I’m going to begin this review by saying that I was a big fan of the first Assassin’s Creed. A lot of people complained about the repetition, and yeah, I noticed that, but I’m a completist and I absolutely had to collect every flag, do every side-mission, and kill every Templar. And I had fun doing it. That’s the big thing. While the first Assassin’s Creed may not have been an absolute must-buy or a worthy “game of the year” contender back in ’07, it was a fun game.

That’s my mini-review of the first game. Now, for Assassin’s Creed 2:

If you didn’t like the first, I implore you to give the second a chance. Yes, I’ll admit, the repetition is still present, but that’s only if you’re one of those people (like moi) who feel compelled to collect every single item and do every side-mission the game has to offer. Otherwise, the main game is much more varied than AC1, and there is a lot to do within the confines of the story.

This time around, Desmond is put on the back burner, only popping up in the beginning, middle and end of the game. This gives AC2 a much more immersive feeling than the first Assassin’s Creed where you’d have to listen to the inane conversations between Desmond and Dr. Vidic, which I can basically sum up like this:

Vidic: Get in the Animus, Desmond.

Desmond: What’s going on?

Vidic: Get in the Animus, Desmond!

Desmond: I don’t wanna.

Vidic: GET IN THE FUCKING ANIMUS!

Desmond: Okay.

Desmond and the overarching narrative that is going on in present time are more developed in this second installment, and I really like the way things are going, even if things do seem to be getting slightly out of hand by the end of this game. Desmond, however, is far from the real draw here; this game belongs to Ezio.

My biggest gripe with the story in the first game was that while Altair was a badass, that’s really all he had going for him. You really couldn’t connect to him. For half the game, he was just being an asshole to everyone. With Ezio, you have a character who breathes. He feels happiness, sadness, frustration, anger, you know, emotions and shit. He has more charisma than Altair could have ever hoped to muster. He even has sex a few times throughout the game. Hooray!

Ezio really drives everything forward, because let’s face it, none of the other characters are memorable. Except, of course, for Leonardo Da Vinci. He’s the man, ‘nuff said.

The game itself looks stunning. The environments are huge and detailed. While the cities in the game aren’t exact representations of their real-life counterparts, there are several historical sites that are recreated faithfully. And there’s a real joy in clinging to ledges and climbing all over these places that actually exist in the world.  Several of them, such as the Palazzo Medici and the Torre Grossa even allow for indoor exploration, which is a new edition to the game.

Before I get to the indoor environments though, I’ll take some time to talk about the controls. They haven’t really changed much from the first game, which is both a blessing and a curse. Outside, running across rooftops is just as exhilarating as it was in the first game. The only times there are problems are when you’re trying to get somewhere quickly. You’ll curse at Ezio for jumping off in some strange direction when all you wanted him to do was run up a wall and grab a ledge. Outside, though, these problems are few and far between.

I keep saying outside because where the flaws in the controls really show up are indoors. The controls just aren’t polished enough to handle the precise platforming that’s involved in these indoor environments. And while, the first few times you go indoors and get to explore historical buildings or catacombs, it’s forgivable. After a while, these indoor elements become an exercise in patience and really experimentation.

Case in point, one time while hanging on a ledge, I needed to jump to another ledge behind me. The on-screen help told me all I need to do was hold back on the joystick and press jump. Doing this, however, caused Ezio to jump off to the side, completely away from the ledge I wanted to go to.  It took me a while to figure out exactly what angle I needed to hold the joystick at for him to jump directly behind him.

The reason for all of this is the camera and the fact that the controls don’t carry over when the camera angle changes. Take a game like Devil May Cry, for instance. If you were holding left on the controller to run out of a room, and the camera angle changed when you got out in the hallway, in this new angle holding up would conceivably take you in the direction you were running coming out of the room, but because the controls carry over from the last camera angle, you don’t have to worry about changing the way your holding the joystick. This helped a lot in the faster paced sections of the game, or when you were being chased by something. It was a very intuitive feature. Something small that can be taken for granted, but that really added a lot to the excellent controls of that game.

Unfortunately, the controls don’t work like that in AC2. Whenever the camera angle changes, you have to rethink how you’re holding the controller so you don’t mess up and end up in a direction you really don’t want to go. Basically, it’s a pain in the ass. By the end of the game, I dreaded having to go into the Assassin’s Tombs (something that is completely optional by the way, but, like I said before, completist).

Also, it would have been nice if there was more exploration involved in these indoor places. It’s really just one set path, with some minor variations in how you can get around obstacles.

There’s also swimming now, which is a welcome edition. There was nothing worse than meeting your end in the first game because Altair was too much of a bitch to learn how to swim.

Water offers new hiding places from guards, as you can now dive underwater. Other than that, it doesn’t really provide much else. Also, there’s this weird thing that happens sometimes when you’re trying to get out of the water where Ezio will just flail like a retard against a ledge or the side of a boat. You have to give up for a second then try again, and usually he’ll climb right up. Definitely not becoming of a master assassin.

Despite the indoor environments, there are a lot of welcome editions to the gameplay, such as more interesting ways of killing people. The double hidden blades are really satisfying, plus there’s poison, smoke bombs, and different weapons besides swords, such as maces, hammers, and spears.

One of the niftiest new features is the economy system. Early on in the game, you become head of your own run-down little villa. You don’t really have to do anything with it, but you are allowed to invest money into it, which in turn earns you more money, since the more you fix it up, the more people come to visit and live there, and the more taxes you earn from them. It’s a nice little distraction that I’d really like to see expanded upon in the next installment of the series.

Probably my favorite new edition, though, are the puzzles involved in discovering “The Truth,” which consists of tiny film clips that flesh out the larger conspiracy linking the games and really defining what’s going on in the present.

There are twenty pieces of film to collect (I won’t tell you what it depicts, but it’s pretty interesting and surreal to say the least), and each piece comes with a puzzle that must be solved. At first its simple things like discovering similarities in works of art, or deciphering a code. As you get closer to uncovering “The Truth,” the puzzles become more complex and esoteric.

Activating these puzzles involves finding glyphs hidden on the historic monuments in the game, again, this is another optional part of the game.

Really, Assassin’s Creed 2 is all about choice. You can choose to just follow the main game, or you can dabble in side missions, or you can be a complete freak, like myself, and try to do everything.

I don’t want to deter from everything that Ubisoft has done to make this a better experience than the last game, but if you really want to get the most out of this, I would recommend sticking to the main quest and just doing a few of the side-missions. Trying to do everything really reveals all of the games flaws.

So Assassin’s Creed 2 has delivered overwhelmingly on the main quest. The side missions, though not perfect, are welcome editions, and overall it’s an involving game. I can easily lose 3 to 4 hours of my day exploring Renaissance Italy and getting lost in the immersive world.

For those who bailed on the first game, give this one a chance. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

For those who stuck with it, it’s really cool to see the game evolve, and I’m sure the finest hour of the Assassin’s Creed series is still to come.

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