Now that it's been out...Can I hear from some of our regular forum goers? SPOILERS!!

[RzaRecta357]

Hey guys, just wanted to see what some of our regulars thought of that game now that it's been out. Obviously i'll have spoilers in here but I'm talking about people like Lightrey, Jexx, Animuses, Chrono, Blind2Society and any others I may of missed.

I know some people were stressing when the reviews were coming in.

Anyway, this game totally surprised me. I'm one of those people that loved AC1 the most but this game is now my favourite in the franchise.

So, first I'd like to say I was super surprised that the Turkish armor was actually the special hidden armor of the game. Unless that preorder is something different. Either way I could care less as I got it at EB and that armor and mask look amazing.

This is the first time I actually enjoyed the look of all the armors in the game also. I think they all looked awesome and the hidden tomb one is amazing and now my fav outfit.

The hookblade? I thought that was an AMAZING addition. It just feels natural. The way it springs him upward is awesome.

The music? Amazing. You can tell they tried hard to mix it up from the Rome style they hard and I love it.

The assassin recruit missions really help you feel like a mentor. I read people were complaining about the Den defense. It wasn't THAT bad and it was almost completely optional besides the first time if you remember to bribe a herald every so often.

I didn't mess with the bombs to much but they are cool. I thought throwing a smoke bomb at my feet felt a bit clunky now though.

I did Desmonds sections almost right away and I thought they rocked. I don't see the complaints. They're optional for the story wanters anyway and I enjoyed it.

I don't know how I feel about Lucy or the way they handled 16. Did they want us to think he was going to try and steal Desmonds body or something? I totally thought that for a moment when he was freaking out. Then he grabbed him later haha.

The Sophia bits were awesome also.

I was hoping for a bit more with Altair and Maria after reading the book but I must remember the games are more canon than the book so that's the way it goes down. Although I would of LOVED to see buddies eyes bulge out and his face clawing and what not.

I love how they explained the apple thing also. The first civilization video was cool also even though they try to pull some heart strings with the woman and baby.

Anyway, there is more I want to say but I can't remember it as I'm just fresh off beating the game and was amazing by it. I wonder what AC3's gameplay will be like with his glowly armor. Heh.

Also I was so busy typing this while the credits rolled that I fear I missed something with the flashes like maybe 16 flashing or something. Anything?

[Adnocana]

I thought the story was shallow at best.

If a game is called "Revelations", I expect some actual revelations. Ubi claimed this game would tie up the stories of Altair, Ezio and Desmond.
However, we already knew of Altair's story. His gameplay segments were not only incredibly short, they were also extremely linear and aside from fanservice added nothing to the overall plot. There was nothing we didn't already know.

Ezio's story is not good. He is an awful mentor, as he was in AC: Brotherhood. For a man striving for peace, he sure has no qualms killing anyone in his way. Ezio is a sociopath, anyone even remotely linked to a neighbour of a Templar cleaning lady needs to die. The way he basically killed an entire city just to destroy a supersmall weapons cache shows that he is an awful tactician. The fact that his feelings towards a woman compromised the entire Brotherhood, killed his closest friends and forced him to hand over the Masyaf Keys proves that he is an awful leader.
His ending was also lackluster. I understand that he is a tired, worn out man. Tired of conflict, tired of battle. But the way he just throws his stuff on the floor and "quits" at that specific point in the story is awful. Also how out of nowhere he "understands" he is just a vehicle to tranfer the message to Desmond. Yeah okay, what gave him that insight all of a sudden?

As for Desmond, we didn't get any revelation at all. We get some backstory on his life through the 5 [optional, by all means] Animus Island segments. The ending cinematic was utterly confusing. The big Lucy cliffhanger from Brotherhood thrown in the wind, utterly forgotten after 5 minutes of play. We get a cinematic of the earth getting destroyed by solar flares. Something we already learned in ACII, two years ago. The ending taught us nothing new, other than that Desmond is back in the USA and with his father.

He ends with "I know what we have to do". Well it would be nice if the game told us this, too.

This entire game felt like the middle episode in a season of Lost or 24. It ties up nothing, it concludes nothing.

A dissappointment throughout.

[Animuses]

I'm liking it much more on my second playthrough.
The first sequence left a bad taste in my mouth. First the weird rope climbing gameplay, then the annoying horse carriage, and then I'm not even able to fight Leandros.

Things started to get better during the second sequence.It was okay since it was basically a tutorial sequence.

The third sequence was still kind of slow story-wise, but it introduced the Master Assassin missions, which I love. Once sequence 4 started then the game really began.

What I really liked about the story is how they sort of stressed the fact that Templars and Assassins have the same goal, but have different ways of achieving it. It wasn't like Brotherhood where is was, Assassins good, Templars bad.

<span class="ev_code_WHITE">I loved the Tarik's assassination and how Ezio killed an innocent man. The emotion in Ezio's eyes really got me and you could see how sorry he felt.

I loved Shahkulu's assassination as well. First air assassinating him from an awesome spot then finding out you didn't kill him and you get into an awesome fight with him. He's now the only character I'll use in Multiplayer.

I wasn't a big fan of the fight with Ahmet, it could've been done better and the parachuting before it was not that good either.</span>

One of the best additions to the game were the Jannisaries. They were just what combat needed. The hookblade was great. Whether it be for climbing, ziplining, or rolling over a guard when being chased, it's ALWAYS useful. Oh and how I love sweeping people's legs.

The bombs are enjoyable, not necessary, but a nice addition. Bombs really do help a lot in open area stealth.

The characters were few in number, but they were all great. 16 was a great character as was Yusuf, Sofia, Suleiman, and Ahmet.

I liked how the Sofia missions were separate, but also part of the main story. If you want to play the Altair memories right away, you can. If you want to wait, you can wait.

The Den Defense was NOT bad at all, it just didn't fit. I actually enjoyed it, but it really does pull you away from Assassin's Creed.

The Desmond Memories gameplay was annoying and didn't seem well thought out to me, but I get to hear Desmond talk about his past, which I really enjoyed.

I probably missed a bunch of things, but what I have will have to do.

For a years worth of development it was really good. Imagine if they had more time and the original devs back...

As of now I'd rate the game somewhere from an 85-89.

[Black_Widow9]

I'm going to move this here-
Assassin's Creed Hints & Tips (http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/frm/f/9011039408)

[zerocooll21]

Sub'd

[twenty_glyphs]

I absolutely love the game, but at the same time understand a lot of the complaints. It definitely starts out slow and kind of clunky. When I was playing sometime in Sequence 3 and exploring the city, I was feeling overwhelmed by the city since I hadn't learned it much yet and a little underwhelmed by the game. As Sequence 4 and 5 got going though, the game just kept getting better for me. I love the story, especially Ezio's, and thought the "nexus" was a fantastic moment. I thought the parachute chariot chase was actually a lot of fun and epic. The story did leave me feeling incredibly sad for all the pain that Ezio has been through, but it was a good kind of sad, which is hard to explain.

The hookblade is definitely a great addition, and gives improvements in tons of areas. I discovered something yesterday I never saw mentioned anywhere in the game. The game has had a move for a while where if you are sprinting towards the edge of a roof and you let go of the legs button but keep holding high profile, you'll grab the ledge and turn around and hang on it. That still happens, but if you hold the empty hand button and high profile while going over the edge, Ezio uses the hookblade to grab the edge much faster and drop down to the same hanging position. It really helps the fluidity and makes it easier to break line of sight of rooftop guards when I'm running around up there.

Bombs are okay, but not essential. I haven't experimented too much with them yet, but some of the effects have been nice. I was disappointed that there are only 10 types of effects, and don't feel that different from each other sometimes.

Den Defense isn't terrible, but it's really just not that much fun. I've played it 5 times and don't really want to play again. I have two contested dens now that have been that way for a while and won't get taken over. I did like the fact that when a den is contested, there are Templars all over the area and it's a challenge to sneak up to it anonymously so you can interact with the door. It was cool to see Templars trying to chop down ziplines, but I still don't know if they would ever actually succeed. I can't tell if ziplines really get added or taken away with this new system. I appreciate the dynamic they were going for with letting you attack and defend the dens, but the execution still needs a little work.

I was a little disappointed with the Altaïr memories other than the last one. The fact that the last 3rd, 4th and 5th seals were just a repeat of The Secret Crusade felt a little cheap since that had been out for 4.5 months and I already knew the story. It took away some of the urgency of finding them to see what happened. It's also a strange continuity error, because Ezio actually finds The Secret Crusade journal and supposedly reads it on his way to Constantinople, yet he doesn't know the story the book tells until he finds the seals.

I actually thought the Desmond memory gameplay was really interesting and it really started growing on me. The first person nature of it really threw me off though. I was disappointed in the stories you get from the memories, since we really learned almost nothing we didn't already know. It was all just small details. I was so excited in the fifth memory and loved how the level was a recreation of the escape from Abstergo level from AC2. I was expecting some big payoff, but it was a big letdown. I liked Desmond narrating them, but it seemed really lame that all you had was stock photography in some of the rooms representing what he's talking about. I was expecting Desmond to actually walk through 3D projections of the memories he was having and view them from that angle, and think it would have had more effect than just generic pictures on the walls.

I miss the old conspiracy-based puzzles of The Truth. I do understand that it's probably getting hard to mine more and more conspiracy theories from history to create the same mood as the AC2 and Brotherhood puzzles. Maybe the next step is to mine mythology and show what elements from myths about the gods apply to TWCB. Tinia did say the Grand Temple is where Desmond would find all his answers to questions about who they were, what happened to them, what they desire from Desmond, etc. Maybe that could play out with some sort of puzzle gameplay in AC3.

[Adnocana]

I'm pretty sure certain parts have been cut from the game. Not only is it fairly short, it also lacks the "multiple angle" view that previous games had.

ACII and AC:B had clear "chapters", with different groups of people [both allies and enemies] at the center. The story focusses on a certain group, and moves on to the next. ACII had the Medici in Florence, for example. AC:B had the mercenaries vs. the French army, for example. When that storyline was finished, the game moved to the next sequence. They had a very clear structure to them. AC:R does not, it even completely ignores the factions in the city, aside from one obligatory mission over at the Romani camp. The AC:R story focusses on about 3 enemies throughout the game, and that's it. We don't learn much about them, one of the biggest "crimes" they commit is about shipping a crate of guns around. And Shakhulu likes beating up people. There was no obvious reason why any of these people need to die other than "they're Templars". If any, the game constantly made me question the opressive and fascist ways of the Assassins, especially when Ezio relentlessly killed the innocent man. He had no reason to other than the sultan kid told him to. This happens on several occasions throughout the story, Ezio is more a hitman/gun for hire than he even realises.

Also, after the absurd parachute/charriot race with Ahmed, his brother shows up, strangles him and throws him down the cliff. Wasn't the brother also an evil person? Didn't he tell Ezio to stay away from Masyaf/Constantinople? Also, how the hell was Masyaf abandoned when Ezio and Sofia went in? It was overrun with templars at the start of the game, and I suspect that the entire duration of the game is a matter of months instead of years like in ACII or AC:B.


I also thought it was absurd that we didn't even get to free-roam Masyaf. Just looking around the village, finally climbing the Masyaf castle. None of that.

I like this game for its amazing city and great exploration, but the story left much to be desired, as did most of the design choices [den defence, notoriety system, upgrades, upgrading stores].

I mean, even after the million threads we had over the last two years we're still not able to remove a piece of equipment/armor. We can now craft 100 types of bombs, 95 of them will never be used but something simple as unequiping a chestplate is impossible. It's little things that annoy me.

[rileypoole1234]

Kinda sad you didn't name me as a regular hahah http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/bigtears.gif. But I loved the game. One of my favourite AC games so far. Can't decide between AC2 and ACR. The ending of this game, and Embers, had me speechless. I'm still speechless really. I don't know what to say about it besides I thought it was absolutely fantastic, brilliant, and amazing.

[Animuses]

The Altair missions were quite short, and skipped way too far ahead in his life. I was looking forward to seeing him studying the apple, writing the codex and using the double hidden blades for the first time or something like that. I fought as normal Altair three times, the other three times I was hardly able to walk.

Where's Malik? Where is the Armor of Altair? These are things we wanted to see, but we only got one mention of Malik and no special armor.

What really annoyed me was Abbas. He was such a pathetic character. I don't find it believable that the Assassins would actually follow his orders.

I still really like the Altair missions though, but they could've been done so much better.

I do have two minor issues though. Altair's voice never ages and Altair was able to melee with the hidden blade. He made that modification after the events of AC1.

[twenty_glyphs]

Another small gripe I have is that I was disappointed in the Ishak Pasha Memoir Pages. After the Codex pages and the Scrolls of Brutus that you got to read in the last two games, I expected these pages to tell some cool stories written by him and to have some drawings of TWCB stuff like those documents in the last two games. But as far as I can see, they're just something you collect. Don't get me wrong, I like that they're in the game and the way they unlock the tomb where you can get his armor. But it feels like a couple of these small details got left out after they were in the last two games. I just expected something labelled a memoir page to actually have a memoir account with it, and it would have made the armor mean more if we knew his story.

[Will_Lucky]

Originally posted by Animuses:
The Altair missions were quite short, and skipped way too far ahead in his life. I was looking forward to seeing him studying the apple, writing the codex and using the double hidden blades for the first time or something like that. I fought as normal Altair three times, the other three times I was hardly able to walk.

Where's Malik? Where is the Armor of Altair? These are things we wanted to see, but we only got one mention of Malik and no special armor.

What really annoyed me was Abbas. He was such a pathetic character. I don't find it believable that the Assassins would actually follow his orders.

I still really like the Altair missions though, but they could've been done so much better.

I do have two minor issues though. Altair's voice never ages and Altair was able to melee with the hidden blade. He made that modification after the events of AC1.

The Altair memories, of all the things promised in the past I think this has been the biggest disappointment in the series for me.

So much potential ruined. I was expecting to see old characters, the new inventions. But all it was in the end was the conflict between Altair and someone who virtually had one or two lines in Assassins Creed 1.

I enjoyed the game overall though, I loved the Ezio arc I felt sad at the end though but happy for him to strip away his weapons and just retire there and then far better than the Ezio I saw in Brotherhood. It was in the end a great game I feel.

[goclo822]

I actually thought the Desmond memory gameplay was really interesting and it really started growing on me. The first person nature of it really threw me off though. I was disappointed in the stories you get from the memories, since we really learned almost nothing we didn't already know. It was all just small details. I was so excited in the fifth memory and loved how the level was a recreation of the escape from Abstergo level from AC2. I was expecting some big payoff, but it was a big letdown. I liked Desmond narrating them, but it seemed really lame that all you had was stock photography in some of the rooms representing what he's talking about. I was expecting Desmond to actually walk through 3D projections of the memories he was having and view them from that angle, and think it would have had more effect than just generic pictures on the walls.
That was also what I was hoping for and disappointed we never got. I know that we were suppose to be piecing together his memories but I think it could have been done in a much more literal way. There was one point where you walk through a street right at the end of one of the sequences and I was hoping it would continue on like that but it was more of the same. I enjoyed his sequences but I was hoping to see more than just narrated pictures of his past.

Same with Altair's storyline. I enjoyed the bits we got from it. There was a lot that I hadn't known before about him but I was hoping for some more surprising revelations (no pun intended) from his life.

[agitatedchimp]

Originally posted by Animuses:
The Altair missions were quite short, and skipped way too far ahead in his life. I was looking forward to seeing him studying the apple, writing the codex and using the double hidden blades for the first time or something like that. I fought as normal Altair three times, the other three times I was hardly able to walk.

Where's Malik? Where is the Armor of Altair? These are things we wanted to see, but we only got one mention of Malik and no special armor.

What really annoyed me was Abbas. He was such a pathetic character. I don't find it believable that the Assassins would actually follow his orders.

I still really like the Altair missions though, but they could've been done so much better.

I do have two minor issues though. Altair's voice never ages and Altair was able to melee with the hidden blade. He made that modification after the events of AC1.

Yeah im kind of annoyed that Malik's excecution wasn't in the game or the fact that it was Maliks son who supported Altair in killing Abbas. These were mentioned in the secret crusade however it could be considered no-canon.

Also Altairs voice did age, just only in the final sequence.

[dchil279]

I fail to understand why when Desmond meets Subject 16 face to face but forgets to ask him "what the **** have you been trying to tell me all this time"... We still don't know what the **** was up with Juno making you kill Lucy, and all that (Tinia or Jupiter?) tells us is literally the EXACT same information that we learned in AC2 and ACB only this time we get a cute little video with a woman and a baby. The one piece of info we get is that the coordinates from the Da Vinci Disappearance is in fact a temple which we basically knew already. Bill IS Desmond's dad (Shocker!) and This game should not have been called "Revelations". It brought absolutely nothing to the modern day story line. In fact, if you skip this game, and went straight to [AC3] you wouldn't be confused at all.

The Ezio gameplay was pretty good, but Ubisoft is still straying away from the original AC1 concept of main assassination targets Ezio just kills everything and anyone in his way (which is fun, but...). I found myself questioning Ezio's actions, logic, and philosophy more than ever in this game. Also, the beginning to the game is terrible in all aspects.

The cutscene music was a nice touch, but was very out of place during many of them. I don't see why they felt they needed to change Ezio's face and make his eyes yellow but that's cool I guess... and I don't know why they felt they needed to change Desmond's face either, although at the end of the game his face goes back to normal...

The city and atmosphere of COnstantinople is the strength if this game. I love wandering around the city more than I did in ACB and just as much as AC2. It's nice to see that the devs did put a lot of effort into at least part of the game.

All in all it was a good game, not great. I would have much rather them just skip making this game and go straight to ACIII though.