Shadows has released and 107 hours later I have Platinuumed it.

Love the hideout so fun getting to place the buildings/some decor and then run around and see everything where I put it.

The game is so pretty. The level of foliage for the trees is insane. It’s so dense and the blossoms are gorgeous. The lighting, riding through the forest is just a real wow.

I think the combat is pretty deep. There’s lots of builds you can do with the gear, engravings and mastery points (I have seen some videos). I don’t understand the combo thing, and I wasn’t very good at anything ‘complex’ but I did manage to make the smoke bombs work a couple of times on Naoe. I never did manage the vault which was sad because it looks really cool. I did eventually managed to block (sometimes) which is better than at the start of the game haha.

I do find games like this addictive. I like collecting and finding all the things, completing it all etc. it feels good to get a clean sweep. I said that I wish Mirage had been longer and considering I paid about the same for it, as I did for Shadows, and I still have some things to finish up and there’s the free DLC coming Shadows is much better value.

Having both Yasuke and Naoe play so differently was fun. Evie and Jacob played basically the same in Syndicate. They had great personalities, I loved the banter between them (Naoe and Yasuke are much sweeter with each other). Yasuke isn’t an assassin, he’s a tank and his leaps of fail are funny. It’s a completely different combat style.

Anyway I have been obsessed with it since release (obviously) so how does the ranking go now?

But before I do I want to talk about Origins. I said in the previous update that I was pissed Steam had bricked the game and I refused to rebuy it as I was so mad. That’s been true for most of the time but just recently I have softened. I nearly got it on the last PS 85% off sale. Call it nostalgia I don’t know but I always have loved the Egypt setting. I’m not sure whether to include it in the ranking or not. I did have about 60 hours and finished the main campaign, but it’s been a while and Steam bricking it has made for complicated feelings.

Ranking:

1. Syndicate

2. Origins

3. Shadows

4. Rogue

5. Black Flag

6. Mirage

Anyway this is what I am thinking. I said I still had AC3 and Liberation on the list but ehhh, I also said that they were free so I wasn’t going to stress it. I got Freedom Cry the DLC addon to Black Flag and I want to play that. I also still want to play Odyssey and Valhalla. I don’t know where the time goes. So I still don’t know where they will rank but I suspect Odysssy will go high.

However! With how Mirage and Black Flag are sliding down the list I am feeling a bit weird about it. I just like these games and the whole franchise has the same aspects (which is why I like it) and so it’s hard to say X is better than Y. They are all good.

That just leaves Unity as the only game post-Black Flag that I haven’t played and I’m starting to get tempted by that as well. I have always dismissed it as unplayable due to the bugs and reports vary. Some say it’s been fixed now and others say it’s still bad. I don’t know maybe I will try it.

Until next time – hopefully not another year or two or I will be having to talk about Hexe! 🙂

I should be writing but /cough just let me ramble for a second.

On October 9th, 2021 I made this post, so that’s like 2 and a half years ago? And I feel like doing a little update.

It’s funny what experience changes. I hadn’t had my PS5 long when I wrote this and was still playing all of the AC games on the PC through Steam. The PS5 controller was a million times better than the Steam controller I had previously been using but I was still struggling. I didn’t grow up with a console/controller. I played a few PC games as a kid but wasn’t really a ‘gamer’ until I discovered Warcraft and that as an MMO with keyboard/mouse is a very different beast.

Anyway since this game by game breakdown there have been developments!

There are 12 Assassin Creed games and I own 11 of them (+ Liberation as it was bundled with III). I don’t own Unity because I read so many comments about it being ‘buggy’ that it put me off. I didn’t feel any particular draw to the location either. If it had been super cheap like the earlier games I might have decided to try it, but even with the Steam sale it wasn’t quite cheap enough so I decided to skip it.

Anyway, I’ve talked a couple of times about reducing my backlog of games so this weekend I booted the games that I’d not even touched. I’ve now at least loaded all of the Assassin’s Creed games. Breaking it down game by game, this is what I thought:

So I picked up Assassin’s Creed Origins and Odyssey in the Steam Summer sale. I’ve been interested for a while ever since I saw a trailer on the TV. Seemed like just my kind of game being third person (first person makes me motion sick) and with the strong story. But they were so expensive that I wasn’t willing to chance it. Well 80% off persuaded me to have a go.

I’m utterly terrible at gaming.

I actually finished Jedi Fallen Order and got about 93% complete, (I keep meaning to go back and finish it off to actually 100% a game), but I did it on Story Mode and I still had trouble on occasion. I don’t know if it’s because I didn’t grow up with controller games but I struggle to remember the buttons. I am the textbook definition of button masher. It’s a bit weird as I manage Warcraft ok but that’s a keyboard/mouse I guess.