Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
I made some initial remarks on the game already. And I stand by those. The big flaw of the game is one of pacing. Activities open up before the introduction to them, offering freedom at the cost of confusion. Some abilities are really only unlocked very late in the game, giving little chance to use them. I also had some frustrating times with, of all things, the metagame hacking puzzles. And the freerunning has its ups and downs, making it easy to accidentally jump the wrong way.
But, the game plays pretty well overall. On land, it's reasonably fun. Occasionally, the mission objects hedge you in a lot, but sneaking around and picking off targets is satisfying. At sea, it's as good or better. Steering the Jackdaw feels "good." I can't compare to reality, of course, but there's a certain feel of weight and resistance, and wind that is anything but consistent. Ship boardings can get a little repetitive after a while, and offer a strange "health orb" mechanic because initiating a boarding puts on hold the battle with any other ships around and when you fully take a ship, you have options that include essentially cannibalizing it to repair your ship. It makes some of the harder fights much more doable to have some light ships to cripple and use to repair. There's also a fleet system where you can capture ships and make use of them to fight battles and ship cargo in a little minigame available when connected online. It's simplistic, and the shipping runs happen in realtime and can take hours, but it's another interesting little aspect and a decent way to earn some additional money in the game.
The story feels a little odd to me. First, there's two stories going on, being an Assassin's Creed game. The metagame story gets lesser screen time, putting you in the role of an employee at a game company using Animus tech to relive and record ancestral memories. Naturally, the Assassin/Templar conflict is still going on in this business world, and said employee is caught in the middle. There are also a lot of audio/video/text recordings to hack along the way that paint a picture of the world and satirize the game design process.
Then there's the memory of privateer-turned-pirate-turned-Assassin Edward Kenway. That's where the bulk of the action takes place. I generally like the story, but I find it hard to "get into" Edward when he's so lost himself. At times, he seems driven purely by profit, and at times he seems to uphold some higher ideals - and he goes back and forth. He picks up Assassin blades early, and has the sight and climbing skills, but he only sort of joins the order very late in the story. You also get to see renditions of most of the big names among pirates, most in at least a somewhat sympathetic light. Not so spoilery, considering this is at least loosely based on history: most of them die. And that lends sort of a sad tone to the whole tale.
One audio recording strikes a chord - Desmond Miles, before his death, leaves a message in which he quotes Orson Welles who said: "If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story." A story based on pirates is sort of hard to carry to conclusion if you want a happy ending. Edwards tale, perhaps, ends at about the right place here, though the story afterward is already laid out by AC 3, where Edward is gone and his Templar son killed by his half-Mohawk grandson. Yeesh. Though really, the whole Templar/Assassin thing feels sort of "incestuous" to me anyway - both factions using similar knowledge and methods, though one organization espouses order and the other freedom.
But, the game plays pretty well overall. On land, it's reasonably fun. Occasionally, the mission objects hedge you in a lot, but sneaking around and picking off targets is satisfying. At sea, it's as good or better. Steering the Jackdaw feels "good." I can't compare to reality, of course, but there's a certain feel of weight and resistance, and wind that is anything but consistent. Ship boardings can get a little repetitive after a while, and offer a strange "health orb" mechanic because initiating a boarding puts on hold the battle with any other ships around and when you fully take a ship, you have options that include essentially cannibalizing it to repair your ship. It makes some of the harder fights much more doable to have some light ships to cripple and use to repair. There's also a fleet system where you can capture ships and make use of them to fight battles and ship cargo in a little minigame available when connected online. It's simplistic, and the shipping runs happen in realtime and can take hours, but it's another interesting little aspect and a decent way to earn some additional money in the game.
The story feels a little odd to me. First, there's two stories going on, being an Assassin's Creed game. The metagame story gets lesser screen time, putting you in the role of an employee at a game company using Animus tech to relive and record ancestral memories. Naturally, the Assassin/Templar conflict is still going on in this business world, and said employee is caught in the middle. There are also a lot of audio/video/text recordings to hack along the way that paint a picture of the world and satirize the game design process.
Then there's the memory of privateer-turned-pirate-turned-Assassin Edward Kenway. That's where the bulk of the action takes place. I generally like the story, but I find it hard to "get into" Edward when he's so lost himself. At times, he seems driven purely by profit, and at times he seems to uphold some higher ideals - and he goes back and forth. He picks up Assassin blades early, and has the sight and climbing skills, but he only sort of joins the order very late in the story. You also get to see renditions of most of the big names among pirates, most in at least a somewhat sympathetic light. Not so spoilery, considering this is at least loosely based on history: most of them die. And that lends sort of a sad tone to the whole tale.
One audio recording strikes a chord - Desmond Miles, before his death, leaves a message in which he quotes Orson Welles who said: "If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story." A story based on pirates is sort of hard to carry to conclusion if you want a happy ending. Edwards tale, perhaps, ends at about the right place here, though the story afterward is already laid out by AC 3, where Edward is gone and his Templar son killed by his half-Mohawk grandson. Yeesh. Though really, the whole Templar/Assassin thing feels sort of "incestuous" to me anyway - both factions using similar knowledge and methods, though one organization espouses order and the other freedom.
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