My brutally honest review on Assassin's Creed, just not quite as I expected. *Contains spoilers.*
Assassin's Creed takes place in September of 2012. You play the role of Desmond Miles, who is kidnapped by a researching company called Abstergo Industries, who use him on a machine called the Animus, to recall his ancestral memories to his ancestor named Altair, who is an assassin in the Third Crusade in the year 1191 A.D., as he is part of the 'Assassin Brotherhood' and most of the story has you playing in the role of Altair, as he fights and hunts down 9 different people so that he can fulfill his rank, and blah, blah, blah. The story is partly confusing most of the way through, and it would take me a little while longer to explain the rest so I will just leave it at that and not give away any other spoilers.
The characters in Assassin's Creed are somewhat believable, there are only a central few, most of them are okay, but the best one is Altair, since he is the one you'll be most focusing on during the story. The other ones aren't real important and most of them look the same, especially the citizens of Damasucs, Acre, and Jerusalem.
The graphics are one of the highpoints of the game, as you climb tall, tall buildings and jump down, the buildings around you flashing downwards as you land in a bundle of hay. The cities looks truly beautiful. One problem with them though, is that the faces of the people weren't really up to the 360's standards.
The sound is also amazing, as you will hear the clanging of swords on swords, or arrows whooshing by your heads as you escape on top of city rooftops and the sound of feet on roofs or even the sounds of Eagles as you climb the high points in cities to synchronize the areas around you. Very, very good sound here as well.
Combat is fun, as you can perform different combos on people, or block attacks, etc. But after awhile the combat tends to get boring and repetitive, especially if you see a large bunch of enemies up ahead that you have to fight, otherwise you can't progress anywhere in the story, and it tends to get annoying, even if you keep dying after awhile if you aren't experienced in the game.
Weapons range from Throwing Knives to a Hidden Blade and a Sword, each is fun to use and will keep you busy for a long time, especially if you're just running through the streets.
Then that is where things start to fall apart. After I finished the story I found there was nothing else left to do besides collect flags, achievements, kill templars, etc. and it got boring since there was not much else to do after that. The action is very repetitive, the A.I. can be dumb, or can be way too smart overall and will randomly spawn in front of you, or know your every position. It is also weird that Altair can climb buildings hundreds of feet high but can't swim in water that is less than 10 feet deep and I hope that Ubisoft fixes this in the sequel. The controls were pretty good, but sometimes never did the function that I was meaning to do, which would result in my death or another 5 minute chase from the city guards. I also felt the need of the beggars and the drunks to be annoying as they would either push you into guards, causing another 5 minute chase, or cause you to fall of a pier and drown, and the beggars always get up in your face, and if you are climbing up a building away from them, they will throw stones, causing you to fall and likely hit a guard. I also don't like how anything can set off a guard, from stealthy killing someone and then going back to the body, to slightly bumping into them with your elbow, and I felt that they were always set off no matter what. The game can also be frustrating at times, and much much more. I wanted to enjoy this game, but I was let down by all the flaws that it had embedded deep inside. The game was way overrated from my standards, and was just one of the more disappointing games I have ever played. I'm not trying to offend the fans of this game, this is just my opinion and how I felt about it. A 7.5 out of 10.
-horrorboy