Tokunation Assassin's Creed Lair- Assassin's Creed Discussion!
 

All things Assassin's Creed here! Any of you thinking of buying the McFarlane Assassin's Creed figures? To be honest I was disappointed that they scored the license. NECA wanted to make a figure of Connor from AC3 but they could not get the license before the end of last year.

Right off the bat, what McFarlane will undoubtely do better is make a much wider selection of figures. Their 1st assortments indicate that they are not limiting themselves to just countless versions of Ezio and Altaire. They are already making different pirates(some yet to be revealed) from AC4, some of Desmond's other ancestors, and people for Connor to fight from AC3. Range of motion will probably be better but from what I saw of McFarlane's Connor prototype, NECA still has them beat for sculpts.

I got into AC somewhat late. I played the 1st one briefly a few years back, then bought Revelations last year or the year before(since it had AC1 on the disc). Beat Revelations, then 1, then 2, then Brotherhood. Brotherhood is my favorite so far. I have to say, story-wise, 2 probably had the strongest. The way everything culminated before Ezio fought the Pope....so awesome.

Discuss!

You know, I have mixed feelings on the AC series. The first game was extremely subpar, as it got really boring almost halfway through and then the cliffhanger was an insult. I also hated how you could not kill any of your targets in secrecy, so you always had that hide and seek game after killing a target every time.

However, ACII was down right incredible. It was like they listened to every complaint about the first game and fixed it, making for one phenomenal experience. Not only was Ezio's story compelling, but I started to gain a big interest in Desmond as well and had fun with his little moments too. THe areas in ACII were a blast to play through, but the carnival was and still is the greatest moment in the entire AC series. Everything from the costumes, the masks, to the tournaments were fun. And even though the game still left off on a cliffhanger, it was still fun and did not seem like an insult as it had before. It felt like I had completed a story.

Brotherhood had some great moments to it as well despite it's slow start, while Revelations became more of the same. I did love the closure feeling to Ezio's story in Revelations, but you could definitely see that the game was rushed. Oh, and the tower defense bit was atrocious.

The Embers movie that finishes Ezio's story was quite good though.

Which brings me to ACIII, which was a vast disappointment. Connor was a supbar assassin, he was slow, the controls no longer felt fluid, and the assassinations became scripted QTEs instead of straight up assassinations I could plan out and do my self. Most important, this game was a friggin glitch fest. I cannot 100% it because of a glitch with the Homestead stuff, as even though it says I have scanned all of the workers, the game only recognizes that I have scanned the lumberers twice and any time I scan them doing something it gives me an error message. And then the ending was an even bigger insult to our intelligence than the first game's ending. In fact, it has completely ruined the series for me and I will not be playing Black Flag (which should not even have a number in front of it, as it is NOT a sequel).

I am disappointed by McFarlane getting the toy license as well, but since I never managed to get any of the NECA figures, I guess I won't have to worry now about hunting them down since they just won't fit together. :/

I do like how McFarlane is making more characters (dear lord NECA made too many Ezios), but at the same time, the sculpts really aren't nearly as good. Especially with the joint pins and whatnot showing. But I'll still probably try to/want to get them all...

Assassin's Creed was the first series I played on the Xbox. I fell in love almost instantly. I have really enjoyed it the whole way through, even if there were some bumps along the way. Revelations being a somewhat boring copy of Brotherhood, for example. Or that horrible ending to ACIII. But I like the premise of Black Flag, although it definitely leaves me wanting to know who our present-day protagonist will be that we're playing Edward through...

Yeah, NECA doesn't understand the concept of character variation regardless of what it is. They had the license for God of War and chose to only make like 6 different versions of Kratos, nothing else. With Legacy of Kain, they made 3 different versions of Raziel and one Kain, again, no one else. With Resident Evil, they were doing variations of zombies and Las Plagas, but forgot about half of the actual cast. They did Jill, Chris, Leon with jacket, Leon in RPD, Leon without jacket, Ada, RE5 Chris, and Sheva, but they never bothered with Wesker, Claire, Ashley, Barry, Carlos, or Rebecca.

While I found the first entry to be repetitive and forgettable, Assassins Creed 2 is one of my five favorite Xbox games of all time- it plays great and it has a very compelling story; Ezio is a superb protagonist. That mostly stays true through Brotherhood but stumbles a lot in Revelations-which brought in way too much unnecessary side stuff (Seriously? a Tower Defense subsystem for Assassins?)

Three i just recently picked up, and while I like it I do think its not as good as predecessors. The controls aren't as tight and the overall gameplay isn't as polished as before. And Connor/Raton's not explored enough to make me feel for him as a character.

I hope the timeline from game-to-game keeps progressing regularly. I'd love to see an Assassin in the Old West setting (think Zorro-ish gameplay :))

What I hate about McFarlane is their insistance on using PVC construction and all the associated qc problems from it. Stuck joints, fragile parts, et al. I have some of their HALO figures, pretty decent figures but some are prone to the problems mentioned above.

What I liked about Revelations was the assassination abilities added to Ezio. You can kill Shakulu in the end from an extremely high altitude...in the previous games you would have just straight up died on impact. The ending battle was incredible too. I was very impressed by it.

Gotta admit, I haven't felt inclined to finish up Desmond's animus memories on Animus Island, they were kind of boring and I don't think they really added to the game.

Otherwise, Revelations felt, as some of you have stated, like a copy of Brotherhood with more assassination techniques and the Animus Island. It just didn't feel as fun. I thought the Altaire Codex flashbacks were great though. Thing is that could've just been made as a DLC bundle of side-missions for any of the previous games.

I hope that McFarlane makes the following:

• Ezio(Armor of Brutus from Brotherhood)
• Ezio(Armor of Altair from ACII)
• Ezio(Armor of Ishak Pasha from Revelations)
• Cesare Borgia
• Rodrigo Borgia as Pope
• Al Mualim
• Robert de Sable
• Abbas
• Old Man Hermit Altair(return to Masayaf/Abbas assassination flashback in Revelations)

I've been playing these very intensely since last fall, only slowing up recently when I got Injustice. I'm currently in the later part of ACIII - really loving it a lot. My favorite is definitely Brotherhood - love Rome so damn much - but III is probably just edging out II as my second favorite.

I will definitely get III sometime this year. It looks awesome and I want to now how exactly Desmond's role plays out in relation to Juno.

Confession. I never made it out on the tuturiol for Assassins Creed, the first one. The part were you gave to gently push aside people without them spilling their vases? Yea. I failed it for an hour and said screw this I'm playing DC Universe.

...

:eyebrow

You just have to hold down the B button when you walk.

... Ooooh, hold it down. I was tapping it.

:lolol

B button? You mean Circle, right?

No, I mean B. B is move aside, X is attack, Y is Eagle Vision, and A is blend.

Assassin's Creed is an amazing game series from the beginning to it's current game, III.

I don't understand how some of you can say the first one is subpar, boring, repeatitive, etc. when at the time there was no other game like it. Nothing at the time compared to Assassin's Creed, and even these days it's hard to top that.

Kain, I'm not sure what you mean by QTE assassinations. You must have been playing a different game than I did. The only QTE that occurs is when you're up against predator animals, and when a soldier gets on a horse during normal combat. Beyond that (and the first assassination in the theater) nothing is a QTE.

Also, Connor isn't slow by any means. His parkour skills game wise are the best in any AC game. The way he vaults over objects, fences, and his running assassinations keep him on the move, not to say anything about tree running either, which is hella fun.

Also, I absolutely love Connor's more realistic abilities that should have been in the other games, like peeking around corners, or whistling to get attention.

I feel that Connor is a great character. In AC1, Altair's purpose was to acquire his rank back, and learning to do what he was told, though still hunting down answers. In the end, it was still a quest of self-fulfillment. Ezio's story was about revenge, then rebuilding Rome, and then rebuilding Constantinople. Originally it was a self-fulfilling act, but Ezio furthered himself to protect and rebuild the Assassin's Order, lastly by finding answers at Masayaf.

However, in 3, Connor is introduced. He's absolutely torn. He's a man of two worlds, two cultures and in the end, both cultures betray him. Both of the people he fought for, turned against him. So he's silent, moody and tired of being told what to do to make it "all better." Also, he's not completely versed on the English language (his lack of contraction use proves this) so his lines come across as intentionally sounding "off."

I loved playing as Haytham as well. He's very much a smart ass, while still trying to be noble and just. I wouldn't mind playing as Haytham again in 4 in fact.

I still enjoy Brotherhood the best, and I think that, like Switchblade, 3 is coming in second. It just seems more "realistic" to me. And, as a history buff, it's nice to see the events unfold before your eyes, and this as good as it gets, even if not completely accurate, Ubisoft has definitely done their homework.

Lastly, looking forward to 4 so much. It doesn't matter if it's not a sequel or prequel or whatever, because by that logic, 3 should actually 5. The numbering sequence occurs with each new protagonist, not with any sort of story/sequel order.

Best thread ever on TN. Just sayin' :)

Oh, you must be playing it on that other console with the X and the $ and the Micro with the soft. :)

Because it was the same thing over. Go to city (which all looked exactly the same), do the same 6 tasks over, go to enemy fortress, kill enemy in front of EVERYONE, run and hide for 5 minutes, return to base to report.

The other games might have had some repetitiveness to them, but the tasks tended to vary so it wasn't always just the same task over. plus, the environments looked different.

Really, then how did you kill Haytham and Lee? I remember a long drawn out chase through a burning ship and across the city before you get to watch Lee die. That was so exciting.

ACIII got rid of the ability to plan out your assassinations. You had one direction essentially to go to kill the majority of them. Yes, there were some who you could do on your own terms, but most were scripted events.

Nevertheless, I can deal the negatives of ACIII had the ending not been so half cocked and rushed. It was worse than the ending to ME3.

Because this game feels tacked on. The AC series is being killed by being a yearly franchise. This game shows it, as all they really did was take the one thing the third game got right and turned a full game into it. However, there is nothing more they can do for the story because Desmond is dead.

The series needs to sit 2014 out and come back in 2015 with a fresh new look with something new to add to the next generation of gaming.

Assassins Creed is one of my favourite video game series, and I really enjoyed it. The original was good when I played it but, looking back, I wouldn't want to go through it again; it's too repetitive. I never played II but Brotherhood was my favourite. It has good script, Ezio is a badass character and the Borgias are satisfying too kill. Revelations was OK but it felt like a rehash of Brotherhood, even if the Templars were getting better as enemies and Ezio's songs are awesome! III was good to play through, and while the gameplay was strange to get used to it quickly happened.

Also, regarding Desmond's death, various sources say that for IV you are playing through the memories as a Game Tester after the DNA was extracted from William and uploaded to the cloud during his capture by Abstergo. Although more boat gameplay doesn't sound good, being a pirate should be awesome. Plus you're British!!!

You say that's the one thing that 3 got right, but 4 is only 40% naval battles. On top of that, the naval battle dynamics are changing. According to reports, this time you'll be able to take out a ship in more than one way by just attacking it. You'll be able to board it, (and it's not a scripted boarding either) or you'll be able to dive off the Jackdaw and swim to the other ship, sneak on board and take out the entire crew, with stealth, or brute force if you choose.

I disagree that the naval battles are the only thing that 3 did right though, because there's many things I've already mentioned that should have been in the first one, at least the second one. If Ezio can whistle to call a horse, why can't he whistle to distract Templars?

Also, there's an entire underwater world we'll get to discover as well, which is something new to the franchise. It's really not just naval battles and that's it.

Also, regarding the story and Desmond's death there's plenty more they can do. As we've seen, Desmond and Clay aren't the only ones tied to an ancestor that's not via the same family. Not that's whats to happen, but regarding the main story, there's still the issue of Juno's release from captivity that might be a pesky issue for not only the Assassins, but the Templars as well. I wouldn't be surprised in the future if there was someone from both "sides" trying to put an end to that issue.

As a huge fan, I don't think it needs to take a break. It's being refreshed every year with new substance. Some people may not like it, but in the end, it's not CoD where it remains a FPS (now with dogs! :O ) for every instance it puts out.

I admit, AC1 was repeatitive. But again, there was nothing like it at it's inception and unlike most games, it learned from it's firstborn and has only gotten better and better with each release.


I want to touch base on the spoiler-hidden part. It seems that's the case, but at the very end of 3, you hear an Abstergo employee say that they've "done it" and are "uploading to the cloud." This could be what you're referring to, or they've managed to find memories of other people who are also ancestor candidates. Abstergo is now providing "entertainment" by selling this "game" to the masses and in turn, having the player at home do the work for them as the unknowing at-home players are actually hopping through time trying to find POEs or whatever else Templars are looking for.

However, despite that, oddly enough Desmond's death isn't listed on the Assassin's Creed calendar, while everything else from Templar to Assassin, is

Man I'd like to see D-Arts Assassin's Creed!

That would be pretty BA.

I liked how in Assassin's Creed 1, Altaire goes from arrogant to humble, to righteous. He attempts to right the wrongs that Al Mualim incurred on the Order. His legacy is felt throughout the subsequent titles. I thought Revelations was a nice way to wrap up his story.

I thought it was bad ass how he almost killed Swami with his own blade.

That would indeed be so incredible.

And I have to agree that AC1 was not bad. At the time. Like I said, it was the first game I played on the 360 and it hooked me immediately. I found the story pretty good, because Altair was indeed a great man. Also, it only became repetitive the second time I played it, which was maybe 3 years later. By then I had played AC2, so of course it made the flaws obvious. If you played them in quick succession or even out of order, then obviously AC1 wouldn't be so amazing... Or you could actually just genuinely dislike it I suppose and that's your right to.

I still wouldn't call it the worst, though. I've thought about it a lot before and I really do think AC:R (Altair missions aside) might be my least favorite.

But it's the same game, just with a new character.

The problem is not with Desmond's death, the problem was there was no pay off to the 5 games I spent playing through Desmond. He achieved nothing. I spent 6 years playing it and got nothing in return. Just a giant middle finger with $ signs for prints.

http://th06.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/...ct-d4n1as1.png

How is it the same game? You spend time looting and going after other ships for their treasure. Like a pirate. Connor never did that unless it was a specific Templar/Assassin based treasure.

Plus, the idea of an Assassin Pirate in itself is an oxymoron. Assassins tend to fight for freedom of choice, where Templars fight more along the lines of "peace through tyranny/control." Pirates however, it's all for one, take everything and give nothing back. Sure there's a sense of brotherhood on a pirate ship, but in the end, how far does that go. Even in a latest AC4 trailer, Edward says his only concern is his ship and crew, which isn't very "Assassin" like in the least. We know Connor's story. We know Altair's story, Ezio's as well. We don't know Haytham's complete story or his father's, Edward Kenway's story. So how is it the same game?

Well, like I said, the AC Calendar (yes I bought it) has no mention whatsoever to Desmond's death and that came out after AC3 did. Also, there has been PoEs known to bring the dead back to life

Though I feel that story should have had a better ending and I'm upset regarding it, I think there are other stories that will pan out due to it. If not, and they decide to use the "Templar Cloud", that's fine with me as well. History is their playground after all.



I'm not sure what to make of this. Can you explain? As this is a discussion board, I can only respond to discussion in kind. Thanks.

I tend to think of AC1 as an open beta for the AC2. It had the skeleton of the later games, but everything is much rougher and/or not fully realized.

Agreed, and like I said before, Ubisoft learned from AC and created bigger and better games from it.

A friend found them in a TRU in Maryland the other day too.

I really wish WalMart or Target would carry them... Because as it is, I'll have to be getting them online. :/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqMF6hvghwk

Reviews are up, and actually have been for a while now. :lol

Not bad, good amount of accessories, and they don't have V-hips as originally expected.

Very little useful articulation between the knees and shoulders, that's what I was afraid of. :(

I'll still likely pick this guy up if I can find him. I love these games and I want to have all of the main Assassins.

Edward is better but Haytham is worse, so yeah a mixed bag all around. But not as awful as the first pics made it look like

Oh is that what I saw at TRU last week. I was wondering why the figures shrunk (forgot about this actually).

Just got the McFarlane Connor and Edward... Almost got Haytham just to complete the family, but just couldn't bring myself to after hearing nothing but bad things. Maybe eventually.

Connor is the worst of the two. He's not horrible, but... I just don't feel like I can do much with him. Nevermind that the coattails aren't pliable, his legs hardly move to begin with. As the man who runs through the treetops, I want to be able to get him into dynamic poses.

Edward's better, but not by a whole lot really. For one, he's got a mid-torso cut and his coattails are a little more pliable. But his legs themselves are still rather limited by the really stiff crotch piece (but not nearly as badly as Connor's). I also wish he came with some pistols. Mine also has a really, really weird right eye, so although his hood can come off (unlike the other two figures' hood/hat), I'll be leaving it on.

They both look fantastic, to me, at least. And when it comes down to it they will end up on a shelf. I've wanted an Assassin's Creed collection for a LONG time. NECA stuff was just always too hard for me to get ahold of. :( And when I started to become serious, AC3 came out and there was no news from them on it.... I wanted to make sure I'd be able to get all of the Assassins first. Then the McFarlane announcement came...

Well, I'll say they aren't bad for starting a collection. I just sincerely hope we get an Ezio, Altair, and more down the line, and that they really make improvements as they go.

Figures I probably waited too long to get the McFarlane Haytham. He went from stocking stuffer price of $4.50 (literally being advertised as one; despite being offered at that price for quite a while) back up to full price on Amazon. Oh well, it's still not too much.. Might even be down more and hopefully not gone heh when I do order him in 2 weeks after getting back to school.

Anybody here get Freedom Cry yet? I've been holding off because I can't decide on whether or not to get the season pass yet on the off chance more story DLC comes out, as unlikely as it may be, which also means I've not yet played Freedom Cry. Just kind of looking for a general "yay" or "nay" on it. I did get some Xbox gift cards for Christmas that need used...

IIRC NECA came as far as making a sculpt of Connor but was not able to get the license for ACIII since McFarlane scored the license.

Sad to hear how the McFarlane toys turned out. I expected limited movement but was expecting more given how well their Halo figures are articulated.

The PAKs look good but I am not longer a big fan of that line. The toyline that lends itself best to Assassin's Creed IMO would have to be D-Arts. I'm pretty sure if Tamashii made AC figures they would take range of motion and super articulation without being hindered into consideration.

It's just a damn shame to see Assassin's Creed figures that aren't "agile".

I think that whoever finally gets AC figures right is going to be the company that finally realizes that you can't make articulated Assassin's Creed figures with plastic robes. You need to have some kind of softer material if you ever want an Assassin who can move his hips worth a damn.

What's the best Ezio figure?

Maybe one of the NECA ones(the Revelations ones) or the PAK from ACII. I have the Revelations and Brotherhood Ezio's(one of each), be careful with the hidden blades if you retract them, as they are made of hard plastic that doesn't have much "give". Mine broke on my Brotherhood figure. I superglued them back together. Though they are now "fixed", they look weird.

Also for as much articulation was added on the Revelations figures, the leg articulation is largely hindered by the PVC robe sculpts. It works against the range of motion for the hips, pretty sad considering the Assassins are quite adept at parkour.

I just want to comment on Assassin's Creed: Liberation HD a little.

I'll start by saying I didn't mind the main mechanic of the game at all, that being the guises. While I didn't really see much of a difference between the Slave and Assassin's (especially given how easily Slave notoriety raises), the Lady was interesting. I didn't like her until you got the parasol gun, because then she became useful. It was an interesting change of pace and added a new dimension to Aveline's character.

But Aveline's character... so messed up. Not her personally, just how she was presented to us. That's the biggest fault of the game - that it's a game within the game universe. That's an interesting concept in and of itself, but it made the game incredibly convoluted to understand. Even after watching all of the "true" cut scenes, I still feel like I was missing out on information or that not everything was really revealed.

The Templars also felt exceptionally weak here. There was indeed an artifact they were after... but I don't even remember hearing the word "Templar" until near the end of the game. Just "enemy this" and "enemy that." Perhaps that was part of the "altered history" of the game too? But because it was a jumbled mess of an altered timeline, I didn't know who to believe was on the "good" side and what everyone's true motivations were.

The world was an interesting one, too. Between New Orleans, the bayou, and Mexico, there was some nice diversity. I wish we had gotten to explore Mexico more and that the bayou wasn't so barren. For being built off of the Assassin's Creed III engine, I was expecting hunting. Instead we had very sparse quick time-only encounters with crocodiles. And only them. So that felt lacking.

So it was indeed an Assassin's Creed game. I still enjoyed running on rooftops (except as the Slave given, again, how ridiculously easy her notoriety increased) and assassinating people. But the world was barren and the story lacking.

Newest entry in the series- "Assassins Creed: Unity!"

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news...s-Says-Ubisoft

Boo @ next-gen exclusive. :thumbdown