Assassin’s Creed is a special franchise to me. I remember watching videos of it on YouTube during its marketing run and pining over the fact that I didn’t have an Xbox 360 at the time. But after few months of saving, I bought myself an Xbox bundled with Assassin’s Creed and since then I have been a fan of the series.
With the highly anticipated Viking-themed Assassin’s Creed dropping later this year, I thought now would be a good time to replay the Assassin’s Creed games while looking back at them and the fond memories they brought. I will not be going over the spinoff games that launched on Nintendo DS as I have not played them so I can’t really talk about those.
I also won’t be covering Assassin’s Creed Rebellion as it doesn’t really fit in the franchise’s timeline. But without further ado, let us embark on the road to Valhalla!
The Third Crusade
The Third Crusade was a brutal and interesting setting. You played as the assassin that started it all; Altair who sported his iconic white hood. Assassin’s Creed came after Ubisoft’s stint with the Prince of Persia franchise (which so badly needs a resurrection) and it has often been said to be the game’s spiritual successor.
The digital recreation of the Holy Land was praised and the attention to detail in the landmarks and region really showed how passionate the developers were about the game. The Assassin’s Creed games pride themselves on their research and doing the different cultures and time periods right throughout their series. There have been some minor mishaps along the way but Assassin’s Creed was not one of them.
The game itself is tedious though. Players end up doing the same things over and over in the form of eavesdropping, pickpocketing, and finally killing the target after enough information was gathered.
It did make you feel like an assassin, especially with the social stealth aspects of blending into crowds and casually sticking a target with your hidden blade before walking off among the sea of people undetected. However, it wasn’t very imaginative in terms of mission types.
Thankfully, the storyline was phenomenal with both the modern-day storyline as well as the historic storyline blending together. The Assassin’s Creed games are very good at blending historical fact with fiction that, especially in the earlier titles, that it somewhat felt believable to an extent.
Assassin’s Creed’s Humble Beginning
This game is a must-play game for any gamer. Not only has it aged like fine wine but it set the benchmark for a franchise that is still going strong today. Although the game features rinse and repeat gameplay, the storyline just blew it out of the water.
Assassin’s Creed has spawned a series of games, books and comics as well as a heavily underrated movie. And, it all started here with Assassins fighting off Templers in the Holy Land during the Third Crusade.
It’s doesn’t get any more Assassin’s Creed than that.
