Assassin's Creed Unity Review

“Assassin’s Creed Unity”

     Assassin’s Creed Unity is a worthy entry to the series, albeit it has its problems. You are Arno Dorian. Arno joins the Assassin brotherhood as part of a personal vendetta, and it’s quite evident that his personal issues get in the way of what is morally right. For God’s sake, at a certain point in the story he murders several people over some wine and to get his pocket watch back. Simply put, he’s a bit of an a-hole, but still manages to pull off a considerable amount of charm, reminding me of Ezio. Unity manages to establish a solid relationship between Arno and his childhood love, Elise. The two play off of each other well and you can really feel the chemistry.

     Taking place during the French Revolution in 18^th century Paris, Unity’s Environments are breath-taking. I grew excited each time I was about to synchronize a viewpoint. As the camera pans out and the music adheres to the gorgeous view of Paris, you really get this sense of a living, breathing world. Story-wise, Unity stumbles to establish solid ground, bouncing around from the modern world and something about finding the “sage-being” to stopping the Templars. It’s all very confusing sometimes, but Arno’s journey is still a lot of fun. An important high-point of Unity’s story are its “open-ended” assassination missions. These give you the opportunity to plan out your kill; go through underground tunnels, set off fireworks as a distraction or maybe poison your target’s drink. Each “open-ended” mission has a different set of routes so choose wisely. I found myself constantly reloading a checkpoint due to being detected just so I could achieve that perfect kill.

     Paris is grand, the streets littered with thousands of NPC’s milling about their business. An unfortunate side-effect of these thousands of NPC’s is the frame rate. According to Ubisoft, Unity is supposed to run at a locked 30 fps, but when the screen is filled with pedestrians, the game can dip to about 20. In a couple rare circumstances where there are no pedestrians present, the frame rate has literally dropped to the point where it looks like I’m playing a slide-show. While not game-breaking by any means, it really grinds my gears when developers fail to live up their promises. Ubisoft doesn’t exactly have the best track record right now (Watch Dogs = meh). Other mechanical problems occurred such as NPC’s floating in mid-air, or at weird angles, clipping, Arno getting stuck in certain objects and enemies spotting me, but then immediately acting like I was never even there even if I was standing directly in front of them and Arno falling through the map.

     Oh, and did I mention the practically broken cover system? Ubisoft thought that they were doing the game a favor by adding a cover-system, but it turns out that was a mistake. Cover is initiated by holding down the left trigger to crouch and then pressing “x” or “a” to stick to a wall, etc. Why is it broken? Because, half the time, even if something clearly has room to take cover behind, Arno does not take cover. It becomes difficult to even identify whether you are even in cover or not. Be mindful, Ubisoft is releasing patches, (they’ve already released two), planning to fix any issues. At least they care. The good thing is though, unless you’re a cynical, nitpicking nut-job like me sometimes, these issues won’t ruin the game for you.

     Don’t you just hate when you run out of stuff to do in a video game? Well, Unity solves that by filling your entire map with icons for side missions, treasure chest locations, Income revenue properties, journal locations, collectible locations, etc. Honestly, it can be very overwhelming. Your map becoming just a sea of icons can make it very easy to get lost. The filter option to make it less overwhelming isn’t very specific so you are still bound to get lost one way or another. I never thought the day would come where I would say that a game had too much extra content.

     Speaking of treasure chest locations, Unity has a companion app that is used to unlock additional content in game. The app is a game in itself packed with little mini games, assassination targets, and puzzles. While it is always cool to see developers making good use of other technology for incorporation with their games, Unity’s companion app is more trouble than its worth, and it’s free; not counting the optional $1.99 you can pay for “heat-maps” or something. In addition to the treasure chests, there are “Nomad” chests scattered throughout Paris. To open these chests though, you must use the companion app. I bought the game on a console, not my iPhone, so just let me play it on my console! It feels like too much of a chore. Speaking of game-immersion breakers, Ubisoft decided to add micro-transactions to Unity ranging from $5.00 to $100.00. Are you serious? Last time I checked, I paid $60 for this game, I don't want to see micro-transactions. While playing the game without them is fully achievable, no need to panic, it is still sickening to see Ubisoft insert this blatant cash grab into an already $60 game.

     Historically, I can’t really say much because I don’t know much about 18^th century Paris or the French Revolution besides Napoleon Bonaparte or guillotines and heads in baskets. Although, Napoleon Bonaparte does happen to make an appearance in Unity, though his presence is so lacking that it makes me wonder, did he really even need to be in the game in the first place? Fortunately, this is not totally a bad thing, because even if the game’s story isn’t perfect, Ubisoft has chosen to focus the story on Arno, and this is good. Seeing Arno hone his skills and become a master assassin. On a side note, Unity has these intriguing side missions called “Helix-Rifts.” These “rifts”, transport Arno to other times in history and task him with different objectives. An example; I was transported into a rift as part of main story mission and to get out of the rift I had to CLIMB, yes, CLIMB, the Eiffel Tower. SUPER COOL. It really was, and the weird part was, for it being such a small part in Unity’s campaign, it was one of my favorites. I got to man a gattling gun, shoot at war planes and scale a blimp. It was amazing.

     Multiplayer works well for the most part, allowing players to form assassination “clubs” and take on missions together, including heists. I would advise against playing with people you don’t know. A better option would be to play with your own friends on your console. It makes communication and taking out your target much easier. Multiplayer has a few glitches as well, but none that can’t be fixed in the near future. Combat in Unity is much different in comparison to past games, it can be quite unforgiving if you don't practice at it. You cannot just charge into a group of enemies and expect it to be an easy fight. Especially because at times in combat, surrounding enemies will pull out their guns and try to shoot you while you are in the middle of a sword-fight. Ubisoft has added a parry system and the ability to perform a dodge-roll.

     Graphically, as I stated before, Unity is beautiful. Buildings are detailed gorgeously; even interiors shine bright with excellent textures. Thanks to the power of Next-Gen, most random buildings can even be entered now. Lighting is impressive as well. The cut scenes in this game, MY GOD, some of the best facial animations I have ever seen. It’s odd to say how impressive facial animations can really make you feel closer to a character, but it’s the small things that can end up really mattering the most. The blood-spatter effects that occur when fighting enemies or being damaged are spot on. Stabbing an enemy, his clothes becoming soaked with blood or his blood spattering all over a wall that’s behind him; it looks awesome. Traversing Paris works well, most of the time. Ubisoft has simplified Assassin Creed’s free-running mechanics by adding the ability to scale and descend buildings just by holding down two buttons. It does wonders for traversing Paris and is a welcome addition to the series. Watching Arno walk, run, and scale buildings is astonishing. Depending on how you are dressed, seeing his hair flutter in the wind or the back of his outfit sway as he scales a building looks excellent.

     Unity also has a brand-new customization system available in its campaign and multiplayer. In multiplayer, everyone is still Arno, just with their own color outfits and gear. There are a decent number of colors for your gear and tons of upgradeable weapons. Outfits from the past Assassin’s Creed’s games can also be worn, but most of them must be unlocked using an online service, “Assassin’s Creed Initiates”, which you guessed it, isn’t currently running. Weapons range from, swords, pistols, rifles, long and heavy. If you want some good gear, you better get to upgrading your property in the game to obtain more revenue. Arno is basically customizable from head to toe. You can change his hood, chest, his forearms, waist and legs. Plus, the amount of options Unity gives you to change once you choose what area you’re looking to upgrade is enormous. Each piece of gear has different attributes; some improving stealth or melee, while others could improve range. Arno also has a skill tree consisting of upgrades for stealth, melee, ranged and health.

      Assassin’s Creed Unity could have been a great game, but due to its “broken” launch with a host of bugs/glitches, there is no excuse. Paris is a beautiful playground for the entry’s newest assassin, Arno. Now that we’ve seen what Ubisoft can do with the power of new hardware, even if there are problems, it is still absolutely mesmerizing.

Final Score: 7.8/10

PROS:

-          Charming lead character

-          Paris is GORGEOUS

-          Open-ended assassinations

-          Updated free-running

-          Helix Rifts

-          Character Customization

CONS:

-          Story fails to establish solid ground

-          Host of current mechanical problems

-          Map is a “sea” of icons

-          Frustrating companion app