Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
Supporting Content
Project Legacy: Ubisoft developed a game called Assassin's Creed: Project Legacy on Facebook September 30, 2010. Their trailer made it sound like some sort of secondary artificial reality that interacted with the main game. Also mentioned in the trailer, you were able to earn the Medici and Venetian Capes in the game (cosmetic only). Unfortunately due to not complying to Facebook's Terms and Services by updating their product, it was discontinued May 15, 2013. You can always find the narrative records of the game by visiting Access the Animus website.
Multiplayer: Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood is the first game in the series to include multiplayer. In fact, they heavily hinted it in their E3 trailer. Over the period of a year after the initial release, Ubisoft released three Animus Project Updates that added characters, maps, and game modes. However, your main goal remained consistent - receive a randomly assigned target and assassinate them. You do gradually earn more abilities to counteract your opponents, but you're primary objective is to simply ruin someone else's day. There seems to be some sort of anti-cheating program called PunkBuster that gets installed along with the game that keeps these fights fair.
DLC: Along with its three multiplayer updates, Ubisoft also added 2 DLCs and a few unlockable cosmetics through their gaming platform store. Copernicus Conspiracy, first released in 2010, offered 8 more memories to prevent the demise of Nicolaus Copernicus and his fellow scholars. The Da Vinci Disappearance, originally offered for 800 Microsoft Points or $9.99 in 2011, was later given out for free in the Game of the Year Edition (also currently available for download in the Ubisoft Store). This package added 8 memories revolving around Leonardo's disappearance and the hidden message inside his lost paintings. Both DLCs were fine additions to the game.
Editions: The previous two games included Collector Editions that contained little figurines of Altair and Ezio (choice of black or white outfits). Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood decided to go a tad different with a unique Harlequin or Doctor Jack-in-the-Box (depending on the retailer) to highlight their new multiplayer mode. Of course you could always cash out and get their Codex Version for the Renaissance Collector Chest. Though as I stated in my previous blog entry, it would probably be easier to buy all 5 of the first games in the Assassin's Creed: Heritage Collection or at least the 3 games pertaining to Ezio's story trilogy in the Assassin's Creed: The Ezio Collection. The collections "barely" improves the graphics, lighting, and textures in the game, include all DLC, and have a couple of short films.
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Narrative Content
Story: Since Assassin's Creed II worked so well for Ubisoft, they decided to use the same formula. This direct sequel follows up on Desmond fleeing to a new location with his ragbag team of blue shirt assassin buddies. It assumes you have completed the previous game by collecting all the feathers, completing all six tombs, and playing the epilogue that occurs during the credits. Eventually we get to see Ezio live comfortably in his Villa for roughly 5 seconds before being surprised by a giant army (like how in the world does that happen?). A huge battle, that you will enjoy every minute of, rips everything you earned away. I think I wrote "I've never been so happy to fire a cannon before" in my notes. He then flees to Rome (they pronounce it Roma) and re-establishes his connections in the city between 1499 - 1507 AD.
Your primary goal of the game is to chase after the person responsible through 9 primary memory sequences. All the events are loosely based on actual history. However, you are going to have a hard time unless you do a few side missions along the way. You can build up your 4 guild factions, take down the Borgia captains and burn the towers restricting each district, reveal key points on the map from reaching the top of said towers, and buy everything in sight. The game tends to skip around chronologically with the various fragmented memories or "events in time" as I call them. For example, the "restored memories" from the DLCs can actually be accessed before its proper moment at the "point of no return" after Sequence 8. After all was said and done, the game lasted me around 20 hours, as usual.
Mission Flow: After playing through all three games, I've noticed small improvements and little problems that crept up in Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood over the previous games. Some of the sub-menus became easier to read. Most of the database entries have been refined in a professional manner. You can access and insert location markers on the map directly from the database. You can skip any cutscene, restart memories, or abandon them when pausing the game. It isn't perfect though. Restarting a memory means exactly that - from the moment you start making that little trek across the map. Everything you earned across the map from your last run, like flags or treasure chests, must be collected again. Your ammunition resets as well. What I don't understand about starting a mission is why it takes the game 10 seconds to "load" the memory. It doesn't even give the computer lady enough time to read the little tooltips on the screen. In fact, the minute run to your target could give the game enough time to load your target into the background.
When memories and areas are unlocked wasn't very clear to me. I think they are directly tied to which main memory sequence you recently completed. Icons on the map are clear and distinguishable. A marker with a white square around it shows whether or not it has a "quest" available. Icons and districts will appear on the map even though the area can be still technically "not available." You can leave the Animus "as if to take a break" to answer email and talk to your pals at any time now. An exclamation point will appear if you receive any new useless email to read. Upgrades and Fast Travel aren't given out anymore. They have to be bought to unlock like nearly everything else in this game. Missions are a bit more strict, even sometimes requiring a complete run-through without being detected. This includes running directly up to a soldier or archer and assassinating them. This only compounds the issues of targeting and guard awareness when they can be a bit problematic at times.
Guilds: After completing the first few memory sequences, you unlock 3 guilds (in addition to your own) to help fight the Borgia. Each of the 4 guilds provide you with their own set of 5 to 10 challenges. Completing these challenges will provide discounts and additional perks to the recruits of that faction. Completing all of the challenges provides you with some interesting weapons - Assassin's Guild rewards a decorative Assassin's Guild Crest and Altair's Sword, Mercenaries Guild provides Bartolomeo's Axe, Courtesan's Guild gives Maria's Dagger, and Thieves Guild award La Volpe's Bite (a sword). The mini-games inside the buildings - the fist fights at the barracks or the dice game "Hazard" in the Thieves Guild (offered through Da Vinci Disappearance) - don't seem to award you anything other than a gambling addiction.
Gameplay
Controls: They finally incorporated a proper xbox controller setup for the game. The problem? You cannot modify the buttons. Honestly, the setup is actually pretty well-designed. The weapon wheel is assigned to the right bumper and "high-profile" is mapped to the right trigger. I just had to remap my brain to use the "back" button instead of the left bumper to open the map. The game does reconnect your controller if you have to suddenly replace some dead batteries. However, the game never recognizes the controller if you forget to turn it on before starting the game. The good news is you can assign 4 things from the weapon wheel to your directional pad, something that wasn't offered in Assassin's Creed II.
New Features: There are so many little details added to this game. They added "lifts" that give you a fast way up. You can instantly kill multiple targets with a variety of amusing animations, including firing your pistol directly into someone's face. You can "kick" people in combat to get them to stop parrying your strikes. Along with looting and carrying bodies, it now tells you if you are full on a specific possible loot item (not sure if that is a pro or con). Certain items can be obtained from bodies and treasure chests that can be sold to the shops. In addition, you can "invest" in your shops (something I never really understood). Once you "blend" with a large crowd, it will automatically push you around like it did in the first game. Watch out for friendly fire. You can easily harm the very person you are sworn to protect or be killed by your own men. Enemies will search and poke around certain hiding spots, even before detecting you. I guess this isn't much of a problem since you can still kill them from your hiding spot.
Weaponry: The concepts of your weapons are heavily borrowed from each other and previous games, but it is worth mentioning all of them at once. Daggers are fast and easily counter enemies. Swords allow you to strike through multiple targets with ease. Two-handers are slow but deal enough damage to take down bigger targets. They increased how fast you can focus your pistol so you can fire before the guards detect you. Crossbows don't do as much damage but are able to strike down any archer instantly with a faster reload time. Throwing Daggers seem to be ineffective for the amount of damage they do compared to the crossbow, but you can still wildly throw them to stagger targets.
The other abilities are mostly used to lure the guards away from their post or help you survive. The poison dart (unlocked later) makes the target swing their body around like a crazy person as they spend 30 seconds dying. Throw Money (something I never used) creates a disturbance as people run up to pick the coins off the ground. You can use up to 3 ridiculously overpowered Smoke Bombs that not only allow you to assassinate 5 targets with absolutely no resistance but allows you to flee a scene without being chased down the street. Carrying up to 15 Medicine can also make the game pretty trivial when using one instantly heals a good sum of your health.
Assassination Buddies: As you clear towers, icons will appear on your screen where you must save civilians (just like the first game). Afterwards, you are given the option to recruit the pawn to be one of your minions. These guys will jump out and utterly destroy whatever target you choose with a press of the left bumper. Though you can recruit up to 12, only three are allowed to be called out at a time. Sending them on assignments to other parts of Europe for around 10 minutes will help level them up and gain you some coin in the process. Though I guess they too suffer from the game's failing mechanics. I once failed to save a civilian when they fell off the side of a roof and died. Eh, he didn't seem worthy enough to be a part of my team anyways.
Horse Manuevers: How cool is it that horses can now roam inside city limits! In fact, you can summon a horse to your location at any time. A little white dot on the minimap when you call them using the 'Y' button will show you which direction they are coming from. Civiliand don't seem to have any issue of you running over them. Guards, on the other hand, might want to share their concerns with you. Most of the time the horses are very good at jumping over large obstacles like broken pillars and fences. Yet, they seem to have an issue when it comes to scattered pieces of rubble and giant cliffs. These aren't Skyrim type horses. One thing I never tried was striking enemies or shooting arrows while on a horse. Though, the guards are also now capable of doing just that. They can commandeer a civilian's horse and chase after you. You can counter their strike, hijack their horse, or even shoot them down with an arrow. And pray you don't run into a mob of mad gunmen on horseback.
Extra Content
Collectables: Ubisoft is notorious by adding a bunch of busy work to help buffer their games. They have gotten better in making it easier, more challenging, and even rewarding to collect these items. However, that doesn't still excuse the fact that most of these items are just not worth getting in the long run. For the record, I did collect 10/10 feathers, 25/101 Borgia Flags, 84/144 Treasure Chests, 0/5 Hidden Artifacts, and 4/10 Glyphs. Treasure Chests and other collectables will appear on your map as icons if you find them using eagle vision. The feathers? They do nothing. Collecting 15 flags will give you a rare painting, 25 will unlock buyable maps that show where the flags and feathers are, and 100 will get you a Borgia Cape (permanent 0% notoriety).
One benefit of opening certain treasure chests is the ability to barter specific items for weapons from the shop keepers. However, they have missed the fact that these items can be accidentally sold. On top of that, you would never know which two chests hold the shrunken heads for the Exotica. Without Project Legacy, there didn't seem to be any benefit to opening all the shops and all the landmarks. I wouldn't have done it myself except "might as well while I'm here." I do regret not finding all 10 glyphs. It would have awarded me with the Desmond Skin and a neat prelude to the ending of the game.
Fast travel: There are 19 tunnels that instantly teleport you around the city of Rome. Although 3 of them are at your friendly guilds, there isn't one available for the Assassin's Guild at your home. Like everything else, you have to buy them to unlock them. The difference here is they don't charge you to use them. There are locations where they are pretty sparse. I personally do not like the fact that you have to scroll through the locations one-by-one until you find the spot you need to go. I'm not sure how the list is categorized either. It is rather frustrating to see just those travel points on the map too when you have similar games that allow you select your destination on the map you would normally use in the game. Please be aware that you cannot use the tunnels during a mission either.
Challenges: This game has a ton of useless challenges that don't reward you with anything other than a little achievement badge that says well done. The virtual training was so demanding that I skipped the whole thing entirely. Completing all of the challenges with at least a bronze medal would have rewarded me with the Raiden Skin (tribute to Metal Gear series). Mission challenges that required me to "not be detected" during a 20 minute mission or "complete in specific amount of time" when there are exclusive items to be collected were just to daunting for me. However, there were intriguing challenges that proved rewarding. Many of the assassination quests that asked me to use a particular kind of weapon, for example, was a very welcoming change of pace to the monotony.
Side-Missions: I felt like certain quests were more satisfactory over others. Christina's Requests (shaped like a broken heart) were actually pretty depressing. Assassination Missions, Thief Assignments, Templar Agents, and Courtesan Assignments were all 5 minute bursts of pleasure. The 6 Lairs of Romulus were extremely nice to play through. I couldn't decide whether the exploration of the decaying remains of The Lateran Palace or the chase sequence through the rain in Wolf in Sheep's Clothing was my favorite. They were both so good. Repairing the aqueducts allowed you access to the one under the ground. But the real prize was when you took control of Leonardo's excellent War Machines.
Bugs: The game overall was slightly less polished than I expected, maybe because they only had about a year to develop the game. I've seen quite a few glitches, bugs, and problems that stood out in between all the busy work. I've seen this weird problem where cloth is stretched out across the screen or doesn't flow properly when people are moving. I've seen glances of hollow bodies, artwork flashing in-and-out, skin not appearing, and clothes clipping against the artwork. You can't loot bodies after a cutscene because they seem to disappear without a reason. Air assassinations don't connect well. One person is highlighted but the "assassinate" button targets the person closest to you. If there is anything between you and the target once the button is pressed, your body will be flying all over the place. I once saw a horse on a roof! Certain areas within the ruins don't prevent you from falling off the side. And last but not least, there were a few spots there weren't any subtext for the chatter on the screen.
Ending: Make sure you have a couple hours available for Sequence 9, because there is no way you will be wanting to leave once you start it. As usual, the game sort of ends spectacularly with an awesome battle, some technology mumbo jumbo, and a huge cliffhanger. Don't get me started on the whole 72 crazy train either. Don't worry about doing anything during the credits. There are maybe two lines of dialogue spoken out at the beginning of a really long list of names. You would think they would have added some sort of video montage of all the missions or maybe a little mini-game where you fend off some guys (like in Assassin's Creed II). Nope, the credits run so long that I managed to eat a whole sandwich about the same time my controller powered down.
Review
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood properly continues the saga into areas left unexplored in the city of Rome. Ubisoft's expansion adds numerous improvements and features over its predecessors with the addition of a multiplayer mode. The campaign is still relatively short as expected at 20 hours, even after all the frivolous busy work of collecting trivial items and unlocking cosmetics. The game's problems become much more apparent when compared to Assassin's Creed II, once you realize how much the developers came up short in optimizing their new changes. Still, you will ultimately find a few moments of delight somewhere among the rubble, especially in the introduction and conclusion of the story. I'd say give it try and avoid doing the content that you deem unnecessary.
5-14-2020