Whether you like action, adventure or stealth, Assassin's Creed is definitely a game for you.
The story is truly something original, as you are a modern-day bartender who is apparently kidnapped by a very well funded organization and put through some sort of experiments on a machine called the Animus. This machine allows you to access the genetic memories of your ancestors. In your case, the memory of Altair, an assassin from the time of the Third Crusade. Altair is the best of his order, and thus has become arrogant and full of himself, until he is demoted by the master of the order for his reckless behavior. The story takes you to different cities as you complete your missions. These missions consist of assassinations you must do, your targets being selected by the master of your order. Although you are given the target, you cannot take him out immediately. First you must do some recon. These are like some sort of quests which consist of eavesdropping on people's conversations, interrogating suspect persons, pick-pocketing and some occasional help you provide to your fellows assassins while in the city. Only after you have done some of these certain quests are you allowed to kill your target. Although this can be considered one of the innovative factors of the game, it also brings forth the most negative of it's aspect, and that is too much repetition. Having to do all these quests over and over again seem like a drag on occasions. But although the action is repetitive you get sucked into the atmosphere of the game which makes you wanna finish these quests, just so you can see the cut-scene at the end of the mission which are very fulfilling.
The game-play is difficult in the beginning and this is a result of what I would call annoying controls. They need a while to get used to, but about 3-4 hours into the game the problem will disappear. While difficult at first, the game-play is interesting, and as I said earlier, quite innovative. Your actions are analyzed by the surrounding people and the result is a level of alertness, and if it goes red, you are in trouble. If you do inadequate gestures like running like a moron through the streets and bumping into people, surely the guards will notice that something is weird about you. When the area is in high alert, the guards will start chasing after you, and might I say those guys are really ambitious, even climbing buildings to try and catch you. First you bust break the line of sight, and then find a hiding space like a terrace garden or blending in with a group of scholars wearing the same clothes as you. You can always choose to actually fight the guards and thus it will be more easy to lower the lever of awareness, as the guards are...you know...dead. The player's health is described as being the level of synchronization between Altair and the modern-day bartender who is in the Animus, Desmond Miles. When you die, you actually are not synchronized with the memory. So practically Altair never dies, it's just you who are not accessing the memory correctly. If the synchronization bar is at max, the player, as Altair, has the ability to use Eagle Vision, which is a cool option which enables you to see which of the people in the streets are enemies, allies or even targets. There are more to be said about the game-play, but things that are better off to be discovered by yourselves.
The difficulty of the game is medium, as some missions are a cake walk, with others annoying you to the point where you are forced to close the game, calm yourself and try again sometime later. Although all missions can be finished by not only eliminating your target but all the guards he has around him, there are some missions in which if you try harder you will manage to assassinate only your target and make it easier for yourself to escape without a sword fight. This does require some level of finesse but it will not prove all that troublesome to the stealth-oriented type of players.
The technical aspects of the game are pretty easy to cover as all of them are delightful. The graphics are nice and pretty impressive at some points. The music composed by the one and only Jesper Kyd is awesome.
I have already stated the most negative aspect of the game, the repetitive missions. But that doesn't mean it doesn't have other flaws. Another one that has to be mentioned is the sometimes idiotic AI, which doesn't know how to climb a ladder... Maybe one last thing would be the ending. I found it a bit too abrupt for my personal taste, but to each his own.
In conclusion, Assassin's Creed is a good game with an interesting and original story where you add an innovative game play, but which you need to get used to. With a lot of good, and just a little bad, this game offers you a beautiful mix which will surely impress you. This is not one to miss!