Me, me and Ezio

Version tested: Xbox 360

It must not have been easy for Ubisoft to accomplish Assassin's creed revelations, the third chapter of the franchise starring Ezio Auditore da Firenze: there are many questions born in the minds of fans of the series that need an answer and too many are the needs for innovation loudly requested for a gameplay that remains strongly anchored to its prototype four years ago. And it is therefore not surprising to see in the opening titles as many as six divisions of the French publisher collaborate on this huge project, the one that should close the narrative arc of a story that has marked this generation of consoles and has become part of the lives of many players. that in Altair first and Ezio later have found real characters in some cases even to idolize.



Me, me and Ezio

We would therefore like to highlight that it will not be easy to avoid some essential spoilers to explain the evolution of the plot and at the same time we would like to immediately report that in our opinion Revelations cannot be adequately enjoyed by those who have not played the previous exponents of the series. Precisely for this reason we will assume that the reader of this review is not new to the adventures of Desmond, Altair and Ezio but rather has followed them with some attention, instead indicating to those who are fasting in the series, to approach Brotherhood first, if not even to Assassin's Creed 2, and then to take Revelations in hand.

Three stories in one

Desmond Miles is in a comatose state, hastily attached to the latest release of the Animus in a desperate attempt to keep his mind completely ravaged by contact with the apple of eden alive. We were forced to stab Lucy to death without having real control of our avatar at the end of Brotherhood and now we see the terrible scene replaying before our eyes shortly after the start of Revelations. We are inside a surreal scenario with the sea waves crashing on a beach populated by huge gray monoliths and rock sculptures floating in the sky. Our first contact as the bewildered Desmond is with subject 16 who somehow acts as Cicero to explain the meaning of this Black Room where only the basic functions of the Animus are active and where our protagonist will have to relive the actions of the his ancestors, once again, to look for mnemonic junctions, abstract entities capable of separating Miles' personality from that of Ezio and Altair and thus make him regain consciousness even in the real world. This is the beginning of Assassin's creed revelations.



Staying still for a moment in the role of Desmond, we will have the opportunity to play five unlockable missions by collecting the fragments of Animus scattered throughout the game. These represent one of the great novelties of the sequel: wonderful puzzle sections played entirely in first person where only the ability to jump or build small blocks of two different shapes is given. And with these few elements of interaction he will have to overcome obstacles of all kinds within a virtual reconstruction of the machine language of the Animus, all while Desmond narrates the memories of his life, from childhood to the capture by the Abstergo with which opened the first Assassin's Creed. Of course the bulk of the game is focused on Ezio Auditore. Revelations recounts the assassin's exploits about 12 years after what was seen in Brotherhood.

Me, me and Ezio

Burdened by age and long pilgrimage, Ezio thus finds himself disembarking in Istanbul - or Constantinople, if you prefer - in 1511 where he will meet some historical figures who really existed, first and foremost Prince Suleiman, future Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. and Manuele Paleologo, pretender to the Byzantine throne and new guide of the Templars. The adventure of our protagonist in the wonderful border city between Europe and Asia will allow us to meet two supporting actors who will accompany Ezio for most of his stay in Constantinople: Yusuf, the mentor of the local guild of assassins and Sofia, a book scholar who studies ancient texts. . And obviously in all this dense layer of history he could not miss him, Altair ibn La-Ahad, whom we will find in Revelations in a handful of missions dedicated to him that will make us relive his deeds in Masyaf. As in the case of Desmond's missions, these are rather guided sequences where very little is left to the autonomy of the player and where in practice there will be very little to explore. Ultimately, this is an exceptional fan service where Ubisoft's skilful mastery of direction is evident, capable of bringing together the three parallel stories in a crackling and melancholy ending which, while leaving open a narrative vein, manages to satisfy a great deal. part of gamers. And just for information, it took us about 15 hours of gameplay according to the internal counter to reach 70% completion. We do not struggle to imagine that those who want to complete every single element of the game will hardly take less than 20-25 hours.



My whole city

The game structure of Revelations remains extremely similar to that of its two predecessors with a handful of small, but substantial differences and novelties. We are therefore in the presence of a free roaming gameplay where the player is free to pursue a rather substantial amount of secondary objectives that go alongside the classic missions essential to carry on the story of the game, once again divided into different DNA sequences. .

Me, me and Ezio

It will then be possible to scale the various observation points to synchronize the game map and restore the shops scattered throughout the four districts into which Istanbul is divided. There will obviously be historical monuments that can be restored to their former glory and the classic faction headquarters with the courtesans replaced by the Athingani that will allow you to unlock the various tests and a series of small additional missions. The recruitment of new assassins already seen in Brotherhood also remains valid and is activated by setting fire to the various templar dens scattered around the city once the leader who manages them has been killed. The battle for control of the Mediterranean also returns, allowing us to use our followers in a whole series of missions that will change the strength of the domination of the Templars in several crucial cities of Europe. Compared to the previous title, however, not only will it be possible to conquer in all respects the various urban agglomerations but, depending on the percentage of ownership, we will see gradually increasing quantities of money flow into Ezio's pockets and we will have access to constant supplies. of components for bombs (and we will return to these later).



Me, me and Ezio

In addition, by gaining experience to the assassins, we will be offered the opportunity to put them in charge of one of the lairs freed in the city by unlocking additional secondary missions. In short, if on the one hand we reluctantly witnessed the loss of the so-called exotic quests that carried Ezio around the world to complete the requests of Leonardo and Machiavelli, on the other we noticed a greater refinement in the accessory offer to the main plot. In other words, more compressed content but certainly of higher quality and without those ups and downs that instead distinguished the secondary parts of the prequel.

Pad in hand

But let's get to talking about the more substantial introductions. Let's start with the completely redesigned warning system. Now Ezio's notoriety in the city will no longer grow only by committing murders and harassing the guards but also by carrying out restoration actions, buying goods, weapons and armor components and even carrying out the various missions. But even if the behavior of the guards will be much less influenced by the degree of "crime" achieved than in the past, it will be essential to keep it under control by bribing the auctioneers or killing the officers on patrol (fortunately the posters to be torn have disappeared) under penalty of assault of the Templars to a den we freed earlier. In fact, reaching the maximum level of alert, a territory will become disputed and we will have to go to the place to start a sort of mini-game essential to resolve the dispute over control. In a sort of tower defense we will have to manage a resource, morale, to populate some roofs of various types of fighters with the sole task of blocking a certain number of waves of Templars.

Particularly intuitive and fun at first, this digression on classic gameplay tends to become extremely repetitive in too little time and there is no need for variety in attacking and defensive units. Even the technical solution of a free view in rotation but blocked in zoom and movement left us rather dumbfounded. Where, on the other hand, the Ubisoft guys have managed to perfection in their intent is in the desire to make Ezio's navigation between the streets and roofs of the city even more frenetic, rapid and fluid. To be the master in this case is the hooked blade, a particular weapon that will be delivered by Yusuf to our protagonist practically at the beginning of the game and that will allow him to climb buildings much more quickly, to jump on the back of the enemies during a race, to demolish on the fly the wooden barricades that line the houses and finally to exploit the cables that connect some roofs of the buildings, even offering the possibility of killing the guards who are near the arrival point on the fly. In short, Ubisoft's desire to make escape or stealth action even more enjoyable, rather than the actual combat that with Revelations reaches new heights of simplicity, becomes very evident. In short, the French publisher did not want to retrace his steps by modifying what for many is the only real negative element of the gameplay: the fights remain one on one and indeed now more than ever the feeling of power that is felt by controlling Ezio is very strong. between throwing weapons, sharp blades and bombs it is in effect a real immortal war machine. Fortunately, there are several elements of challenge able to bring up the difficulty of the game such as the numerous missions with a stealth flavor where getting caught by the enemy is equivalent to instant defeat with immediate repetition of the memory.

Me, me and Ezio

Finally we come to the bombs. By combining the numerous components that can be collected from corpses, earned through the missions of Ezio and his assassins or bought in the various shops, we will be able to create three different types of bombs that will occupy as many slots in the inventory. There are the lethal bombs whose purpose is to kill the enemy, the debilitating bombs that serve to put the enemy at a disadvantage during combat and finally the diversion bombs useful to attract the attention of the enemy in a specific area before identified us. In common these three types have the selection of the type of envelope that ranges from contact mines, to bombs that explode on impact or after a few bounces or still able to stick to the enemy and the type of gunpowder that determines the area action of the explosive but then differ in the agents used to determine the effect. In total we will have hundreds of different combinations to choose from for the happiness of the most tactical players. Too bad that it is possible to carry a maximum of three bombs per type, which forces the player to return with disarming frequency to the creation desk to reassemble his favorite bomb.

The increased number of weapons available to Ezio forced Ubisoft to partially rethink the interface for quick selection and use of the same in battle. Now in practice, holding down the right backbone, two dials for selecting weapons will appear on the screen. It is always possible to use the four directions of the digital cross to quickly set and select objects but now they have become far too many forcing the player to constantly interrupt the flow of the action to select his favorite weapon based on the situation. Furthermore, even if on the one hand you could be happily surprised by the great variety offered, in reality looking more specifically one realizes that many weapons are redundant and in fact nothing changes based on which one is used. Why, for example, offer the throwing daggers, the pistol and the crossbow, when all three do the exact same thing, that is, they kill the enemy from a distance, without any difference in operation? Wouldn't it have been more interesting to offer different range, power or noise values ​​to force the player to make a careful choice based on the situation? Even the difference between long blade, short blade and hidden blade tends to cancel out during combat.

Xbox 360 achievements

The game offers 49 achievements for a grand total of 1000 points. Ten are linked to the multiplayer component, all of which are easy to achieve while fifteen are fully focused on the single player starring Ezio and Desmond. There are also several achievements linked to particular activities within the game and to collectibles such as the completion of all missions on bombs, the control of all the cities in the battle for the liberation of the Mediterranean or the climb of Santa Sofia in less than 25 seconds.

A little healthy multiplayer

In Revelations, the puzzle component that enriched the two previous titles starring Ezio has disappeared. Now there are no more buildings to explore in search of hidden signs armed only with the eye of the eagle, let alone riddles to solve or mathematical problems to face. To break the free roaming rhythm typical of the series there are the various missions with Desmond and Altair already mentioned above and a handful of missions with a strongly platform flavor that in part recall what has already been seen previously in the lairs of Romulus of Brotherhood. Thanks to Ubisoft's excellent design choices in fact we will find ourselves playing very lively sections where the scripting is strong but always grafted onto a well-known gameplay and the management of the camera almost comes out of the player's hands thanks to partially automatic shots, which in some moments they reminded us of the best scenes from the God of War and Uncharted series. In terms of multiplayer Revelations is in effect a work of cleaning and strengthening what has already been seen in Brotherhood; therefore do not expect a package of contents capable of significantly altering the value of the game in its totality but there is no doubt that this game component is rather oiled and well inserted into the series and manages to offer more than a few hours of additional fun. We therefore find, of course, unpublished skins for the characters related to the new setting and five brand new maps with relative variations that flank the four sockets from Brotherhood. And then we find a full-bodied system of experience and configuration of your character linked to the earning of Abstergo credits essential to unlock and purchase the new powers. The multiplayer of Assassin's Creed in fact draws heavily from what is seen in the most popular first-person shooters of the moment and allows the player to use a couple of pre-configured sets or to create their own. The configuration takes place by choosing two out of fifteen abilities that can be activated in combat and two out of ten perks that represent real passive bonuses. Finally, there is no shortage of streaks, twelve to be precise divided equally between kill and loss and which are activated by pigeonholing a series of kills or stuns or losing a series of contracts in a row.

The latter in particular perform the function of help especially for novice players or for when you just can't get into the game. Ubisoft's choice to also provide the multiplayer of a hint of a plot completely focused on Abstergo and able to further act as a stimulus for the leveling of one's character is also interesting, so that he will be able to discover new secrets about the corporation. A hint also to the game modes that see the introduction first of all of the capture the flag here renamed in capture the artifact both in free and team mode and then of the simple deathmatch all against all particularly fast but at the same time very tactical also for the lack of an indicator that points precisely to the opponent. Unfortunately our testing was rather limited for this part of the game but we can safely say that we have witnessed extremely fast matchmaking and practically lag-free games even if the obvious lack of the game on the shelves allowed us to take advantage of empty servers and particularly performing.

Eastern visions

Ubisoft has continued to work tirelessly on its Anvil engine at the base of this fourth nextgen chapter of Assassin's Creed. The improvements are subtle but it is impossible not to notice them. It starts from the even more fluid and realistic animations that move models certainly enhanced for polygonal counting. Particularly noteworthy are the facial ones capable of giving new expressiveness to the main characters of Revelations above all, of course, Desmond, Ezio and Altair. Too bad for the excessive repetition of secondary models which are really poor in terms of variety. But, as for the previous chapters of the series, the real protagonist of the game is the city, Constantinople, incredibly cared for in its thousand streets, buildings and monuments and enriched with some indoor glimpses where the graphics engine is pushed to the maximum. Unfortunately, there are still a whole series of defects that have made the history of the franchise, too, and that have not yet been completely eliminated.

Me, me and Ezio

Let's start with the inevitable tearing which, although very small, is still present here and there to underline the very few sections in which the frame rate is slightly more dancer. Then there is some minimal pop-up phenomenon when the visual horizon is wider than usual and, precisely in these situations, the uncertainties of the engine are noticed in a rendering that is populated by some aliasing phenomenon not adequately covered by the classic mist. Of course we are looking for a nit since at a glance Revelations manages to convince and sometimes even, still, to amaze with the magnificent glance that it is able to offer the player. Istanbul is alive with the hundreds of passers-by who constantly populate its streets and climbing the imposing Galata Tower to reach its summit and take a look at the maze of streets under our feet just before launching into the classic leap of faith always does its splendid effect. Note of merit also for the Spanish dubbing, well acted and with always correct tones as well as abundant for the number of different voices. However, there are some sentences that will make you turn up your nose because maybe scurrilous in a way that we would not have expected given the situations told and the background scenario. As usual, however, the soundtrack turns out to be pleasant, especially in the main theme, but decidedly not very incisive during the course of the game. More work by Ubisoft in this area would have pleased us.

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Readers (999+)

8.9

Your vote

Assassin's creed revelations perfectly fulfills its purpose: to masterfully close a trilogy that made the franchise famous and created a huge host of fans around the world thirsting to find out every detail about the history of the killers. The gameplay continues to work perfectly and while not innovating in its structural characteristics, it offers several additions that can offer new variety to the game mechanisms, on all the pleasant digressions offered by the special missions related to Desmond and Altair. There remains the (non) problem of fights that have now become simple choreographic moments but on the other hand this aspect is so innate to the style of play that it must now be almost accepted a priori. Perhaps in terms of content, on the total, we are slightly below the offer of Brotherhood but what we find in Revelations, if we exclude the tower defense-style minigame, is certainly more oiled and more refined, made in such a way as to avoid the ups and downs that characterized the previous chapters, especially in terms of secondary missions.

PRO

  • The phases at the controls of Desmond and Altair are exceptional
  • The hook blade and the bombs manage to give new variety and fluidity to the game action
  • Istanbul is alive and adequately varied in its outdoor and indoor spaces
  • The quality of the main and secondary missions is very high
AGAINST
  • Dying in the game is truly an arduous undertaking and the fights in this sense are exemplary
  • The Lair Assault minigame quickly becomes repetitive and adds nothing to the gameplay
  • The small graphic defects of the engine remain on all the tearing and the pop up
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