Impressions of Assassin's Creed Revelations
Fresh impressions of the next Assassin's Creed game.
This part is practically an ode to old age and the changing of generations. It continues the adventures of Ezio Auditore, who was the main character of the previous two games in the series. Here he has already grown old, and the game takes place 30 years after the beginning of Assassin's Creed II. Ezio follows in Altair's footsteps from the first game and finds his secret library in Masyaf, beneath the assassins' fortress-hideout. Naturally, the Templars are hunting that library there too. Nobody knows what is inside, but everyone wants it anyway. To open it, 5 keys are needed. Altair once gave those keys to Niccolò Polo, the father of traveler Marco Polo, so he could hide them. The trail leads Ezio to Istanbul.
In Istanbul, Ezio is met by Yusuf, the head of the local assassins, a colorful character. Probably the most colorful one; everyone else fades next to him.
The main plotline is not as interesting as in the previous parts. More boring. But the parallel line with the memories is good. I especially liked the ending. I finished the game in 18 hours. Though this time I got distracted from the main story more often by various side activities.
Over the course of the game, Ezio searches for the keys. Each key contains one of Altair's memories. That way we go even farther back into the past and can see events from before the first part of Assassin's Creed, when Altair was saving the Brotherhood and Al Mualim.
On top of that, in these memories we learn what happened to Altair after the first part, all the way up to his old age when he became a gray-haired old man.
Each key involves some descent into old catacombs where you have to cross gaps and look for paths. They are not difficult at all, and in places are downright linear. Sometimes, though, there are stealth-style missions. The hardest location is probably the last one. There you have to run to the right place in time, and also figure out where you are even supposed to run.
At the end you always get into some little room with a statue holding the key, and from there Ezio somehow miraculously gets back to the surface on his own.
There is still room for humor in the game. For example, in one mission Ezio has to dress up as a street musician to get into a celebration, and there he sings songs. The songs are about events from the previous games. For example, he sings some pretty funny verses about Cesare Borgia :) And yes, Ezio has grown very old.
As in Brotherhood, here you can recruit Brotherhood members. Many of them just need to be protected from guards; with others you need to compete: catch a thief, win a race, or simply fight and beat them. Recruits can be leveled up too. Each now has their own weapon type. You can also send them on missions to different cities, where they gain experience and earn money. In addition, every city is now under Templar influence, and successful missions reduce that influence. After reducing it enough, you can take the city away from the Templars, but it gives no extra opportunities. You just need to keep the city by continuing to do missions there. Recruits can also be used to eliminate targets as you go, and in some missions they even go into battle alongside you. Beautiful, spectacular stuff.
Each recruit can be leveled to 15 so they become a master assassin. To do that, besides experience, you need to complete two missions together with the recruit as regular missions.
The whole city is again divided into spheres of influence, and as in Brotherhood you need to capture districts by taking down the lead soldier there. Some can be handled head-on, while others have to be handled stealthily. For each district you can recruit one or two more people. After capturing a district, you also have to defend it. And that is a whole sub-game in the Tower Defence style, interesting and very cool. Waves of soldiers come at you, and you need to place barricades and place assassins on rooftops so they can bring soldiers down or fight them hand-to-hand. Once you have a master assassin, you can assign him to a district and then he will successfully hold off the soldiers without your involvement. They upgraded the Brotherhood system really well in this part, and I liked it a lot.
The game has new weapon types, including bombs that you can assemble from different ingredients and that do different things. For example, smoke and noise bombs for distracting attention.
Ezio is cool, of course. He still runs and fights well. He is just no longer a young man, so he looks like a tired, experienced guy who should probably retire already. All the games with him are good after all.
The ending, when Ezio finds Altair's skeleton in the chair where he died of old age, is impressive, of course. And what follows after that is now remembered with pleasant nostalgia. A worthy ending to his adventures, even if the main plotline in Constantinople itself was not all that impressive. Next up: Assassin's Creed III.