An honest review from a gamer who tried his best to like this game.
You've probably already read about the repetitious tasks Altair would perform during the course of the game but let me offer a fresh perspective of what bothered me. As you begin, you play Desmond Miles, a random bartender being forced to interact with the 'Animus,' an experimental virtual reality simulator that taps into the genetic memories of its host. AC begins by introducing the theory that you can retrieve and record the memories of your past ancestors through your own DNA. But why Desmond? Because his ancestor was an Assassin during the glory years of the Third Crusade and may carry some secrets that may affect the course of mankind as we know it.
The game world in Assassin's Creed is set out across the Assassin stronghold of Masyaf, three core cities, and a sprawling Kingdom that exists as a vast segueing environment. The inhabitants of these cities interact with each subtle move you perform in the city. On the upside, the graphics and animation are impressive to say the least. Altair can seemlessly move through the environment with so many various animations that it can boggle the mind. Altair's movements and his uncanny ability to navigate through the environment is a technical achievement. In addition, the story, leaps-of-faith, impressive draw distance and crowd interaction kept me coming back...at least initially.
I will not go too deep into the positives of this game. Many positive points were stated in other user reviews including gamespot's official review so I will not delve too far from the reason I gave this game a 7.5 (which is still good, just not great).
One of my main gripes of the game was the stealth and hiding mechanics. When you're discovered after assassinating a leader, trying to break the enemy's line of site became a very tedious chore. This was especially more frustrating when the home base locks up the moment a distant enemy sees your shoelace from the corner of their eye while you're busy hiding behind a brick wall. Of course, this happens 10 feet away from dropping in. What also deters me are the very limited ways of hiding: a bench with two bored citizens, a square hut, a pile of hay, etc. These 4-5 hiding places are the only places where you can hide. The same places where the enemies never bother to check once their line of site is broken. Apparently, enemies can't also tell you apart from monks or scholars either. Simply hold the Pray button and walk.
The other gameplay mechanic that had serious issues is the combat system. During the earlier phases of the game, getting into combat with any enemy was very difficult...that is...until you gain the ability to counterattack. Once you have this ability, there is almost no reason to hide especially since the enemy will attack you one swipe at a time. I remember an experience where I tried to jump on top of my next target and make a quick assassination with my short blade to setup a nice in-game cinematic of the kill. Instead, I would fall right in front of my target and he would send his whole city to kill me. In 10-15 minutes, I slaughtered a whole army within a 20 foot radius. In one experience, I remember blocking the target's escape route with piles of his own dead soldiers. When I gained the ability to grab enemies, it was icing on the cake. I would then take my battles to the roofs tossing each enemy over the edge to their deaths. Interrogation missions were also a single grab-and-shove away from completing it. The game's level of difficulty changes drastically from hard to very easy.
It's too bad that AC was hampered down by the obvious exploits in the game. In my honest opinion, Assassin's Creed (AC) is promising property that has plenty of room for improvement. I just hope they will address these things in the next iteration.