Assassin's Creed Unity

Bear with me on this one, this game brings in a lot of emotions. It's a bit of a topsy-turvey type of emotional rollercoaster that I feel when thinking of this game, so forgive me if I don't make as much sense as I should, or if I just seem overly conflicted.

But before I review the actual game itself, I'll give a slight background so you can see my point of view. One of the first games I ever played for the Playstation 3 was the original Assassin's Creed game. While it did get a lot of positive reception, there was also a bit of negativity in the general consensus of the consumer base. A dear friend of mine said it was extremely repetitive. None of the negativity it received ever really bothered me.

Fast forward 8? years and many more titles - all of which I greatly enjoyed - to last year (month) right before Christmas. I put the game in and gave it a go.

I'm pretty disgusted. After completing 3, for reasons I won't spoil here, I was left wondering what direction the series was going to be taken. Then upon playing AC 4, I felt greatly enthused. Very pleased, even. While there were a small list of things done that I did not like or agree with, the overall experience was amazing. It was similar enough from the Ezio series and the other games of the franchise that I felt at home, and yet there was much done differently where I felt it was not stagnating.

Then I played Unity. While there is a lot to still like about the franchise, I feel that it is greatly stagnating and becoming unenjoyable. While I know of a quite a few reasons why this is so, there's something else elusive about this disgust that I can't actually put my finger on, to this day.

To sum up a lot of what I'm feeling, I'll tell you that Unity feels a lot like Ezio game number 4. While on the outside this sounds great, it really should be but it isn't. Why? Because it's Ezio game number 4 with an English-born character in revolutionary France. Not Ezio, not Italy, not good. It's not good because while it captures a lot of what was right about most of the other games, it also captures a ton of what was wrong with them.

I deny taking into account the framerate issues that has caused Ubisoft to apologize. It doesn't really bother me too much. Yes, I'd love for it to play at a constant 60 frames, but I won't begrudge a constant 30. A few bad framerate issues before the first patch, none seem to happen now. So fixed for all intents and purposes in my eyes. I don't begrudge anyone else wanting the 60 fps, I'm just not going to knock off any star or give it much more of a thought than to tell you I won't be considering it for the overall review.

The thing that bothers me the most about this game is that outwardly, it should be extremely fun. Maybe even just as fun as previous games. I think what Ubisoft failed to do that really is the underlying tone of why diehard AC people such as myself should be bitter about this game is that the past 2 games brought something very new and fresh to the franchise. 3 brought the 1st of the naval aspect of the series, as well as brought a good new character after a great 3 series storyline. Then 4 was great just on its own standing, not to mention it took the naval aspect and blew it up into beyond expectation-level greatness. Two fresh games followed by Ezio 4 with it not being Ezio. Or desirable. I just don't understand what Ubisoft was trying to do here, other than push a game every year. Or two, so it seems last year. It leaves a bitter taste, indeed.

Now that this is pretty long-winded, I'll leave by saying that I'm not pleased in the direction the franchise is going. If I could give this game a 1 and a half star, I would. I have gotten very far in the game, and I am usually against not giving a review or recommendation without trying the whole product, but unless the ending is the most amazing thing to ever happen to gaming, I stick by this review. I'll finish this game someday, and move on to playing Assassin's Creed: Rogue. I really hope the series gets much better moving on from here.