2011 Retrospective: Assassins Creed Revelations

2011 Retrospective: Assassins Creed Revelations - May 25th 2012

Welcome to our latest retrospective review, where we look back at 2011 hits and provide detailed info for those who may have missed some of last years biggest titles. Assassin's Creed: Revelations is the third and final chapter of the Ezio Auditore saga. It also neatly wraps up the tale of Altaïr. Does Revelations live up to the greatness of the previous installments? In a word: yes.

The story of Assassin's Creed: Revelations follows Ezio Auditore for his final journey. The game starts out with our hero traveling to Masyaf, the location of the Assassin's Guild in the first Assassin's Creed, to seek knowledge of the legendary Altaïr. To Ezio's surprise, Masyaf is overrun with Knights Templar, the bad guys of the series. It turns out that they too are searching for the library of Altaïr, which is hidden beneath the castle of Assassins. Ezio then discovers that there are five keys which open the door to the library that are tucked away in the massive city of Constantinople. Ezio makes his way there to find these keys, so that he may complete his original pilgrimage.

Multiplayer is a tense and exciting affair.
Of course, the Templars are in Constantinople as well looking for these keys, which means that Ezio will need some help. He then sets out to find the Assassin's Guild in Constantinople to establish a base of operations. Ezio comes across Yusuf Tasim, who hooks Ezio up with some new gear, like the hook blade. You see what I did there? (I live for puns like that - Ed). Along with a diverse selection of devastating bombs, Ezio is now well equipped to begin his journey.

The developers behind the Assassin's Creed series always manage to innovate and improve their games. Revelations happens to be Ubisoft's biggest project, with over ten different Ubisoft Studios working on this game alone. The gameplay still feels familiar, with enough of a twist to keep things fresh, fast, and fascinating. The controls have been revamped to make combat a synch, with the incorporation of having a secondary weapon. Eagle Vision has been changed to Eagle Sense, which is a huge improvement over the Vision. Eagle Sense shows the patrol paths of guards, and the paths of primary targets along with identifying them. They've swapped out the button normally used for your Eagle Vision and replaced it with the secondary weapon command; this also shows in your weapon selection screen.

Gory executions make a return, as expected.
In previous games, there is only one weapons wheel. In Revelations, there are two, one with primary weapons, and the other for secondary. Primary weapons are the important stuff, like swords, daggers, fisticuffs, and the ever awesome hidden blades. The secondary weapons wheel is more off-hand stuff like the hidden gun, throwing knives, poison darts, and bombs. This really helps out in combat situations when you really don't want to deal with the rather large gentleman wielding an enormous axe. If you have the gun equipped, you can take him down with a press of a button. With the right kind of bomb equipped, another quick press of the secondary weapon button, and up goes a smoke screen, causing your enemies to choke and sputter as Ezio either makes his escape or ends their lives.

The combat system basically remains the same from Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, which isn't a bad thing. Having the close range kill streak makes combat flow ever so smoothly, and it's always a sadistic delight to watch Ezio take out his enemies with style and finesse. As mentioned previously, bombs and the hook blade are new to the franchise. The hook blade is just that, it's a hook and it's a blade, so players can have the dual hidden blade combat that they've come to love. Moreover, the hook part is what makes navigating throughout the city of Constantinople so much easier. First off, there are ziplines set up by the Assassin's guild that really help when you're trying to get to the next objective, or getting away from the bad guys. Ziplines also present opportunities for really cool assassinations.

Player movement is smoother than ever.
The hook blade also allows you to leap up walls, making climbing significantly faster. Also, when falling, or leaping to the next ledge, players have always been able to hold down the grab button and Ezio will catch whatever he finds. The problem is that always seemed to make him fall straight down. The hook blade improves upon this immensely by making the grab reach out, rather than down. And if Ezio ever finds himself in a pinch, and there is a wall of guards in his way, no problem! While running, hold down the shove button, and Ezio deftly flips over the guard in front of him and is clear to get away. But enough about the hook blade, let's talk about bombs.

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