Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Assassin’s Creed for PC has been dated and redated and is now scheduled to arrive on our beloved Chaos Boxes on 28th March. Is that right? Oh it’s April 8th in the US for some reason. Oh and it’s already out and number one on Bitorrent, except that’s a broken pre-release version that won’t load half the game, so you might want to wait until it gets pirated properly comes out in the shops before you start playing.

Anyway, the PC version is also going to have new stuff! You’re actually going to have more tasks to do before those assassinations can happen, young man. No shirking on the pre-kill investigations. And no shirking on the system specs: Assassin’s Creed needs a monster PC. Beyond the jump: everything is permitted.
Read the rest of this entry »

Much-debated man-stabbing game Assassin’s Creed is set to come out on PC at the end of March. Ubisoft’s latest transmission has revealed a few details about the beige-box version:

Following in the wake of the critically acclaimed and worldwide console hit Assassin’s Creed, the PC version entitled “Assassin’s Creed™, Director’s cut edition” will feature four brand new exclusive types of investigations, thus providing even more ways for players to explore the various locations of the Third Crusade.

Woo. I have to say I’m actually kind of looking forward to playing it on PC. No particular reason, it’ll just be interesting to see how time and a port will have treated the old fella.

One title that’s not currently on our Big Games Of 2008 Wot We Should Post Many Words About list is Assassin’s Creed. Mostly that’s because it’s already available on console, and across the sinister mass of the internet you’ll find many a proferred opinion on it, filled with love, hate, hate towards people who love it, hate towards people who hate it or, most commmonly, bitching about its cutscenes. Judging by regular mentions in our threads, it’s a game that causes strong feelings amongst you lot too, so perhaps you don’t need us to give you the skinny on this one. But you do still need us, right? Right?

Also, we really don’t know whether there’ll be much, if anything, different about the impending PC port. Until now. The first truly concrete piece of information’s just in, and it’s a stonker. The minimum system requirements for it are, well, a little shocking.

Read the rest of this entry »

What the UFC pugilists make of Assassin’s Creed:

Thanks, Game Trailers. I think…

While we wait to see when the PC version will turn up, Assassin’s Creed hits the consoles. Reviews are starting to appear, generally speaking below what people may have expected. That said, the thing that’s most caught my eye about the game is Tom Chick – who actually likes a lot about the game – sliding a knife home. The coup de grace?

Where are your balls, Ubisoft? Talk more about the Prophet, peace be upon Him. Put a Jewish character in the game and let him be reviled. Show the Crusaders as something other than the dudes playing the role of the cops from GTA. Because you know everyone’s thinking about it when they see your game. It’s a potentially powerful subject, and it’s on all our minds, and your pussy footing around the weak safe choices is a disappointment, particularly when you insist on wrapping your game in a modern-day shell. Assassin’s Creed is as aware of today as it is of the 12th Century. Act like it, for God’s sake. Because if your love of the setting were expressed in the writing with one tenth of the passion you show for your love of the architecture, Assassin’s Creed could have been an experience as memorable as BioShock or Portal.

While Call of Duty 4 was over-careful in its desire to avoid offending by doing things like setting it in “The Middle East”, it at least tempered it with some genuinely powerful material. You have to wonder why anyone would make a game about a controversial topic without realising that they are – if they’re going to do it any justice whatsoever – make a controversial game.

I keep forgetting that Assassin’s Creed is coming out on PC. Perhaps the “delayed-for-PC-’til-2008″ announcement deleted it from the buffer memory that I reserve for thinking about upcoming excitements, or perhaps my hype-immunisation jab actually kicked in for this one. (Get yours in time for Christmas!)

Yep, in some ways it really does look too good to be true: a series of huge, open Medieval cities in which to adventure as a nefarious hashshashin, picking up missions as you meander. You can scale buildings with La Parkour ease, and interact with crowds with shoulder-bumping precision. You’ll be hiding in plain sight, leaping rooftops, lurking in shadows, and gutting infidels like dogs. (In fact only *that* level in Blood Money really seems to have crowds with even a fraction of Assassin’s Creed’s realism.)

If you’re in any way interested in the game RPS calls “Splinter Thief”, you will perhaps want to watch this eight minute sequence of footage:

Thanks, GameTrailers.

Anyway, yeah, looks like there’s plenty of cut-scene exposition. Sigh. Actually, what is far more worrying is this speculation that the whole game is going to be revealed to be a sci-fi setup of some description, perhaps with the assassin experiencing all this via ‘genetic memory’ or some other such fantastical implausibility. I’m not against science fiction twists per se, but that’s exactly the kind of over-wrought plot device that it’s easy to fuck right up. Careful, Ubisoft, saying “and it was all a dream,” doesn’t tend to go down well these days… A far better end would be sending your protagonist back to HQ to have a big old smoke.