AC presented unbelievable potential and it's unreal to think of how much of it was realized... and how much wasn't.
Pretty much everyone went into Assassin's Creed with extremely high expectations. The advertising campaigns and the way the hype was handled was simply brilliant. I haven't seen a single person who could honestly say there weren't looking forward to Assassin's Creed.
Unfortunately, hype only helps sales. Assassin's Creed dazzles and it is a really fun game, but in some cases the bad outweighs the good.
You put the disc in and one of the first things you see is a disclaimer that literally reads: "This game was created by a multicultural team of various religious faiths and beliefs." What does this tell me? Well, two things. One, is that Ubisoft doesn't have the balls to stand up for what they made. When a company is lacking balls, other things tend to lack. Second, it's that Assassin's Creed is going to insult someone. I'm a Christian and if somehow I was supposed to be insulted by the Templars being evil... I didn't see it. Maybe it was the Muslims that were supposed to be offended, but I didn't see anything hurtful at all!
(you may want to skip ahead, I'm not counting this as part of the score of the review. But I promise it's interesting.)
Shame on you for being without balls Ubisoft! Video games are an emerging art form and I don't remember any artists ever putting disclaimers on their paintings. They were proud of their work and didn't apologize for it. If video games are to be respected as art, then we'll have to start acting like artists. Assassin's Creed had the potential to go into the books as a great game that represented the finest artistic end of gaming, but it didn't and I honestly believe that their disclaimer had something to do with it. Art is expressive and by putting that message, you're claiming you aren't expressing anything. Way to shoot yourselves in the foot.
Anyway, back to the review here. Speaking of art, Assassin's Creed is a very good looking game. The lighting and shading excel. The cities and the world in general are huge! But it still looks good, if not better, than more concentrated games. That is called technical achievement. There are also few loading screens and they aren't very long or boring. There is actually interactivity in AC's loading screens!
Also the animations are something else. When Altair is climbing, he really seems to clasp the objects he climbs on. The sword fighting looks great with lots of sweet animations and moves.
The sound is also great. There is an excellent score buried in there, but it's barely audible. Sound balancing is definitely an issue. For some reason, I can barely hear the characters talking and there is no subtitle option. The sound effects are spectacular, everything is just right. The voice acting is good, but hard to hear.
The gameplay is unique to say the least. The controls are brand new to gaming and are very intuitive. Climbing up stuff and running around causing heck in Medieval Jerusalem is loads fun and very easy to do.
So what do I really have to complain about Assassin's Creed? It really sounds like a perfect game experience. This comes in the execution.
First, actually assassinating someone is about 2% of the game. The rest is spent in transit or doing ludicrously ludicrous sidequests. Seriously, we should be out there killing people, which Assassin's Creed does well, but instead... Here, I'll outline the mission structure:
Step one: Do the ridiculous animus laboratory thing. (won't go into detail because it's a spoiler)
Step two: Listen to the bearded old man babble.
Step three: Leave your fortress at the top of a mountain.
Step four: ride to the city of choice on horseback (admittedly fun, but you don't have to do this and you have no obligation to do it)
Step five: Go to the Assassin's Bureau in the city of choice.
Step six: Listen to an idiot ramble.
Step seven: Pickpocket bad guy #1
Step eight: Sit on a bench and listen to the ominous conversations of bad guys #2 and 3.
Step 9: Beat the daylights out of bad guy #4 until he spills his guts.
Step 10: Spill his guts
Step 11: Do Assassin noob #1's job for him
Step 12: Go back the bureau
Step 13: Listen to an idiot ramble some more
Step 14: Go to your target's house/boat/place of existence
Step 15: Sit there and stare at him while he takes forever doing something or another.
Step 16: Assassinate him.
Step 17: Listen to him ramble.
Step 18: Escape the guards and go back the bureau
Step 19: Listen to an idiot ramble for a third time
Step 20: Return to your mountain fortress and repeat.
Do you see what I mean? Assassin's Creed feels like a chore at times. The only purpose you have is to assassinate the Templars, but you can't do that until you've done all of this. It feels like those times where Dad tells you that you have to clean your room before you get a chocolate bar. The chocolate bar takes you about thirty seconds to eat, but cleaning your room takes a few hours at best.
Assassin's Creed is worth it. It's a sandbox game and there isn't much more fun than screwing around in Assassin's Creed. In what other game can you assassinate random lepers in the street? Or how about throw beggars into the shops? Punch drunkards? How about run around with an obvious arsenal of weapons and a neon sign that reads "I'M AN ASSASSIN!!!!" and nobody suspect anything?
The graphics get a 10.
The sound gets an 8.
The gameplay gets a 9.
The value gets an 8.
And my own tilt is a 7.
Overall, I'd call it an 8.0 game, which is not an average.