I'm liking the changes in parkour and I can see how they will make a difference, but I don't see the combat getting any better.
As Pedneault said (get some English-speech coaching Alex ;D) the problem wasn't with the counter-button but with the immediate kill that would result from a successful counter.
The problem with their combat is that they won't budge and admit that Rocksteady took the formula they came up with in Prince of Persia Sands of time and made it better. Freeflow is not that difficult a system to reproduce, and most of all is not a difficult system to adopt and transform to new gameplay necessities like Crytek has shown with Ryse and Monolith (probably) will do with Shadow of Mordor.
Case in point, Shadow of Mordor already looks like another example of a smart producer taking the Assassin's Creed formula and bring it up to the next level, like Rocksteady did with Arkham City, a game which bests any Ubisoft sandbox game on every single element, be it navigation, stealth or combat. Even the way Rocksteady manages collectibles in Arkham City is a multiple slap in the face to Ubisoft unimaginative feathers/ flags placement.
They keep spending money on marketing for their bullshit pr talk and their bullshit demos and their bullshit screenshots, when they have the solution to a better game right in front of them. As for the assassinations, Hitman and some of the Splinter Cell games have many ideas they could as easily pick-up and adapt.
It's not that they don't see what's wrong with their product, they just don't care: they know that until they can dictate the standards of the market with their amazing graphics, all they have to do to sell is get Day one sales through hype.
It's a franchise that could easily pulverize any other game inspired by their success, and instead keeps getting surpassed in terms of quality and ingenuity by each and everyone of its descendants.
After six iterations (not counting the portable versions) they haven't managed to be a GOTY contender even once, and it's clearly not the fault of a single individual seeing how Wendshuch "magically" became a competent writer as soon as he put himself to work for Warner Bros Montreal, offering one of Arkham Origins strongest points: its plot and its screenplay.
It's the company policy what's really at fault here, which seems to act on a frantic desperation to strike the iron while it's hot, instead of focusing on creating a brand that will stick to people heads even once new labels will be able to match their production values and their manic annual output.
