The Assassin's Creed Hate Is Inexplicable

So, a new Assassin's Creed game is coming this year. Actually, it might be two, one for the new gen consoles, one for the previous gen consoles.

When it was leaked today, the response from most people on this board was... overwhelmingly negative. And I have no fucking idea why.

Usually, if there is hatred directed at an annual series, it can be for one of three reasons:

• Rushed development schedules compromising the games' quality (i.e. games are pretty bad)
• Annual installments seeing incremental improvements at best (i.e. stagnation, no change)
• Developer focusing all their resources on this milked IP, with no room for creativity (such as Activision and Call of Duty)

If and when these reasons are true, I agree with the hate. I jump right on board!

But you know what? These reasons are not true for Assassin's Creed and Ubisoft.None of them, not a single one of them, is. Assassin's Creed may be annual, but it has been an overwhelmingly consistent and fun franchise (III might have been a dip in quality, IV more than compensated with a major course correction). The games mix things up every year- often to their own detriment, but the last thing they can be accused of is rehashing the same gameplay concepts. If you were to tell me that Brotherhood and Black Flag play the same, I would laugh hysterically at you. And Ubisoft does focus on Assassin's Creed a lot- of course they do! It's their main money spinner! But at the same time, they concentrate on other IPs as well, such as Far Cry, Rayman, Splinter Cell, and Just Dance, alongside investing in new IP such as Watch Dogs, Child of Light, and The Division. So there goes that criticism as well.

So... why the hate? Why do you, personally, want them to stop? The games are consistently great. They mix things up regularly (so much so that at this point, the series can almost be said to be lacking a gameplay identity). They don't divert Ubisoft's attention from other IPs or projects (in fact it can be argued that they fund relatively more niche ventures such as Rayman or Child of Light). They sell in the millions, they have interesting ideas and concepts... so why do you hate Assassin's Creed? Why do you loathe its 'annual franchise' status? Do you actually have a compelling, well thought out, rational reason for this, that can be backed up either by facts or by logic? Or is it just a kneejerk reflexive 'lol teh annual suxx0rz!1!'?

Yeah, it's literally the greatest franchise of all time.

lol ASScreed

System Wars hating something? Don't they hate everything?. Actually, I think I'll play some Assassin's Creed right now.

I don't like AC games anymore because they've been recycling their terrible mission design and combat for years now. They are literally "Repetition:The Game" with a new world and story attached

its because even the devs admitted there is no ending,

and it was all just an ass pull.

its just like ubi pr agents got together in a room and threw around buzzwords,

like "parkour, illuminati, assassins, 2012, knights templar, garden of eden, now lets make a game about that"

it wasn't a pet project that was etched into a developers mind,

it was a design by committee actioner,

that did nothing for the 3rd person genre that other games hadn't accomplished already.

sometimes the rose tinted glasses of nostalgia are really beer goggles,

and what you see is really ugly once they are off.

@killatwill15: So you don't like them because... the overall metastory won't end?

@seanmcloughlin: There is so much more to an Assassin's Creed game than just the mission design though.

AC bucks the rules of "milkage" ALMOST every year (AC3 and somewhat Rrevelations) . AC4 is arguably the apex of the series, legitimately. The way I see it is until the series shows evidence of NOT being able to grip me for 40+ hours of pure sandbox fun every calendar year, i'm still gonna champion the series.

"Assassin's Creed may be annual, but it has been an overwhelmingly consistent and fun franchise"

In your opinion. In my opinion it's a tired franchise which, like all franchise that have had 6 games, needs a damn good shake up. 4 got away with it somewhat because of an interesting setting, fun ship combat and not being Assassins Creed 3, but at its core it was still pretty boring.

They need to go back to the core of what AC should be and make a solid singleplayer campaign focused around actually assassinating people instead of listening to them have a bloody chinwag because I am AN ASSASSIN not the fucking NSA.

i have liked all the games so far but AC 1 and AC 3. Which i think were both good, but had it's flaws

the story was all over the place and lacked focus,

because there is no end to it,

so its just going to be a circle jerk of narrative mediocrity.

the gameplay will have to reflect those decisions and suffer for it,

assbleed 3 was a prime example of the game suffering because of the scope of the story.

just constant additions of useless gameplay mechanics and no real direction.

like what the **** does pirate ships have to do with being an assassin?

narrative and contextually it makes no sense,

that's like playing half life 2 and all of a sudden you have to battle rap by typing mavis beacon style.

it goes against the core of the character and the base game design.

Assassin's Creed is dead to me if they don't improve the combat and land mission structure. I really liked ACIV, but only because of the open world pirate stuff. The main missions were pretty terrible.

It isn't inexplicable. It's completely justified. Assassin's Creed has some of the most mindless, shallow, boring gameplay around. The games are designed around being needlessly clunky and wasting the player's time as much as possible. Why are they open world games when you aren't allowed to do anything in them? The game slaps you on the wrist whenever you try to do anything spontaneous or fun, having an obnoxious message pop up about how "your character didn't do that!" Well, I'm the one playing as the character, and I'm doing it, so evidently my character did do it so the game needs to **** off. This means that the only thing to do in the world is search for completely meaningless, bland collectibles and go from mission to mission. So what's the point?

It takes for fucking ever to get from mission to mission thanks to how slow and clunky you climb buildings up and down over and over again, and there's absolutely nothing stimulating about doing is since all you have to do is simply hold a button. Combat amounts to little more than mashing two buttons over and over while enemies that could just simply shoot you line up one by one to be killed. There's stealth segments where there's zero punishment for not being stealthy. There's missions that involve slowly walking behind people for 15 minutes while they talk at you. None of the characters are likable and the story and writing are nauseatingly popcorny and awful.

It's a miserable series.

Assassin's Creed Revelations and Assassins Creed 3 weren't very good.

To me it is just too repetitive to enjoy. I will say I have played every single one up to AC4. AC4 was a very nice game, but overall the series is just too repetitive. I feel that if they took like 2-3 years off and really focused on it they could create one of the best games of all time.

as a wiiU fan....ubisoft can blow me.

I loved the last game, so I'll be on board for the new game that's on the PS4.

not looking forward to the new one as much as i was ac4...seems to rushed to have another one out this year already

Loved 4, all the rest don't interest me (the only one I don't own is 3) . I don't think I will get anymore, 4 was amazing and I don't see Ubisoft beating it.

Exactly

The hate should focus on how the franchise has been shallow since it's inception and hasn't really evolved into anything interesting or nuanced as a game.

I got pretty bored of it. ACIV was fun but I just stopped caring halfway through it and forced myself to finish it. I may be in the minority but I was really interested in the story and wanted to know what happens. Then the ending for III completely killed it. Then they come out and say it has no ending. I'll skip these AC (I own all the rest up to this point, excluding the DS ones) and play it again if and when they finish of the story.

@charizard1605:

But mission design and combat make up a large portion of the gameplay. They have been consistently recycled with little change through almost every iteration of the franchise, and if you don't enjoy them, you're aren't going to enjoy Assassin's Creed, no matter how good other elements of the games are.

I agree with the TC.

It's ridiculous how much hate the series gets. Yeah, it is getting tired, but I don't LOATH the series for it.

No matter how good a game it is. All you need to do is release one each year and the hate will floruish.

I find the games fun and more fun when I don't have to reflect on paying top dollar for them, they'll drop in price in a year when the sequels arrive. I take issue though with the story since the beginning of the series and where it went since Revelations and AC3, basically being a 2012 doomsday plot, such bad writing. And the older games don't even hint toward it, it's like they purposefully shrouded everything in purposeful obscurity in order to write it later. I haven't played the latest one though so I don't know how they recovered the story arc or created a new one. Anyhow, next one takes place in Paris, sounds boring.

I never got the appeal to the AC series (mindlessly repetitive), but I've spoken too many times about why I don't like the series.

Instead of forcing myself to post what I don't like yet again, I'll just quote these dandy posters who I agree with:

QFT.

People get tired of consuming the same formulaic, manufactured crap every year.

I think Black Flag got a lot of negative feedback with their rating system on those bad or repetitive missions , so hopefully they listened.

I really didn't like 4. I think every game has gotten slightly worse since 2, honestly, and 4 was quite a bit worse than 3, but not quite as bad as the first game. The series really needs a lot of improvement in regards to stealth mechanics, combat, and its campaign. I thought AC2 was a really good game because the character was very likable, everything felt fresh, the campaign was very interesting, I loved how the game actually kind of tied into real history in regards to the characters you were killing and interacting with, etc. Brotherhood and Revelations felt like expansions to AC2. AC3 introduced a lot of cool mechanics that were poorly executed. AC4 improved on all of those mechanics, but the campaign was just awful. AC4 feels like the game gives you a big checklist of things to go do, shows you exactly where everything is on an enormous map, and waits for you to go do it. Cool stuff occasionally happens in between, but you will do the same stuff so many times that even something awesome like taking down a naval fort or killing a whale becomes a chore by the time you finish your list. The world and environment is amazing. The gameplay mechanics just don't translate very well, and the game rubs things that should be a lot of fun and make for a deep, rewarding experience, like controlling a fleet of pirate ships, in your face with the worst turn based strategy ever devised in mini-game form.

Ubisoft really should take more time between games. It worked well when they made AC2.

The first one sucked, didnt bother with the rest. I might check out AC4 if it ever gets patched properly on PC.

I think they are the best games as far as just open world fun. Something is more enjoyable than GTA to me. These open world games aren't perfect by any means but AC does more right than most imo. As far as open world, story, variety of things to do that are fun I think they are the best as far as what is offered. GTA is much more repetitive and boring to me and the story and characters are not as enjoyable. That's not saying much though.

My chumdumps, if the game offered any form of anything remotely approaching a challenge it wouldn't be so bad.

When the player can (literally) press X to counter and win. All these unlocks and upgrades mean jack shit. And without engaging gameplay most people who want to actually play a game, will be bored shitless well before the 30-40 hour playtime is done.

It's baffling how the console people say "oh strategy boring". Yet a superior historical title like Shogun 2 has variables that matter, thinking and challenge, it can keep a person engaged and entrained for hours.

Yet, you run out and buy this shit instead. The only reason seems to be corrupt media telling you it's good. And you, believing it's good. It's the only explanation.

I didn't enjoy Assassins Creed 4, even though I did finish it. Maybe it's too much of the same thing and I'm growing sick of it. I didn't like the stealth elements in the game and I certainly didn't like it when you had to trail someone whilst remaining hidden (it felt more like a chore).

Other than that I felt the story dragged on a little too long and it failed to hold my interest, and I found myself starting to fast travel more often as travelling to each destination by ship kind of got boring by the end. I was really hoping I could love the game but eh, the only way I'll buy the new game is if it's based in ancient Egypt or ancient Greece.

I enjoyed AC2. I'm actually considering picking up AC4 right now or just waiting for watchdogs. I'm getting kind of tired of the same stuff over and over myself though. People say these games are different but i'm starting to realize how cookie cutter games are becoming.

People hate on Assassins creed. I personaly think any game and the entire industry deserves some hate. I don't know if hate is the right word but these games are so whatever they are these days. AC is one of the better series imo but even still it's not that great.

The series has been shallow since AC1 while the story is laughable at best. AC4 was the only AC game that was remotely interesting and that was just cause of all the boat/pirate crap you can do but the crappy combat is still there along with the crappy mission structure like "tale the target" is beyond overused.

Mechanically the games might be constantly refreshing, but the concept has become incredibly tiresome.

I understand it's a successful franchise, but come on, do something different for a change. Why does an Assassin need to look exactly like Altair, Ezio, Rah:ankentan (whatever) or the pirate guy? Why can he not dress differently, and use an entirely different skill set to achieve his goals (perhaps not be agile and parkour-oriented?).

I'm still sitting on ACIV, not having touched it since getting bored with III about a third of the way through. I cannot bring myself to play yet another installment in the game I've played 4 times now (AC, II, BH, RV). It's getting to the point where they are becoming like annual sports titles. A roster update (new characters) and a new mechanic or two.

EDIT: On top of that, the games base mechanics have not evolved a single iota since the first game, which was mechanically innovative, but heavily under-developed and completely ignored for the sake of "story" (which honestly didn't ever go anywhere after II). They have only added superficial fluff to the basic moveset and mission design. Instead of being a stealthy assassin, they have essentially turned the franchise into The Legend of Altair: Pieces of Eden. Except without the massive strengths of the mainline Zelda games.

assassins creed has to be the worst and most generic franchise next to call of duty. uhg. such a wannabe action-adventure title. take some notes from the PS1/N64 era please...

I don't think I've ever had less interest in a franchise than Assassin's Creed.

I've gotten the chance to play a bit of ACIV, and it's pretty boring. I haven't played any of the other games in the series, but if IV is the apex then I feel okay about my decision to never play them.

Definitely a series built to appeal to the lowest common denominator

I kinda lost interest when they said there would be no true conclusion to the games story. They really plan on just milking this franchise for all eternity like that? People will lose interest eventually.

Things I dislike about the Asscrud series:

The story. The historical parts of some games can be interesting, but the futuristic tie in is just badly done. Both the past and the present for 4 was just laughably bad. A voice tells you to go hack something, you have no choice but to do the hack, then the voice says "Gotcha idiot! Now you you are my bitch!" And then you are. That is like the whole "futuristic" story.

The Combat: The game has to artificially create difficulty by popping a game over screen if you get detected because you can literally take on a thousand soldiers at once. The only danger there would be your hand getting tired. It is the only game I hoped people would shoot at me because it autokilled the fat guys,

The "story" missions: You know that minigame you just did to unlock that thing you didn't need? Now you are doing it to progress a story you are not interested in. Check back in three missions, you will be doing it again!

The free running: This actually isn't bad when it really is free running. When however it is required to solve an uninteresting jumping puzzle or when they shoe horn in the chase minigame, it becomes a chore.

The fact that it isn't a stealth game: Because even when outnumbered one hundred to one there is no real danger, stealth is a chore you have to deal with in order to progress, rather then an option for dealing with problems in an interesting way.

How tacked on everything is: There are a lot of upgrades in Asscrud land, and things you have to collect to unlock them, but they are all pointless. You can usually purchase a weapon early on that is more then able to carve through ten enemies at a time without much effort. I beat Black Flag, and only bought one sword.

At the end of the day. the boat carried Black Flag. The series was really showing it's age with 3 and Liberation.Without the boat to show something interesting in 3, and to carry Black Flag, it would have nosedived. I think we all would have been happier if instead of 3 they had just released a boat game. The worst part about Black Flag was all the Asscrud you had to deal with before they would let you go back to playing with your boat.

too repetitive and the story isnt even that engaging,

I got bored during the first AC. Is it actually worth finishing?

It seems like AC2 and 4 are the ones worth playing

@charizard1605: I've learned to accept AC for the product it has become.

Also took your advice Char and completed AC4 - and thanks are due for talking me into it. AC4 was top notch, would play its sequel (pirate-themed, meaning).

The only AC game i played was Brotherhood, and i enjoyed it a lot. The thing is, none of the other games interest me besides maybe Black Flag because of the pirate theme.

I think its my 2nd most hated popular franchise only after CoD. I cannot stand the cheese, combat, assassinations, joke exploration and this bs present days garbage they've been spamming since Ass Creed 1. This game can go to hell with Ubisoft

You're saying Assassin's Creed isn't a milked franchise? It doesn't have incremental improvements? Come on. Even worse, it has the same fucking problems it had in 2007. Now, the customization of armor and weapons is gone, and I just don't care anymore. I also hate this sci-fi shit. I thought AC 2 was the best, but when all this talk of "gods" and stuff came in to play, I just started hating it. The minute it got away from humanism and realism, I just stopped caring.

Although, AC 2 was a great game. I also liked the AC1 story, even if the game wasn't great.

Assassin's Creed 2 is personal and sad. It's a really good game. Also some nice customization options. I would say the opposite. Everything after Brotherhood starts to dip into poopy.