Two years after the release of the first Assassin's Creed, UbiSoft Montreal released their block buster title "Assassin's Creed 2" in November 2009 on all major video game consoles, the PC version was released in March 2010. This review will be based on my playthrough of Assassin's Creed 2 on PC.
Introduction:
The first Assassin's Creed took place during the 3rd crusade in the 1190's, where the player was exposed to a sand box style world in the crusader era. The interesting storyline certainly was the strongest point in the first game, however the biggest complain was the repetitive gameplay and the linearity of the side quests in the game, that made Assassin's Creed 1 a far from perfect game. In Assassin's Creed 2, UbiSoft Montreal has listened to the complains and feedbacks of the gamers, and have go out of their way to improve all the flaws in the first game. The game is till an open world with non-linear play, but with more varieties.
Story:
Assassin's Creed 2 is set in the renaissance Italy, and takes place 300 years after the events of the first Assassin's Creed. The player no longer takes control of Altaiir,but takes control of one of Altaiir's descends Enzio Auditore. Enzio's father belong to the league of Assassin's, and after a consipracy plot that leaves Enzio the only survivor of the Auditore family, Enzio set out to avenge his family by becoming an Assassins himself, in the course find out a much bigger consipracy plot by the templars. One very interesting thing is in Assassin's Creed 1, most of the story have already been revealed, so in AC2, the game developer really had to come up with a gripping storyline to keep the game interesting according to the tradition of Assassin's Creed games. The story is actually really good, this time the player feels more personally involved with the character of Enzio and his story, and every target or objective that you achieve feels like it's actually worth something. A word of warning to Christians, the story of Assassin's Creed 2 is based on Panspermia (the theory that human are created by alien from outer space), and the story also involves Adam and Eve, and also contains the altered Adam and Eve and the forbidden fruit story and calls it the "truth", and also the story seem to progress towards the Mayan prophecy of 2012. I think that some Christian brothers and sisters out there might be very sensitive to this type of topics. Therefore if you are more sensitive person and is easily offended, perhaps it is good to re-consider before you buy this game. However, if you are not easily bothered by conspiracy theory, and is able to treat the whole game as merely entertainment that provides nothing more but enjoyment, then you guaranteed to find hours of intrigues and a thrilling, mysterious adventure ahead of you. One more thing, many fictinoal depctions of actual historical characters, such as Leonardo DiVinci, and Rodrio Borgia (later known as Pope Alexander VI) and more make appearances in the game as well.
Gameplay:
The gameplay of Assassin's Creed 2 has been improved the major improvements are:
1) Enzio now has a new arsenal of weapons, from 2 wrist blades, poison blade, smoke bombs to guns.
2) Enemy AI has been improved, for example if you hide in the hays to evade pursuit, now the enemy will stick their weapons into the hays and drive you out.
3) Enzio can buy armor and weapons, the equipments gets damaged and need money to repair.
4) There is a new living economy system at work in the game, now you will run a small city that you can upgrade and manage, in doing so the player will receive more money from tax, the player also has a small castle in the city.
5) The player needs to visit the doctor and buy portions to be healed from wounds now.
6) Counter attack is no longer as powerful as in Assassins Creed 1.
7) In every city there are secret Assassin's tombs that can be explored to unlock Altaiir's armor and sword, undoubfully the most powerful equipment in the game. THe background story of Altaiir's armor is very interesting as well.
8) The player controlled character can now swim in the game, as well as rowing a small boat.
9) THe missions have more variety, the main missions are no longer just go and assassinate someone, but involves strategic planning and more storyline/involvements with the gameworld and its characters.
The numerous changes in the gameplay are real improvements to the game, as makes the game more balanced and more fun to play.
Graphics:
The graphics in Assassin's Creed 2 is just as good as in Assassins' creed 1. The cities are really well designed, UbiSoft Montreal has keep up to their tradition of making the cities the exact replica of the cities in real life. The player will visit Florence, Venice, Tuscan, and a little bit of Rome. The cities are lively, the building designs are beautiful, when I was playing the game I changed the language so the main language spoken is Italian, with English subtitles, with the beautiful graphics and scenery . I felt like I was really immersed in the renaissance era, pacing through the city of Venice, Florence and Tuscan in the late 1400's. In addition, because the story is set in renaissance the cities are more colorful with more contrasts, compared to the yellow, dark atmosphere in Assassin's creed 1.
Sound:
The music scores of Assassin's Creed 2 are really good, the voice acting is excellent, I deliberately changed the audio to Italian and turned on English subtitle, the result is a phenomenal experience.
Final rating:
Story (4.5/5) - The story of Assassin's Creed 2 is really well written, with many surprising twists and turns that will keep you interested. However, Christian brothers and sisters beware of the Panspermia overtone, and the fictional/altered depiction of Biblical events and characters. If you are easily offended by this kind of things, I would recommend that you re-consider before playing this game. However, if you are like me, and can just play and enjoy the game for what it is and just treat it as entertainment and nothing more, then you will enjoy the story a lot, it is a hundred times better written than Dan Brown's DaVinci Code for sure.
Gameplay (4.5/5) - The vast improvement of gameplay really made AC2 a remarkable game, and suit the open/sand box style game world really well. However, my biggest complain about the game is the UbiSoft's new DRM technology. This means whenever you want to play the game, you have to be connected to the internet, because all your save games are online! For me this is extra ordinary inconvenient! Because if for some reason my internet connection breaks up when I am playing, then the game comes to a halt and jumps to the error message screen until the internet is back online. I already bought the game, and I think I deserve to play the game on my PC without having to be constantly connected to the internet! I think the DRM technology is really unfair on the consumers!
Graphics: (4.5/5) - The graphics in AC2 is amazing, however it seems like it is the same engine as AC1, however the graphics is still beautiful.
Sound (5/5) - I love the sound tracks in AC2, the music scores are very well composed classical musics to opera to suit the atmosphere of renaissance Italy.
Final verdict (4.5/5) - I am really happy with the second installment of Assassin's creed, UbiSoft has done a great job with this game, and it is a vastly enjoyable experience. However, I really think the implementation of the DRM technology is unfair on honest people who purchased legal copies of the game and should be removed.
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