gamingeek said:

So, how come you hated the first game but love the second Bugs-the-betrayer?

in the end i liked the first game as well.  it's certainly repetitive no doubt about it, and it's easy to hate it for that alone.  but there were a few good things which made me play to the end (well I also played it to the end because I felt I should do so ahead of playing no 2).  One is scaling viewpoints and then leap-of-faith-ing (this never gets old, n-e-v-e-r), another was running and jumping on rooftops (satisfying as hell), another was the historical setting and the beautifully rendered cities and finally the killing, especially with the secret blade and the assassination missions were mostly satisfying.

No 2 keeps all of those, builds upon them and even more importantly puts them in an all around great game (in contrast to the first one).  In the first game within the first twenty minutes, you knew all of what you would be doing in the next twenty hours.... you are an assassin, you have 9 targets to assassinate because your boss said so, you must scale viewpoints to learn the areas and do a few repetitive missions to gather info on each respective target before offing them.  The sequel is more traditional in its structure in that you follow the plot as it unwinds and the missions depend on the context of the story (ie they're not always the same).  So the design of ACII is much stronger than that of the first one.

On top of that you have several wonderful (for the most part) additions.  In the first game the collection thingy (ie catch all the flags was pointless at best and masochistic at worst), personally I couldn't be bothered.  In this game the collections are generally very interesting and you will want to complete them (in a gotta-catch-em-all way).  Paintings, weapons, glyphs, codexes, even treasure chests and feathers.  The addition of money is great.  You use it mainly for the aforementioned collections and upgrades but there is also the simple but fun "restore the villa back to its former glory" aspect.

As Steel and the others said you also have the additions of the assassin's tombs levels which are great fun and add lots of variety.

The game is just lots and lots of fun.  Very ambitious (which was something the first game was too) but this time Ubi delivered on their promise.  I think I'm roughly about half way through the main story line but it's the first time in ages when I'm playing a game and don't feel in a hurry to see the end so I can move on to another game.

I really really think you should make it the next game you play

gamingeek said:

Are there any elements of this game that remind you of the Hitman games?

No. Assassination in itself is as straightforward as it gets. The broad array of choices that the Hitman series games have regarding how to fulfill your objective is nowhere to be found here.

You're just trying to reach the victim undetected, but you don't stage accidents and shit (unless it's a specific goal) you just avoid guards, reach the boss, pwn him, then flee while being chased from guards just about as agile as you until you lose them. Then the story progresses, and you move on to the next area, see who you have to kill there, why, what's happening, etc. I liked the story a lot personally, it's nothing much but it's presented in cool ways, conversing with your soon to be dead victims in your hands etc. But usually you do various side objectives first, scouting the area, following dudes around undetected, etc, before the assassination opens up. I liked both games, the first also, I didn't mind the repetition. I liked the second the same, there are improvements but not that many, it's just more of the same, and good all the same. It's a bit like Prince of Persia in how you navigate the city climbing and jumping everywhere, except the fighting is based on stealth, though you can fight normally as well, but then you'll need to flee and hide until things quiet down etc so you can't just beat the game by owning everyone with the imba counters. And there are things to break the pace like chasing down someone around the city rooftops or specific locations, say, a guard that runs to sound the alarm or whatever, so it has sort of platforming as well even though a lot of it is nearly automatic, it does require some skill at times. Get the first game if you aren't sure you'll like it, it should be really cheap by now. 5 quid for PC on Amazon UK.

some of the "revelations" and conspiracies obtained from doing the glyph puzzles are quite awesome.  for example there are letters exchanged between thomas edison and henry ford (evil) about nicola tesla's (virtuous) intentions to use his inventions for the good of humanity (and do it for free) ... and their schemes to stop him.

instinctively i always knew Tesla was a modern day Prometheus and a true hero that's why he always was my favourite scientist so it's fun to come across tidbits like this.  i suppose in a similar way to how Leo enjoyed the Da Vinci myth-history in the game (though that's a part of the actual game whereas what i'm talking about is more of an optional aside).

so i'm moving along nicely with the game ... now finding "things to do in Forli when i'm dead".  Forli is another great location in the game.  Was so impressed by it that asked a friend of mine (who lived for many years in Milan and has seen a lot of Italy) about it but he said modern day Forli is a shithole   as opposed to san gimignano which is still beautiful (though it doesn't have all of those towers)

Venice scary, try Napoli.

What do you guys think would be a good setting (time and place) for assassin's creed III?  (not brotherhood, but once ubisoft stops milking Ezio and works on a proper third part)?

I think it would be awesome if it took place in Civil War era US.  I think the setting is fitting for all kinds of crazy plots and conspiracies and you could be an assassin sort of doing stuff in the shadows and killing evil templars to help Lincoln unify the country.  Not sure about which were the cities that played a big part and would be fun to play in.  Maybe Savannah GA, Richmond VA etc.  I think they could make a great game with that setting.  In any case the concept is so open that there is an abundance of settings and plots they could do.  Very very exciting and promising franchise.

...anyway back to exploring Venice on a gondola!

Victorian London is an awesome idea.  A lot of characters, events, intrigues etc could play into the story.  Those you mentioned, also things like the great fire of london etc ... The setting could be amazing if they did a historically and geographically accurate London. Wonderful Christopher Wren buildings.  And jumping off the dome of St Paul's Cathedral will be the leap of faith to end all leaps of faith

You need to play the games before suggesting stuff

You're really making me want to spoil it for you

bugsonglass said:

gamingeek said:

How about Assasins Creed future like that concept art?

think replacing blades with firearms would make the game losing character.  unless it's somehow like yakuza, where you can only use melee weapons for some strange reason

Jedi assasins creed. Make Steel cry.