Last week I received my new gaming rig. Bundled with my graphics card I got AC3 along with a few other game.
The only game I’ve played in this series is AC2, so I can only compare these 2 games.
My impressions of AC2 was, that it could have been a great game, but I felt the port was terrible. I found it really difficult to get a hang of the controls without using a controller.
AC3 on the other hand, is much better in this respect. The game seem to follow pretty much the same concept, but the controls feels much more straightforward, and during the tutorial, you are actually told what keys to use instead of having to recognize different symbols, and try to remember what key on your keyboard corresponds to each symbol.
The game, for the most part takes place in 18th century Americas. I’m currently a few hours into the game and it is still very linear, however I expect the game to open up a bit more down the line.
Graphics
I must say, this game looks awasome for the most part. Most of the enviremental graphics, as well as the characeters looks, and moves nicely. This is pretty much expected from a tripple A title. It’s not just the quality of the graphics. Most of the places I’ve seen so far has a lot of detail that adds to the imersion of the game.
Audio
The sound effects and voice acting is generally good so far. There are games with better voice acting, but this is defenitely good enough.
User interface
Well, I can only compare this to AC2, and as mentioned earlier I think the UI is hugely improved. FOr example. Early on in AC2 I got stuck on a roof (or tower) with an objective to press 2 or 3 keys simultanously, however, since I didn’t have a printout of the control options and couldn’t access it during the scripted sequence, I was pretty much stuck. I guess you get used to the controls, but that pissed me off quite a lot. AC3 on the other hand, teaches you the controls early on in a straightforward way. Stuff like “Press F to aim” is much better then just being presented with symbols from a console controller that you don’t own. This has helped me to get into this game pretty much without frustration I was kind of disapointed that a game with such great potential as AC2 has was missing such a basic thing. The character movement usually feels pretty fluid and intuitive.
Gameplay
If you’ve played earlier instances of Assassins creed, you pretty much know what to expect. Early on, the game is very scripted without much freedom, but as mentioned I expect this to change. Expect to spend a lot of time leaping from roof to roof and climbing stuff. Evne though the game has a main story, there are also side missions along the way. I’ve been trying to avoid reading up on the plot, but it seems like the main character (or the one you play when doing the time travelling thing) will take part in the american revolution and war of independence. SO far, I’ve nly seen parts of Boston, but I expect to be able to go to other key historical places of the time, we’ll see. So far I haven’t had to make a single decision on my own in the game whitch is a bit dissappointing. The dialogues and scripted events have been very straightforward. Maybe this will change later on as well? The combat, so far has been very easy. I’ve been shot at with pistols, and attacked with swords and (I think) bayonettes but nothing I couldn’t handle. The combat system overall feels quite simplistic. The blend of history and science fiction in this series has always felt a bit weird to me, but it works for the most part. Sometimes some features feel a little out of place while trying to get imersed into the historical setting.
Conclusion
If you enjoyed the earlier games of the series and wnat more of the same, I expect you’ll get a lot oout of this game. If you expect complete freedom to explore and do whatever you want, or have a lot of choices to make right from the start. Chances are you’ll give up the game fairly quicly, if you don’t find the story compelling enough to continue playing just to see where it’ll take you. After my earlier experiances wit hthe series, I didn’t expect that much out of this game, but so far, I find my self enjoying it enough to want to continue playing. It seems like they’ve done a uch better job with the PC version this time around. It doesn’t hur that I really like 18th century setting either. If you don’t have this yet, and have any interest at all in the series, this is the game I would pick up. Especially if you can do it during a sale.
