Assassin’s Creed :Revelations – Review

Developer: Ubisoft Montreal

Publisher: Ubisoft

Release Date: Nov 15 2011

Score: 7.5

Platforms:PC,Xbox 360, PS3

The Short: The latest edition to the Assassin’s Creed Series is the same formula and a disappointing installment

In a time where so many brilliant games are being released, Assassin’s Creed: Revelations proves to be a mildly entertaining game, but fails to really add anything new to the formula and bring itself to the level of some of the other great games that have been released recently. As you play Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, a question might come to your head. That question will most likely be “Hey, didn’t I do this exact same thing in Rome last year?”However, the game does manage to add a few new things into the mix, such as the addition of a hook-blade, which provides a new way to get around or face your enemies,and the Tower Defence game play is somewhat enjoyable the first time around but ends up becoming quite tedious and annoying . The multiplayer has been refined with new modes added, although it still feels very similar to the previous game.

You start the game directly where you finished off in the last game, but now Desmond is in a coma like state and the only thing keeping you alive is the Animus. For Desmond to escape his imprisonment in the Animus, he must go through three memories and separate each one.The scenes on Animus Island seem extremely out-of-place and unnecessary and leave many confused as to what the place actually is, me being one of them. Throughout the game you play as Ezio following the footsteps of Altair in the attempt to find his personal library which holds the secret to saving the world from the doom that was foretold at the end of Assassin’s Creed 2. You play most of the game in Constantinople and, like in Brotherhood, you try to rebuild the city to its former glory. Sadly, there isn’t enough variety in the activities to  keep you very interested. You just seem to be doing the same thing you did in Rome even to the extent of burning down the Templar towers.

 

The tower-defence game mode, which leaves Ezio peering over a roof into the street below and commanding your assassins to shoot at the oncoming waves of Templars in a tower defence like fashion is an odd addition to the game which feels extremely out-of-place and seems to ruin the feeling of Ezio being the assassin’s mentor where in other missions you are able to take on almost twice as many opponents just by yourself. People have been waiting for years to see a lid placed on Desmond’s storyline but sadly, they leave it on another cliff-hanger. Overall, the main storyline for Assassin’s Creed: Revelations isn’t nearly interesting enough or diverse enough to keep most players interested over the span of the game, although it does finally cap off Ezio’s storyline.

Much like the rest of the game, the multiplayer component of Assassin’s Creed: Revelations has not really been changed from the previous game. Although the addition of new game modes and the long-awaited demise of the radar pointing towards one’s enemy are very nice. New maps and new characters are also tossed into the mix, but all of this seems like it could have been done with patches and DLC packages. Assassin’s Creed multiplayer was always an interesting subject and it still is, and, unlike most games, they at least attempt to add in some form of storyline into the multiplayer.

It seems to be the kind of thing that you might just try for a couple of hours when bored or with a group of friends. The multiplayer section like most of the game hasn’t changed that much from the previous game and leaves you thinking “Shouldn’t there be something else new here?” Still, as it happened in the last game, you find yourself stalking your prey but also frantically checking over your shoulder in suspense just to check if a citizen suddenly starts to sprint towards you. The multiplayer can be a very entertaining thing.

One thing that has changed from the previous games are the visuals and sound design. Assassin’s Creed has always been a series that did a wonderful job of presenting you with extremely beautiful landscapes and cities which you could wander around and explore whilst being spurred on by fantastic ambience music. Assassin’s Creed: Revelations doesn’t disappoint in this, with even the dingy back corners of the city looking utterly beautiful and with another fantastic soundtrack by Jaspyr Kid playing just at the right moments. The music and visuals really pick up for some of the games weaker points and are often placed in just the right time to add a sense of emotion and feeling to the game.

All in all Assassin’s Creed: Revelations certainly isn’t a bad game as it clearly does the exact same thing that made the first three games fantastic, but it will leave many fans of the series wanting more and wondering why they didn’t release this next year with more content instead. The multiplayer, as in the previous game, won’t keep you busy for long but what it does it does brilliantly, keeping you on your toes and clenching your teeth in suspense, not knowing if your pursuer will jump down from the roof top and put an end to your life. Never the less it puts a tight cap on Ezio’s storyline giving hope to fans that they will eventually get that game which finishes Desmond’s story.