"Load last checkpoint..."
I've only played for about an hour so far, so I can't speak to how I'm liking the game too much, but even in that short time you can already tell that this is a far superior product to Revelations (and Brotherhood, I would say) - and I say this as someone who didn't think those games were as bad as some others, mechanically at least. The story is total garbage but that's sort of a problem with the entire series. Honestly a lot of what Ryan was saying in the QL made me think I probably wasn't going to enjoy this game, but I'll save those thoughts for when I can actually speak to them. But I can say that there are a few little tweaks to the game that I really like. Having an option to return to a checkpoint is really just emblematic of that, because It always seemed totally ridiculous to not have that option in previous games, particularly after they introduced the "full syncronisation" mechanic (this was how I discovered how difficult it was to die in these games, because everytime I missed a full sync objective I would have to try and get killed to go back to a checkpoint rather than start the mission over).
But there are other little changes that I reallyl ike too. Having the secondary objectives pop up at the relevant moments, rather than just being told them at the start of the section does a lot for keeping you "in" the experience, I think. Streamlining the whole high and low profile actions thing was a good move. I can't think of any more, but I appreciate those small changes nonetheless.
Althoug they do still do the thing which I think assassin's creed series has always been really bad at, which is switching between cutscenes and direct control really arbitrarily in some moments. At the very start of this game, there is a segment where Desmond and co are going int oa building which switches betwee nthe two about 3 times. But the cutscenes don't give you any new information, and you don't do anything of interest when you have control (and of course, desmond has never been fun to control anyway). It always annoys me, even though its a really minor thing. A lot of games do it, I think. It always makes the experience feel kind of rough and shoddily put together though.
Log in to comment