwell on it.
I'm not an expert on the time period, but I believe that during the 18th century, the relationship between natives and colonists was a good deal more complex than a one-sided massacre. The natives were still a powerful force, and alliances with them were sought by all colonial powers invested in that area of the world.
I imagine the attitude towards natives was a lot closer to a pragmatic "what can the other side do for me, and are they a threat?" on both sides than a cartoonish "let's kill all those natives and take their land!" attitude.
I'm actually more worried that it's going to be a different cliche; that of the saintly natives vs the evil whitey (Similar to Avatar). This trope is, I think, more common than the first, and quite frankly, it drags down pretty much any work I've ever seen it in (Again, such as Avatar).
I mean, the only real difference between the Nazis and the British Colonial Empire is that the Brits wrote the history books. The horrors they inflicted on entire nations and races of people have had a drastic effect that has lasted to this day.
Imagine someone starting a thread saying that they're worried some WW2 game set in Germany will fall into the "cliché" of portraying Nazis as evil, and the whole Jew-killing thing is boring and they shouldn't dwell on it.
This is not a case of period accuracy! I repeat this is not a case of period accuracy.
During the Revolution, Indians allied with the British. Yes it is true that the English had been involved in tit-for-tat attacks on the Natives but other European powers were also heavily involved especially Spain and France. Who if you remember (which you don't due to your poor knowledge of history) had large land holdings in the New "Wolrd" and were often involved in a similar number of incidents.
Do you know one of the reason's behind the Indians siding with the British? The American Revolutionaries were far more notrious for their attacks against them and would go onto be the people who more or less wiped out the Indians as force.
Further more the fact that the tribe the new protagonist is from was one of the big supporters of the British; which again makes little sense for any agression to be present in the game between the two groups.
I'm actually more worried that it's going to be a different cliche; that of the saintly natives vs the evil whitey (Similar to Avatar). This trope is, I think, more common than the first, and quite frankly, it drags down pretty much any work I've ever seen it in (Again, such as Avatar).
I mean, the only real difference between the Nazis and the British Colonial Empire is that the Brits wrote the history books. The horrors they inflicted on entire nations and races of people have had a drastic effect that has lasted to this day.
Imagine someone starting a thread saying that they're worried some WW2 game set in Germany will fall into the "cliché" of portraying Nazis as evil, and the whole Jew-killing thing is boring and they shouldn't dwell on it.
Do you know one of the reason's behind the Indians siding with the British? The American Revolutionaries were far more notrious for their attacks against them and would go onto be the people who more or less wiped out the Indians as force.
Further more the fact that the tribe the new protagonist is from was one of the big supporters of the British; which again makes little sense for any agression to be present in the game between the two groups.
That's just semantics. During that period Americans and British would've been virtually indistinguishable from a native's perspective. They were all invaders who took whatever they could and spread new diseases the native Americans had no immunity against. The fact that there was in-fighting between the colonists, and some native tribes took sides to play the advantage, is irrelevant. They never supported any foreign invaders, and to suggest so is just bizarre. Why would anyone?
From the colonist's perspective, all "Indians" were savages with primitive brains who had little to no capacity to comprehend what was going on around them. At best they were pitied, at worst exterminated like rats. This attitude is extremely well-documented, and any attempts to paint the relationship between Europeans and Native Americans as anything other than an invasion is "politically correct" revisionist bullshit.
This sort of cultural bias is what really annoys me, especially as it gets worse and worse.
In ten years, I bet people will believe the natives happily gave up their land to the white man and lived in peace until suddenly a comet came along and destroyed most of their population. And later Hitler decided to invade America and World War 2 happened but the USA single-handedly defeated him and they didn't blow up any cities full of civilians or anything.
My biggest concern is WHAT THE FUCK WILL THERE BE TO CLIMB????
I don't know much about that time period in America, but I do know that there were nowhere near enough amazing architecture in America back then. The other games had ancient Castles forts prisons stately home etc. America had none of that back then. Rocks and tree's will not be enough to make exploration good.
Personally I don't understand why they dont set the game in Egypt far more interesting time period, more interesting events, more interesting buildings and generally just better everything for an AC game.
From my understanding, the Frontier will be rife with good climbing locations; cliffsides and mountains whatnot, which I honestly think'll be awesome. But I do agree, the cities will probably not be as exciting, America's architecture is pretty lackluster compared to... well, everywhere. Feudal Japan? Check. Victorian England? Check. Best part of AC, though, is that once they get through the Desmond shit, they literally have all of history as their playground. If the Frontier isn't that great, fine; they can go anywhere and anywhen they want to make it better.
Exactly! I am willing to give AC3 a chance (not buy it obviously I'll borrow my friends copy Problem Ubisoft?). 2 other guys replied to me saying climbing natural stuff would be good, I disagree. Climbing through similarly rendered trees and up seemingly identical patches of cliff, will get old fast.
Although I do applaud Ubisoft (for *dons sun glasses* 'BRANCHING OUT' oh hahaha you see what I did there?) as you said they have a huge variety of infinitely more interesting setting and periods. If they promise to make AC4 (or AC Saturday night disco or whatever they plan on calling AC3-2) somewhere with something historical to climb I will stick with the series.
I'm actually more worried that it's going to be a different cliche; that of the saintly natives vs the evil whitey (Similar to Avatar). This trope is, I think, more common than the first, and quite frankly, it drags down pretty much any work I've ever seen it in (Again, such as Avatar).
I mean, the only real difference between the Nazis and the British Colonial Empire is that the Brits wrote the history books. The horrors they inflicted on entire nations and races of people have had a drastic effect that has lasted to this day.
Imagine someone starting a thread saying that they're worried some WW2 game set in Germany will fall into the "cliché" of portraying Nazis as evil, and the whole Jew-killing thing is boring and they shouldn't dwell on it.
Not averse to values dissonance, just to cartoonish villainy. I'm not going to argue that every place the Brits landed was all sunshine and happiness, but to portray them as randomly massacring people for no reason and kicking puppies while on the way to do it is just as ridiculous. Yes, they killed people. They didn't do it just to be dicks, though.
I'd argue the same thing for nazis, too. They were misguided and based their beliefs on faulty science and false preconceptions, but they were most certainly not evil and painting every single nazi as some kind of psycopath is childish at best.
Historical accuracy isn't about picking which side was 'right'. Everyone on every side in history was human, and I guarentee that just about every one (i.e. the ones that were sane) believed that they were morally correct.
I'm more concerned about the free running to be honest, there probably won't be a lot of buildings to hop around on in the forest, and I doubt they can make the free running on trees look and feel good. Plus horse combat is fucking, shit on a stick.
On counters: Rather than getting rid of fist counters, I move to make them disarm-only, because there are some missions, or at least portions, where the object of the game is not to kill. Assuming you've played Assassin's Creed: Revelations:
There's the part where old Altair returns to Masyaf, and a few of the Assassin's didn't want you back and would strike as you climbed, slowly, up to the castle. 100% Synch required you to kill none of these, which may sound arbitrary, but actually matched the scene perfectly as Altair skilfully disarmed any dissenters, clearly with no intention to kill, after which they would kneel.
To watch, here. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBRYi7fzhRE&feature=player_detailpage#t=324s]
If not, then the example I offer (though also from Revelations, is optional and not really a spoiler) is the Romani thief that silently kills a dissenter in public; she drops to the ground, and as the other Romanis rush to her aid, the guards assume they they killed her and try to attack. Ezio must fend them off without killing the guards, because the guards didn't actually deserve to die. Basically the point is that part of being an Assassin is knowing how to kill, as well as when to kill. There are times when your aggressors do not deserve to die, in which case the disarm function comes in handy.
What should be eschewed is the ability to steal their weapon and then, as they're incapacitated, instakill them, and then make a combo out of it and instakill everyone else; you're right on that. If Ubisoft insists on keeping the combos in, though, at least limit it to only a few enemies.
Completely agree in that regard. Again, the Janissaries are such enemies. The developers of Brotherhood and Revelations apparently didn't understand that "difficult" and "hard to kill" aren't necessarily the same thing. If you've noticed, the only strategy really available in Revelations is on the Janissaries, they're susceptible to counter-steals, and then left open for an attack. The speedy footsoldiers are susceptible to counter-grabs, which kill them instantly. Everyone else is just open for straight fucking up. This needs desperately to change. In the first Assassin's Creed, killing 40 or so enemies at once without getting hit was an achievement (literally): In Brotherhood/ Revelations it's a goddamn sidequest.
Well, I've heard both. The aggressive part was mostly to bring you out of turtling, which is what combat in Assassin's Creed up to this point has been; shielding and waiting for an opportunity to counter. They're supposed to be making your combat more fluid and aggressive to make this not an option, so to my understanding, you have to actually have your wits about you and be skilled to survive, which is key: I agree that there need to be points where your first option should be to run (in short: More emphasis on stealth, and therefore more punishment for not being stealthy), but it shouldn't be impossible to fight your way out, just incredibly difficult. Luckily, though, they also seem to be putting emphasis on escape/ freerunning, by allowing Connor to keep stride while vaulting over, under, through, around anything and everything. In AC up 'til now, going over an obstacle meant jumping on and then off; this means more like sliding over like a boss: The emphasis on escape (I must assume) is because it will necessarily come in handy. The fluidity is being revamped everywhere, from combat to freerunning, which is mostly why I have high hopes for the game.
I agree on the topic of fist counters, because that makes sense from a plot and gameplay perspective.
I welcome the idea of increased reliance on stealth, however what I will say is that I always felt that the core gameplay of AC was not based around an aggressive play style OR a stealth play style, but a play style based around RUNNING AWAY. At its most basic level, Assassin's Creed is a Free-running game, and the most fluid parts of the gameplay tend to be the seamless integration of free-running and climbing with combat. I hope the combat is changed to reflect that: as you say, it should be hard to fight your way out of a situation, with a definite emphasis on running away.
Our Assassin should sneak in, wait and then strike before running like hell and using his free-running to escape. That should be the basic gameplay to a typical AC mission.
I feel the best way to achieve this would be 3 simple changes:
1) Much slower regenerating health. This is so that once you lose health, you pretty much have to go to a Doctor to be healed (so also, no carry-able healthpack things), and they won't speak to you if you are Notorious. This makes it so that if you try to stand and fight, your health will be slowly wittled down, with more and more enemies slowly arriving, until you either run or die.
2) Enemies that, when in groups of more than two, are extremely aggressive. In real life, if 6 armed men surrounded you, they would stab you and there wouldn't be a thing you could do to stop them, regardless of your skill with a blade. In AC however, guards surround you and then attack one at a time, which would obviously make no sense in real life. They took steps to stop this somewhat, but in my opinion, guards should just attack all at once almost immediately: it sounds like major bullshit for the player, but the point is, if you let yourself get surrounded, you are fucked.
3) Escalating enemies. Take, for example, the police from GTA. If you mess with one cop, you can easily dispatch him and get on with whatever you were doing, and then, in GTA as in Assassin's Creed series, more guards/police arrive. How they differ, however, is that whilst in AC, the guards that arrive will pretty much always be the same type, in GTA, as you kill more and more police, they call in greater and greater reinforcements, until you have the army after you with tanks. This escalation of combat is what AC needs to make the game much more challenging and rely more on fleeing that just fighting forever.
--
~~
--
Stekepanne5 said:
I pretty much agree with all of this. Although combos was fun the first minutes, they became overpowered "Press X to kill all enemies" attacks. Not very Assassin-like.
I do also have some problems with the crossbow. It's the most overpowered weapon in the game, and I finished pretty much all of AC:B using it in close combat or sniping from rooftops.
Then again, it's a fun weapon, and I wouldn't want it to disappear.
Having such a large arsenal of weapons as you have, you're well enough equipped to take down a army by yourself. Maybe a complete weapon overhaul would be in place, to balance the character out. Already in AC:II you could win just about any battle with smokebombs and hidden blades.
With Brotherhood and Revelations giving you even more weapons combat is boring.
Overhauling the combat system is one thing, but something needs to be done about the unbalanced items.
The crossbow was one of my favourite additions to Assassin's Creed, and I enjoyed the varied bombs and similar items introduced later as well, though I have to admit all were overpowered. I feel like they should keep all these cool, often gimmicky, things in, but limit:
1) the number of weapons one can carry on their their person at one time; maybe four at a time (as it was with the first game), with the rest left at your house, or whatever.
2) the amount of "ammo" for these things you can carry: if this was limited, with less stuff freely available through random looting, you would think twice before spraying crossbow bolts and bullets into any random enemies; you'd want to save it for the really dangerous foes.
Also:
One more thing:
PLEASE, Ubisoft, PLEASE, NO MORE CITY-RENOVATION-MINI-GAMES. NOBODY LIKES THEM.
Well that's the thing isn't it? Although with the latter two games, these minigames were at least vaguely tower-defence games and thus vaguely interesting, if somewhat irritating, half the time it feels like half of the interaction you can have with the world around you is totally pointless city renovation games (especially in AC:Bro) which are dull and just don't fit with the aesthetic of the rest of the games. At least with tower defence you actively do something, whereas with city-renovation you literally renovate the city so you can make more money which you can only really spend on renovating more of the city. Its remarkably circular and pointless.
Exactly! I am willing to give AC3 a chance (not buy it obviously I'll borrow my friends copy Problem Ubisoft?). 2 other guys replied to me saying climbing natural stuff would be good, I disagree. Climbing through similarly rendered trees and up seemingly identical patches of cliff, will get old fast.
Although I do applaud Ubisoft (for *dons sun glasses* 'BRANCHING OUT' oh hahaha you see what I did there?) as you said they have a huge variety of infinitely more interesting setting and periods. If they promise to make AC4 (or AC Saturday night disco or whatever they plan on calling AC3-2) somewhere with something historical to climb I will stick with the series.
This is something we can only speculate about for now, so before I do so, here is all the information that leads me to my conclusion:
a) The Frontier is 1.5x as big as all of Rome in Brotherhood
b) It makes up ~30% of storyline missions (who knows how much optional content will be there)
c) It is specifically designed to be more interesting than the Kingdom in ACI
d) Ubisoft has so far gone to great lengths to lovingly recreate vast cities
e) ACIII has been in development since ACII shipped in '09
I am led to believe that the same attention to gameplay and detail that went into the architecture has similarly been focused on the surrounding geography. I doubt, or at least hope to the contrary, that the available cliffsides will be identical. This may be the Utah-boy in me talking, having grown up right next to a mountain, I know first-hand how beautiful and diverse natural formations can be; if Ubisoft does this right, it will provide diverse as well as functional-- dare I say, graceful-- gameplay.
In fact, come to think of it, they might have to take great liberties to make the game freerun accessible. The Desmond sections take place in moderndays, correct? Look outside: How many buildings look even remotely scalable? They must by necessity alter that to make it work; same with the Frontier.
But alas, if it turns out I am wrong, I still assure you the next AC game will more likely than not be more to your liking. Hell, even if they keep moving forward in time, the Victorian Era was well after the Revolutionary War, and probably some other great architectural playground in history that I'm not aware of. All is well.
Also, I laughed disproportionately hard at the "branching out" joke. Not expected at all.
Puzzlenaut said:
I agree on the topic of fist counters, because that makes sense from a plot and gameplay perspective.
I welcome the idea of increased reliance on stealth, however what I will say is that I always felt that the core gameplay of AC was not based around an aggressive play style OR a stealth play style, but a play style based around RUNNING AWAY. At its most basic level, Assassin's Creed is a Free-running game, and the most fluid parts of the gameplay tend to be the seamless integration of free-running and climbing with combat. I hope the combat is changed to reflect that: as you say, it should be hard to fight your way out of a situation, with a definite emphasis on running away.
Our Assassin should sneak in, wait and then strike before running like hell and using his free-running to escape. That should be the basic gameplay to a typical AC mission.
I feel the best way to achieve this would be 3 simple changes:
1) Much slower regenerating health. This is so that once you lose health, you pretty much have to go to a Doctor to be healed (so also, no carry-able healthpack things), and they won't speak to you if you are Notorious. This makes it so that if you try to stand and fight, your health will be slowly wittled down, with more and more enemies slowly arriving, until you either run or die.
2) Enemies that, when in groups of more than two, are extremely aggressive. In real life, if 6 armed men surrounded you, they would stab you and there wouldn't be a thing you could do to stop them, regardless of your skill with a blade. In AC however, guards surround you and then attack one at a time, which would obviously make no sense in real life. They took steps to stop this somewhat, but in my opinion, guards should just attack all at once almost immediately: it sounds like major bullshit for the player, but the point is, if you let yourself get surrounded, you are fucked.
3) Escalating enemies. Take, for example, the police from GTA. If you mess with one cop, you can easily dispatch him and get on with whatever you were doing, and then, in GTA as in Assassin's Creed series, more guards/police arrive. How they differ, however, is that whilst in AC, the guards that arrive will pretty much always be the same type, in GTA, as you kill more and more police, they call in greater and greater reinforcements, until you have the army after you with tanks. This escalation of combat is what AC needs to make the game much more challenging and rely more on fleeing that just fighting forever.
I think they need to clearly define what exactly an Assassin is as far as the Assassin's Creed Universe. In the first game, repetitive though it unfortunately was, it surely was the closest to what we would define an assassin as, which is to say, as you already said: Our Assassin should sneak in, wait and then strike before running like hell. The first Assassin's Creed was all about this. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=cc-ClutaN_I#t=31s] Notice, of course, that Altaïr doesn't stand his ground and take on everyone after the kill, he fucking bails (also of note: somebody mentioned earlier that you can eliminate your victim without even realizing, which was not the case in the first AC: Notice how Altaïr doesn't even break eye contact with his target as he deftly takes out two guards coming at him. Too many enemies = lack of focus).
However, the Assassin in their story has since morphed: Not in an altogether negative way, but enough to make is troublesome. At first, it was about freerunning and stealth, mostly in direct contrast: Once you blew your stealth (read: killed your target), you switched into freerunning mode and made your escape. In the first Assassin's Creed, there was actually incentive to find a hiding spot, and they were scarce. Now, there are bales of hay, wells, bushes, benches, kiosks and tents galore, but no reason to use them, because you can just kill all the witnesses. That's the mutation: It makes sense, of course, that the elite Assassins would also be skilled with a blade; exceptionally skilled, nigh unparalleled even. What doesn't make sense, what is actually bullshit, is when they are apparently so skilled that they don't need to be skilled. Let me provide an example: In another (optional, so spoilers aren't a big deal) Romani quest, you need to kill a thespian with one of your Apprentices. Ezio gives a big ol' speech beforehand about not taking chances, saying "We'll both go, so that if you don't kill her I will, and if I don't you will." After the (laughably) easy assassination, I, without any hint of irony, killed everyone that came after me. See, when you can so easily best everyone in combat that you don't need to be stealthy, that's when gameplay is compromised: Then, the only way to possibly "challenge" the player is to make the combat a chore.
I like the slower regenerating health, the focus on Doctors, and not being able to shop while notorious is a nice touch. However, rather than prohibit you from holding medicine, I say, make is a commodity. As-is, medicine is so widely available that I don't even need to speak to Doctors to have it in excess. They're in treasure chests everywhere, and you can loot it off of dead enemies: Seriously? It's so commonplace I use it when I've fallen a bit too far and lost a bar or two of health. This is a problem.
They did something similar with Halo: Reach, one of the few things they changed I could get behind (in theory, they executed it poorly). They made the grenades a lot more powerful, but also a lot more scarce. The medicine is already powerful, so that's no issue, but it needs to be, literally, a last-ditch safety net, not a trump-card. If the medicine can only be obtained by purchase through a Doctor (who must also not be found easily in the cities), in critically limited amounts, at high prices, players will soon learn that health is a commodity. Conserve that shit. This will make money more useful as well as force you to be more careful when freerunning (no more thrill dives unless you want to take a trip to the Doctor) and fighting.
This is also true. However, and this is something I've always liked about Assassin's Creed, take into account the effects of your actions. If I remember correctly, there's a part in Assassin's Creed II where you drop a body into a crowded area to make a threat or something. When you do that, people start freaking out: Of course they do. You just dropped a fucking corpse. This was always cool to me. Unfortunately, that never seemed to translate (adequately) into the combat. How can you watch somebody effortlessly disarm and kill a heavy-armoured juggernaut and still have the cahones to attack this fucking guy?
Everyone knows that gorilla would've fucked that man up. It's the same basic concept: The fact that the man didn't even flinch signalled to the (fucking) gorilla to back off. Everyone once in a while in AC, one of the low-leveled grunt soldiers will panic and run away, which is a reasonable response. I move to take into account all the possible emotions of a group of attackers, including "kill one to warn one-hundred."
I took Psychology last semester, and if I recall, the maximum amount of peer pressure someone can withstand is 8; after 8, you're almost guaranteed to conform. 8 gives a solid number as far as aggression/ cowardice in foes. As you said, in groups of two, enemies should be more aggressive: This should continue up until 8, the maximum, and then decrease with every soldier you off: The hivemind "nerve" that the soldier has dwindles, and after seeing you fuck up four of his buddies, there is no reason for him to think he can win (it always confuses me in Revelations why a footsoldier can see you literally beat a Janissary to death and still have the balls to swing). Basically, the more soldiers there are, the more aggressive/ bold they are, and the more you kill, the less aggressive/ bold they are.
The above also ties in with your escalating enemies premise, which I agree with. Taking the number 8 into account, the riot-mentality of the guards should also be unfazed until you take them down to 8, at which point it again begins to deteriorate.
Not that you should be fighting 8 soldiers at once anyway, it's just something interesting I thought of.
Puzzlenaut said:
Stekepanne5 said:
I pretty much agree with all of this. Although combos was fun the first minutes, they became overpowered "Press X to kill all enemies" attacks. Not very Assassin-like.
I do also have some problems with the crossbow. It's the most overpowered weapon in the game, and I finished pretty much all of AC:B using it in close combat or sniping from rooftops.
Then again, it's a fun weapon, and I wouldn't want it to disappear.
Having such a large arsenal of weapons as you have, you're well enough equipped to take down a army by yourself. Maybe a complete weapon overhaul would be in place, to balance the character out. Already in AC:II you could win just about any battle with smokebombs and hidden blades.
With Brotherhood and Revelations giving you even more weapons combat is boring.
Overhauling the combat system is one thing, but something needs to be done about the unbalanced items.
The crossbow was one of my favourite additions to Assassin's Creed, and I enjoyed the varied bombs and similar items introduced later as well, though I have to admit all were overpowered. I feel like they should keep all these cool, often gimmicky, things in, but limit:
1) the number of weapons one can carry on their their person at one time; maybe four at a time (as it was with the first game), with the rest left at your house, or whatever.
2) the amount of "ammo" for these things you can carry: if this was limited, with less stuff freely available through random looting, you would think twice before spraying crossbow bolts and bullets into any random enemies; you'd want to save it for the really dangerous foes.
Also:
One more thing:
PLEASE, Ubisoft, PLEASE, NO MORE CITY-RENOVATION-MINI-GAMES. NOBODY LIKES THEM.
Well that's the thing isn't it? Although with the latter two games, these minigames were at least vaguely tower-defence games and thus vaguely interesting, if somewhat irritating, half the time it feels like half of the interaction you can have with the world around you is totally pointless city renovation games (especially in AC:Bro) which are dull and just don't fit with the aesthetic of the rest of the games. At least with tower defence you actively do something, whereas with city-renovation you literally renovate the city so you can make more money which you can only really spend on renovating more of the city. Its remarkably circular and pointless.
Agree wholeheartedly on limiting the number of weapons you have on you. I stick to the same few weapons anyway (fists, sword, blades, knife), so there's no real reason to use them all, and seriously, who the fuck can leap from building to building with a mace/ axe/ hammer, a sword, a knife, 9 bombs, 20 throwing knives, a crossbow, bolts, a gun, bullets, poison darts, and enough money in coins to buy the entire city?
Limiting your arsenal is also a good way to let a player determine his/ her playstyle, make them select what weapons they want to fight with and then get good with them: Also, the same thing I said about making medicine a commodity applies to bullets, bombs, and bolts.
Also, I feel the city renovations offer yet untapped potential. In The Saboteur, the delightful game I mentioned a few posts ago with the great soundtrack [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvOlJAS7POA] (in case you missed it the first time around), they did something with Paris that I can only call a stroke of genius. See, France was in the middle of German occupancy. There were Nazis everywhere, checkpoint at arbitrary places, propaganda blaring out of omnipresent loudspeakers. What the guys at Pandemic did was allow you to literally liberate Paris. In the oppressed areas, everything was black and white, save for the Nazi-heavy locations which were intense red; it was often raining. It really added to the feel of the game. As you progressed, though, certain districts of Paris, and eventually the entire city, would become liberated. After, say, blowing up the Nazi supercannon, their influence in that area was less noticeable. That part of Paris was then in full colour, the Nazis dwindled in number, and because the Nazis no longer had power there these areas were easier to escape into and hide.
Something similar could be implemented in AC, by making clear distinctions between Templar controlled areas and Assassin controlled areas. Rather than just buying and renovating the city, though, the emphasis would actually be, as it was in The Saboteur, earning influence there. At the very least, it's more opportunities for side-missions, no?
I'm the opposite. I like the setting a lot, I just worry about the gameplay. I didn't like how guided and repetitive Assassin's Creed 2 was and I didn't buy any of the other games because of it. It seems like only me and Jim Sterling like Assassins Creed 1 over 2 because it let you improvise and make choices about the type of gameplay you wanted to take part in. Don't want to tail somebody? Collect some flags. Don't want to listen to a conversation? Stab two guys within a time limit.
Exactly! I am willing to give AC3 a chance (not buy it obviously I'll borrow my friends copy Problem Ubisoft?). 2 other guys replied to me saying climbing natural stuff would be good, I disagree. Climbing through similarly rendered trees and up seemingly identical patches of cliff, will get old fast.
Although I do applaud Ubisoft (for *dons sun glasses* 'BRANCHING OUT' oh hahaha you see what I did there?) as you said they have a huge variety of infinitely more interesting setting and periods. If they promise to make AC4 (or AC Saturday night disco or whatever they plan on calling AC3-2) somewhere with something historical to climb I will stick with the series.
This is something we can only speculate about for now, so before I do so, here is all the information that leads me to my conclusion:
a) The Frontier is 1.5x as big as all of Rome in Brotherhood
b) It makes up ~30% of storyline missions (who knows how much optional content will be there)
c) It is specifically designed to be more interesting than the Kingdom in ACI
d) Ubisoft has so far gone to great lengths to lovingly recreate vast cities
e) ACIII has been in development since ACII shipped in '09
I am led to believe that the same attention to gameplay and detail that went into the architecture has similarly been focused on the surrounding geography. I doubt, or at least hope to the contrary, that the available cliffsides will be identical. This may be the Utah-boy in me talking, having grown up right next to a mountain, I know first-hand how beautiful and diverse natural formations can be; if Ubisoft does this right, it will provide diverse as well as functional-- dare I say, graceful-- gameplay.
In fact, come to think of it, they might have to take great liberties to make the game freerun accessible. The Desmond sections take place in moderndays, correct? Look outside: How many buildings look even remotely scalable? They must by necessity alter that to make it work; same with the Frontier.
But alas, if it turns out I am wrong, I still assure you the next AC game will more likely than not be more to your liking. Hell, even if they keep moving forward in time, the Victorian Era was well after the Revolutionary War, and probably some other great architectural playground in history that I'm not aware of. All is well.
Also, I laughed disproportionately hard at the "branching out" joke. Not expected at all.
CHRIST it is a good thing its summer we could almost publish that.
a) Not interested in the scale I care more about how interesting the actual place is.
b) No one is really in a position to pass judgement on the missions yet, but that ratio seems promising to me.
c) I loved AC 1's environment my favourite one of the series. I am alone on that one apparently.
d) No one is questioning their commitment to their games scape creation, just their decision to base the game in such an architecturally barren location.
e) Blimey that is a long time I hope they deliver.
They may have lovingly made the buildings, but even a porto-toilet can be lovingly made. Basically even well made environments can be aesthetically bland. Despite growing up in an urban setting I have been dragged up nearly every mountain in Wales (a place where no one should base a AC game I know this because I live there). So I know how diverse mountainous landscapes can be, however I would still take a temple or a castle. Although Ubisoft have only disappointed me with Brotherhood, so maybe I will love AC3 maybe even buy it.
Thank you very much for the info
I think they need to clearly define what exactly an Assassin is as far as the Assassin's Creed Universe. In the first game, repetitive though it unfortunately was, it surely was the closest to what we would define an assassin as, which is to say, as you already said: Our Assassin should sneak in, wait and then strike before running like hell. The first Assassin's Creed was all about this. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=cc-ClutaN_I#t=31s] Notice, of course, that Altaïr doesn't stand his ground and take on everyone after the kill, he fucking bails (also of note: somebody mentioned earlier that you can eliminate your victim without even realizing, which was not the case in the first AC: Notice how Altaïr doesn't even break eye contact with his target as he deftly takes out two guards coming at him. Too many enemies = lack of focus).
However, the Assassin in their story has since morphed: Not in an altogether negative way, but enough to make is troublesome. At first, it was about freerunning and stealth, mostly in direct contrast: Once you blew your stealth (read: killed your target), you switched into freerunning mode and made your escape. In the first Assassin's Creed, there was actually incentive to find a hiding spot, and they were scarce. Now, there are bales of hay, wells, bushes, benches, kiosks and tents galore, but no reason to use them, because you can just kill all the witnesses. That's the mutation: It makes sense, of course, that the elite Assassins would also be skilled with a blade; exceptionally skilled, nigh unparalleled even. What doesn't make sense, what is actually bullshit, is when they are apparently so skilled that they don't need to be skilled. Let me provide an example: In another (optional, so spoilers aren't a big deal) Romani quest, you need to kill a thespian with one of your Apprentices. Ezio gives a big ol' speech beforehand about not taking chances, saying "We'll both go, so that if you don't kill her I will, and if I don't you will." After the (laughably) easy assassination, I, without any hint of irony, killed everyone that came after me. See, when you can so easily best everyone in combat that you don't need to be stealthy, that's when gameplay is compromised: Then, the only way to possibly "challenge" the player is to make the combat a chore.
I like the slower regenerating health, the focus on Doctors, and not being able to shop while notorious is a nice touch. However, rather than prohibit you from holding medicine, I say, make is a commodity. As-is, medicine is so widely available that I don't even need to speak to Doctors to have it in excess. They're in treasure chests everywhere, and you can loot it off of dead enemies: Seriously? It's so commonplace I use it when I've fallen a bit too far and lost a bar or two of health. This is a problem.
They did something similar with Halo: Reach, one of the few things they changed I could get behind (in theory, they executed it poorly). They made the grenades a lot more powerful, but also a lot more scarce. The medicine is already powerful, so that's no issue, but it needs to be, literally, a last-ditch safety net, not a trump-card. If the medicine can only be obtained by purchase through a Doctor (who must also not be found easily in the cities), in critically limited amounts, at high prices, players will soon learn that health is a commodity. Conserve that shit. This will make money more useful as well as force you to be more careful when freerunning (no more thrill dives unless you want to take a trip to the Doctor) and fighting.
This is also true. However, and this is something I've always liked about Assassin's Creed, take into account the effects of your actions. If I remember correctly, there's a part in Assassin's Creed II where you drop a body into a crowded area to make a threat or something. When you do that, people start freaking out: Of course they do. You just dropped a fucking corpse. This was always cool to me. Unfortunately, that never seemed to translate (adequately) into the combat. How can you watch somebody effortlessly disarm and kill a heavy-armoured juggernaut and still have the cahones to attack this fucking guy?
Everyone knows that gorilla would've fucked that man up. It's the same basic concept: The fact that the man didn't even flinch signalled to the (fucking) gorilla to back off. Everyone once in a while in AC, one of the low-leveled grunt soldiers will panic and run away, which is a reasonable response. I move to take into account all the possible emotions of a group of attackers, including "kill one to warn one-hundred."
I took Psychology last semester, and if I recall, the maximum amount of peer pressure someone can withstand is 8; after 8, you're almost guaranteed to conform. 8 gives a solid number as far as aggression/ cowardice in foes. As you said, in groups of two, enemies should be more aggressive: This should continue up until 8, the maximum, and then decrease with every soldier you off: The hivemind "nerve" that the soldier has dwindles, and after seeing you fuck up four of his buddies, there is no reason for him to think he can win (it always confuses me in Revelations why a footsoldier can see you literally beat a Janissary to death and still have the balls to swing). Basically, the more soldiers there are, the more aggressive/ bold they are, and the more you kill, the less aggressive/ bold they are.
The above also ties in with your escalating enemies premise, which I agree with. Taking the number 8 into account, the riot-mentality of the guards should also be unfazed until you take them down to 8, at which point it again begins to deteriorate.
Not that you should be fighting 8 soldiers at once anyway, it's just something interesting I thought of.
Puzzlenaut said:
Stekepanne5 said:
I pretty much agree with all of this. Although combos was fun the first minutes, they became overpowered "Press X to kill all enemies" attacks. Not very Assassin-like.
I do also have some problems with the crossbow. It's the most overpowered weapon in the game, and I finished pretty much all of AC:B using it in close combat or sniping from rooftops.
Then again, it's a fun weapon, and I wouldn't want it to disappear.
Having such a large arsenal of weapons as you have, you're well enough equipped to take down a army by yourself. Maybe a complete weapon overhaul would be in place, to balance the character out. Already in AC:II you could win just about any battle with smokebombs and hidden blades.
With Brotherhood and Revelations giving you even more weapons combat is boring.
Overhauling the combat system is one thing, but something needs to be done about the unbalanced items.
The crossbow was one of my favourite additions to Assassin's Creed, and I enjoyed the varied bombs and similar items introduced later as well, though I have to admit all were overpowered. I feel like they should keep all these cool, often gimmicky, things in, but limit:
1) the number of weapons one can carry on their their person at one time; maybe four at a time (as it was with the first game), with the rest left at your house, or whatever.
2) the amount of "ammo" for these things you can carry: if this was limited, with less stuff freely available through random looting, you would think twice before spraying crossbow bolts and bullets into any random enemies; you'd want to save it for the really dangerous foes.
Also:
One more thing:
PLEASE, Ubisoft, PLEASE, NO MORE CITY-RENOVATION-MINI-GAMES. NOBODY LIKES THEM.
Well that's the thing isn't it? Although with the latter two games, these minigames were at least vaguely tower-defence games and thus vaguely interesting, if somewhat irritating, half the time it feels like half of the interaction you can have with the world around you is totally pointless city renovation games (especially in AC:Bro) which are dull and just don't fit with the aesthetic of the rest of the games. At least with tower defence you actively do something, whereas with city-renovation you literally renovate the city so you can make more money which you can only really spend on renovating more of the city. Its remarkably circular and pointless.
Agree wholeheartedly on limiting the number of weapons you have on you. I stick to the same few weapons anyway (fists, sword, blades, knife), so there's no real reason to use them all, and seriously, who the fuck can leap from building to building with a mace/ axe/ hammer, a sword, a knife, 9 bombs, 20 throwing knives, a crossbow, bolts, a gun, bullets, poison darts, and enough money in coins to buy the entire city?
Limiting your arsenal is also a good way to let a player determine his/ her playstyle, make them select what weapons they want to fight with and then get good with them: Also, the same thing I said about making medicine a commodity applies to bullets, bombs, and bolts.
Also, I feel the city renovations offer yet untapped potential. In The Saboteur, the delightful game I mentioned a few posts ago with the great soundtrack [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvOlJAS7POA] (in case you missed it the first time around), they did something with Paris that I can only call a stroke of genius. See, France was in the middle of German occupancy. There were Nazis everywhere, checkpoint at arbitrary places, propaganda blaring out of omnipresent loudspeakers. What the guys at Pandemic did was allow you to literally liberate Paris. In the oppressed areas, everything was black and white, save for the Nazi-heavy locations which were intense red; it was often raining. It really added to the feel of the game. As you progressed, though, certain districts of Paris, and eventually the entire city, would become liberated. After, say, blowing up the Nazi supercannon, their influence in that area was less noticeable. That part of Paris was then in full colour, the Nazis dwindled in number, and because the Nazis no longer had power there these areas were easier to escape into and hide.
Something similar could be implemented in AC, by making clear distinctions between Templar controlled areas and Assassin controlled areas. Rather than just buying and renovating the city, though, the emphasis would actually be, as it was in The Saboteur, earning influence there. At the very least, it's more opportunities for side-missions, no?
Having had a little look into Saboteur now, it seems, at least on the surface, like it is everything I hope Assassin's Creed would be once it moved into the modern era, and, as you say, does seem to be an example of the city-renovation idea done right: from the gameplay videos, there seems to be a genuine difference in the Nazi-controlled areas, as opposed to AC's mode of just having an area on the map highlighted red.
I do also love the idea of of using intimidation tactics in Assassin's Creed: it would fit in quite well with the idea that a few might die so the rest might live, essentially meaning that if the person doesn't need to die, then an Assassin shouldn't kill him. Would this "8" idea be based around a soldier seeing you have killed 8 people and choosing to flee, or would be the reverse: if you get surrounded by 8 soldiers the game tells YOU to flee? Either way, it would be quite interesting and more realistic.
In terms of limiting your arsenal:
For big Assassinations, there should be a build up that explains the appropriate equipment to have in your limited arsenal for the Assassination, with hints like "there won't be much fighting so you won't need a sword", "You'll need a weapon that can stop this man's horse so you can catch him", "you'll need a distraction to get through this door".
The first AC was ham-fisted and repetitive in its approach in this way, but it had the right idea.
--
At this point, however, I'm advocating so many changes it wouldn't even be an Assassin's Creed game any more. Hell, it'd probably be more like that Saboteur game you mentioned...
This site uses cookies to help personalise content, tailor your experience and to keep you logged in if you register.
By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies.
