Assassin's Creed Unity (2014)

The only thing good about this game is the graphics, everything else is a downgrade from the previous AC games.

The first thing you will notice in the game is that the movements are bad. More sluggish and rigid than AC1. Quite often, Arno moves backward when you want to move forward and vice versa and he keeps climbing onto things you don't want him to, this can prove very costly and your stealth approach will go up in flames especially when you are trying to escape after an assassination. There are also several instances when I got stuck and could not jump off ledges or roofs.

The game also feels quite difficult compared to previous games, mainly because the game mechanics don't gel well with the level design. Batman, Hitman or Dishonored are enjoyable precisely because the game mechanics, the level design and the nature of game play required gel well together. This game is a case of Ubisoft wanting to emphasize on the stealth aspects without polishing the movements and without working on the level design.

The members of the brotherhood seemed to me like a bunch of loonies.

The disguise ability which is a copy from Hitman does not work just when you need it.

To add insult to injury, the Dead Kings DLC cannot be exited once you enter it and Ubisoft does not even care to warn about it. At the mid way stage, out of curiosity I fast traveled to a location marked F on the map and ended up in the Dead Kings DLC, where I at a lower level had to deal with higher level enemies. Apparently, completing the first mission allows you to exit the DLC but I had no patience for it. Ubisoft deserves a slap for this DLC fiasco.

Assassin's Creed: Unity would be one of the best games in the series, easily, if it weren’t held back by its lack of polish and buggy gameplay. Even now, patches and years later, it doesn't quite feel "done". Nevertheless, Revolutionary Paris is a captivating setting convincingly depicted. It can seem a little monotonous the more you play but this doesn’t necessarily translate to stale or boring - it’s a treat to be in this setting throughout.

The sluggish combat, such a departure from previous titles, is not very fun but the assassination/hidden blade kills animations are outstanding. They never get old. And being the last true "assassination" game in the series, it makes sense for this to have been the focal point.

Like others have said and continue to say, the parkour system in this game is the series' best and it hasn’t really been this good ever since. It’s not intuitive but once you are acquainted with the fundamentals and a few tips and tricks, it’s hard to enjoy the other games’ parkour mechanics.

I love the use and frequency of interiors in Unity. They make the world feel that much more alive and it contributes to the communal feeling of revolutionary France. Buildings with doors and windows open here give the sense that everyone has come together, for better or worse, to participate in the event that is the revolution.

The DLC is excellent. It stands apart from Paris proper, with its bleak color palette and overall feel. It doesn’t overstay its welcome and navigating the underground is fun and interesting in each instance.

This is the first AC to really allow customization to blossom but it still falls short of the mark ultimately. I like the standard iconic outfits each Assassin wears on the cover art but in this game, it’s the weakest and most basic outfit. Wearing it subjects the player to a huge difficulty curve. A transmog option would have been nice.

All in all, I leave this game wishing I could have experienced it with a higher resolution and framerate. Syndicate and the remasters for III and Rogue run so much better on PS5 but Unity has no such improvement; at least, not in any marked way. With the love and emphasis Ubisoft puts on the AC franchise, I hope this game gets another shot in the future, especially with the renaissance it has come to have within the community.

The one thing I can’t get over, though, is how everyone has British accents. Speakers of another language have consistently had accents when speaking English in all other games. It tends to break immersion when I hear the world NPC’s and characters speaking English with British accents.

Fue sorprendente ver como Ubisoft entrego este juego gratuitamente este juego, tras los eventos de Notre Dame. De no haber sido así posiblemente jamás me hubiera dado a jugarlo. Si bien no es una experiencia excelente debido a ciertos detalles, si es un juego por completo recomendable.

++Los elementos culturales desde la catedral de Notre Dame y cada una de las demas iglesias, pasando por cada uno de los detalles históricos hasta la música se sienten fantásticos y muy bien logrados

+Uno de los mejores periodos para AC. La altura de las viviendas, y las construcciones especiales fueron excelentemente aprovechadas. Adicionalmente a modo personal me encanta la edad de la pólvora para este tipo de juegos.

+El multijugador, esta bastante bien logrado. Adecuadamente insertado en la historia y sobre todo flexiblemente incluido en el flujo de la campaña.

+Enormes cantidades de NPCs tal como lo requiere un AC para hacer el juego dinámico.

+Gráficos excelentes (cuando funcionan)

+/- La historia romántica es cliche pero encuadra bastante bien. -El antagonista deja demasiado que desear

-Algunos elementos no cuadran demasiado entre la lógica de la hermandad & los templarios.

-Los controles pudieron haber sido mejores

-La DLC de dead kings, le falto desarrollo y mucho.

Un juego que hubiese sido mucho más sino fuera por su pobre lanzamiento que lo condeno a la sombra.

A surprisingly enjoyable installment of Assassin's Creed franchise despite the somewhat negative reviews this game got.

A bit of disclaimer - I've played firstly through the story missions first just trying out different modes in between. Then moved on to additional missions with the exceptions of Enigma ones. And only then tried two or three co-op missions with and without a random player. I've also played after the last patch was added meaning my experience was not as riddled with bugs as some reported early on.

So what's new in Unity? First of we're back in a crowded city. Paris looks and feels amazing. I feel this is one of the best settings for Assassin's Creed game so far and I enjoyed it a lot. Each district is quite unique, very detailed and interesting. You can again travel the city using the rooftops, cut through building - can't stress it enough - great setting.

Visually it's quite good looking. Although if you have an eye for it you will notice repeating character models, pop-ins - sometime the people cloths change when you get near them. Posters and detail appear suddenly sometimes. Personally I did not mind it much as I don't usually notice these things unless I actively try to.

The biggest improvement to the game is the update to the free running. Finally it comes with ability to easily and fluidly climb down from buildings - makes travelling through the city so much better and a lot of frustration known from previous titles goes away.

Apart from that the general skill assortment is pretty similar, stabbing, jump-stabbing throwing darts, gun - all well known from the past series.

The story takes place in Paris as mentioned and is a bit mundane. In short it's a standard revenge story. With plot holes - Arno - the main character - is out for revenge and could care less for the whole assassin's creed. Yet everyone is surprised by that. The war between Templars and Assassins is in a strange stalemate and the plot tries to over complicate things completely unnecessary. I think Elise was an interesting character in whole of the story.

The main story missions are fine - not amazing but quite decent. I liked them mostly for their open character. You get an objective and are somewhat free to proceed as you like. And I really enjoyed it. The fact that you can approach it any way you like is a big selling point. The secondary missions are mostly simple - steal or kill for the most parts, just on a bit smaller scale than main missions. Some of them are fun, but the more difficult they're marked the more boring they become with most of the most difficult boiling down to be forced to fight your way through and no real stealthy approach - a shame really.

The co-op missions look like a cool idea but playing with random players we had no way to communicate and ended up racing to the objective. Played once and never again. You can try the missions yourself but the ones I tried were nothing more than fight your way through enemies so lost my interest pretty quickly.

It's worth mentioning the addition of murder missions, where you try to find a killer in a murder case. A good concept that however ends up to you looking for clues, reading prompts (annoyingly overlay-ed with help pop-ups) and deducting the killer. The only penalty you get for getting it wrong is less money but so you can accuse everyone until you get it right. Cool idea - mediocre execution. Also Enigma missions were added where you get a clue and need to follow it up to find something. Again great idea but just don't click. The clues are too complicated to go on without google, and googling redirects you to walkthroughs which is not really the point. Trying to figure out the clues based on in-game rich descriptions is not enough as it's not detailed enough.

Overall I enjoyed the game quite a lot and have no problem recommending it.

My friends told me about the horrible control bugs that plagued this game when I started playing it. I told them that they must have patched them because I wasn't having any issues. In fact I was enjoying the game.

Until I hit the ~60% mark.

Then for whatever reason the missions you were sent on seemed riddled with situations where Arno couldn't figure out what ledge I wanted him on, or to go up a wall when the 'run up' button is held down instead of jumping sideways, NO ARNO CLIMB DOWN THE FUCKING LADDER DO NOT HOP ACROSS THE SEWER HOLE MY GOD.

Also I thought this series was supposed to be about stealth? The last 12 missions or so (basically everything after four diamonds) is just a combat slogfest. I wish I had a screenshot of the one mission where you have to infiltrate a 500 sq meter area packed with about 47 guards. It was laughable.

Anyway, I imagine every review is similar to this one so I'll just leave it off here. No future you, you do not want to replay this game.

4.5/10

I'm not an Assassin's Creed guy. I find the movement really wonky and almost game breaking, but this was okay. I got it for the co-op though, and you can't play through the whole story with a friend.

However, as of writing this, the game is broken. I haven't been able to try the co-op because I just can't connect... it could up the score a little above a 5 because even though it's not what I had hoped, it would still be fun to assassinate dudes with friends.

As of now though, it's just more AC crap. The good ideas are rendered almost useless due to the terrible controls and movement (this game is DEPENDENT on fluid movement and so many other games like this do it better).