After spending a good portion of my time in the bleak winter of 2007 throwing myself off of tall buildings I am so excited about Assassins Creed 2 that I have already pencilled in time to play it on my calendar. At E3, Ubisoft decided to excite me even more by exposing so much more of this Machiavellian wonder. Playing Ezio, a nOOb at the assassin life, you enlist the help of Leonardo da Vinci (amongst others) in order to seek your revenge. As everyone knows, da Vinci was a great inventor in real life and several of these ideas have been incorporated into the game itself.
With beautiful renaissance Italy providing the backdrop, the kills seem even more brutal especially with new choices of weapon and more elaborate killing moves. AC2 takes everything that made the original an award winning game and pushes it to new limits, now even including a night and day transition.
As every gamer knows, the unwritten rules state you can never swim till the sequel (I know there are exceptions so please don’t list them!) and AC2 now enables you to swim to make traversing Venice a lot easier. With a more aristocratic upbringing, Ezio will blend with society in a very different way to Altair in AC1, leaving the player to discover exactly what each social group has to offer him. The ability to leap on your enemy from pretty much anywhere you can imagine looks set to give a great level of satisfaction, especially with the addition of two hidden blades and new acrobatic manoeuvres.
With a much more sandbox-type feel to the game, Ubisoft also show pride in the historical accuracy of the characters and general politics of the area during the renaissance. There are a number of plot twists as well as many more varied side missions to give you rewards, although a new notoriety level can affect how the citizens see you so you better behave if you want their help!
With a new currency system in play, more options are opened up for upgrades for Ezio although Ubisoft have said the full economic announcement will be made in a few months.
Starting at the point the first game left off, AC2 is riddled with links to the first game and therefore time is ticking for those who never finished the original! Da Vinci aids Ezio by deciphering Altair’s notes so the overall series’ story will have more depth added to it by this instalment.
Like the original, AC2 is also accompanied by a PSP game to enlarge the story and this will be released at the same time as the full game, finishing the tale of Altair. AC2 will be hitting shops in the “holiday” season this year on the PC, Xbox 360 and PS3. Unlike the first game, Assassins Creed: Bloodlines will be able to connect to your PS3 in order to enable full use of coins and upgrades.
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