{"id":990,"date":"2014-11-26T12:15:14","date_gmt":"2014-11-26T18:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/?p=990"},"modified":"2014-11-26T07:25:10","modified_gmt":"2014-11-26T13:25:10","slug":"game-review-assassins-creed-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/?p=990","title":{"rendered":"Game Review: Assassin’s Creed II"},"content":{"rendered":"

This continues my ongoing review of the\u00a0<\/em>Assassin’s Creed\u00a0science fiction\/alternate history game series.<\/em><\/p>\n

Remember all my complaints about\u00a0Assassin’s Creed<\/em>?<\/p>\n

There’s a reason\u00a0Assassin’s Creed II<\/em>, set in Italy during the Renaissance,\u00a0is considered by many to be the best of the series. Released in 2009, it continues the frame story of Desmond Miles from right where\u00a0Assassin’s Creed<\/em> left off (in a very ugly fashion, I might add, that would have angered me had I not had\u00a0Assassin’s Creed II\u00a0<\/em>queued up and ready to go). The character of\u00a0Alta\u00efr is gone, though, to be replaced by the much more dynamic\u00a0Ezio Auditore da Firenze.<\/p>\n

Ezio’s a bit of a womanizing happy-go-lucky guy until his father and brothers have their necks stretched following a treason conviction based on trumped-up evidence. Donning the robes of an Assassin, Ezio spends\u00a0Assassin’s Creed II\u00a0<\/em>pursuing his revenge.<\/p>\n

Ezio also takes up the leadership role for the Auditore family after his father’s demise, and a minigame involves restoring the family’s estate. While that sort of world-building makes its first appearance here, it certainly won’t be the last time in the series.<\/p>\n

Assassin’s Creed II<\/em> takes the series from alternate history to\u00a0very<\/em> alternate history. I don’t recall another game that involves a fight with the pope over an artifact from a pre-human civilization that can be used to control the minds of other people. Seriously. And, as with\u00a0Assassin’s Creed<\/em>, the game ends on a nasty cliffhanger that’s downright irritating. (Seriously, closure, people. Closure.) However, part of that cliffhanger is information tying the frame story far more closely to the main story, which was desperately needed given the player time spent on the frame.<\/p>\n

The game plays better than\u00a0Assassin’s Creed<\/em>. Combat is a bit more dynamic and adds some new weapons to the mix. Ezio is actually an interesting character, and his conflicts with his family and his desire for revenge seem far more organic than\u00a0Alta\u00efr’s flat performance. Large jumps in time are a bit jarring, but this is a far superior game to\u00a0Assassin’s Creed.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Assassin’s toolset expands a bit. First, and most importantly, Ezio can actually swim. Add to that dual hidden blades (instead of the single in the first game), poison, and a gun, and there’s a lot more ways to end a target’s life than in the original game. There’s also the addition of a notoriety system; actions now have longer-term consequences.<\/p>\n

There’s also more world interactions than before. Ezio takes to the air in Leonardo Da Vinci’s flying machine, drives a wagon with a team of horses, and rows a gondola, along with the familiar horseback sequences in the “world” between the game’s major cities.<\/p>\n

AC2<\/em> is improved in virtually every way over the original\u00a0Assassin’s Creed<\/em>. It’s definitely a worthy successor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This continues my ongoing review of the\u00a0Assassin’s Creed\u00a0science fiction\/alternate history game series. Remember all my complaints about\u00a0Assassin’s Creed? There’s a reason\u00a0Assassin’s Creed II, set in Italy during the Renaissance,\u00a0is considered by many to be the best of the series. Released … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":29,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-990","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gaming"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/03\/cropped-villagers-21.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p52rlt-fY","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/990","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=990"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/990\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1005,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/990\/revisions\/1005"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/29"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=990"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=990"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.writingunderduress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=990"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}