So let me start by saying that i've played AC1, 2, Brotherhood and Revelations to completion and found them all to be good games, but nothing more than that. They all suffered from convoluted stories, confusing characters, poor stealth, boring missions, repetitive and meaningless side content and the free running wore out it's welcome way too fast.
Anyone who thinks Assassin's Creed III was a bad game must be bat shit insane.
Almost (and I stress almost) everything that was broken in the previous games has been fixed here. The story is intriguing (not counting the throwaway Desmond thread) and Connor is an excellent protagonist. Having played as his templar father at the beginning gives great context and meaning into the men you're going after to assassinate.
The boring side missions that were chase this or deliver that are gone, replaced by being simply hidden collectibles now, which although meaningless, isn't as tedious. There are more options for stealth, hiding in trees or bushes. The combat system has been improved upon from previous entries with better counters akin to the Arkham games with seamless transitions in animations.
Most importantly, the free running system finally feels fast and responsive.No more slowly scaling a building trying to find a handhold. Now your character quickly clambers up walls and structures with pauses between animation.
But.. There are obvious flaws that when they rear their ugly heads, ruins immersion and the overall experience. The enemy and npc AI is still dumb as nails, sometimes resulting in a failed mission. When enemies aren't dumb, they have eagle vision and get agitated by the slightest of bumps. Riding a horse is cumbersome. Shooting a gun or bow is slow and clumsy (for someone who is supposed to be a native hunter, his bow skills leave something to be desired, why not implement a mark and execute system like from conviction). Mission design with all of these being issues either results in a fun or frustrating mission with little grey area in between.
I am so glad you can restart a checkpoint and still achieve full sync (a decision that was only one of the worst that the developers could have made in previous entries). Chests, feathers and trinkets are all toned way down, or so it seems to me which is always welcomed.
Finally I wanted to talk about all the other stuff you can do in this game and how it's a bad/great idea that it's all in the background.
So I haven't sent any of my recruited assassin's on missions because a) it doesn't seem important to the overall story and b) it was never explained to me how it works in the first place. All that crap that you can trade/craft back at your homestead I still can't understand why any of it is important. What does any of that do? I'm almost done the game and never had to use any of it, nor am I struggling with the difficulty. So why is any of that in it? I did the naval combat tutorial which was bloody awesome, but haven't had to use my ship at all yet. Why?! Hunting... meh.
What i'm trying to say is, I don't understand the hate for this game. I loved the slow build this game took over other entries. Introducing us to the main players in the story and building Connor as a character. Frontier is boring and hunting seems pointless. I was hoping I would get checklists like Red Dead, and i'm sure someone will say it's in there somewhere, but sometimes finding this stuff in Assassin's Creed menu's is rough.
Where do you fall on this game GAF? If anyone wants to help a guy understand the nuances of crafting and what it does or some other stuff I may be missing please feel free to. Would love some help.
Are you a Loyalist (fan) or a Rebel (hater)?
EDIT: I am only on sequence 9 so please try to avoid end game spoilers for now.
Anyone who thinks Assassin's Creed III was a bad game must be bat shit insane.
Almost (and I stress almost) everything that was broken in the previous games has been fixed here. The story is intriguing (not counting the throwaway Desmond thread) and Connor is an excellent protagonist. Having played as his templar father at the beginning gives great context and meaning into the men you're going after to assassinate.
The boring side missions that were chase this or deliver that are gone, replaced by being simply hidden collectibles now, which although meaningless, isn't as tedious. There are more options for stealth, hiding in trees or bushes. The combat system has been improved upon from previous entries with better counters akin to the Arkham games with seamless transitions in animations.
Most importantly, the free running system finally feels fast and responsive.No more slowly scaling a building trying to find a handhold. Now your character quickly clambers up walls and structures with pauses between animation.
But.. There are obvious flaws that when they rear their ugly heads, ruins immersion and the overall experience. The enemy and npc AI is still dumb as nails, sometimes resulting in a failed mission. When enemies aren't dumb, they have eagle vision and get agitated by the slightest of bumps. Riding a horse is cumbersome. Shooting a gun or bow is slow and clumsy (for someone who is supposed to be a native hunter, his bow skills leave something to be desired, why not implement a mark and execute system like from conviction). Mission design with all of these being issues either results in a fun or frustrating mission with little grey area in between.
I am so glad you can restart a checkpoint and still achieve full sync (a decision that was only one of the worst that the developers could have made in previous entries). Chests, feathers and trinkets are all toned way down, or so it seems to me which is always welcomed.
Finally I wanted to talk about all the other stuff you can do in this game and how it's a bad/great idea that it's all in the background.
So I haven't sent any of my recruited assassin's on missions because a) it doesn't seem important to the overall story and b) it was never explained to me how it works in the first place. All that crap that you can trade/craft back at your homestead I still can't understand why any of it is important. What does any of that do? I'm almost done the game and never had to use any of it, nor am I struggling with the difficulty. So why is any of that in it? I did the naval combat tutorial which was bloody awesome, but haven't had to use my ship at all yet. Why?! Hunting... meh.
What i'm trying to say is, I don't understand the hate for this game. I loved the slow build this game took over other entries. Introducing us to the main players in the story and building Connor as a character. Frontier is boring and hunting seems pointless. I was hoping I would get checklists like Red Dead, and i'm sure someone will say it's in there somewhere, but sometimes finding this stuff in Assassin's Creed menu's is rough.
Where do you fall on this game GAF? If anyone wants to help a guy understand the nuances of crafting and what it does or some other stuff I may be missing please feel free to. Would love some help.
Are you a Loyalist (fan) or a Rebel (hater)?
EDIT: I am only on sequence 9 so please try to avoid end game spoilers for now.
