This Game Drags On Forever! (Rant)

[The Brown Hornet]

After 80 hours (and years in my library) you'd assume I've beat this game multiple times....NOPE, haven't beat the game even once! One reason is I quit because the PC controls were horrible. Many hours were loss trying to play a terrible console port. Another reason for the long hours is I try to complete every area in total ( no walkthroughs) before I move on. With no achievements I now regret why I even bothered.

My issue is after all the running around collecting, looting treasures, buying everything, finding secrets, exploring tombs, repairing the villa, gathering feathers, deciphering codex, fulfilling contracts, solving puzzles, etc...the main story itself is dull, repetitive, and going nowhere!

I tend to delay main missions while I go off on all side quests and activities but when returning to the main mission it's a complete letdown! Story is basically "hey Ezio go kill this person...is it done? Ok now go kill that person, good job, now this person has something to do with it go kill them too." I've been hopeful (because I heard this is the best AC game) that at some point an amazing story was going to emerge and everything would be tied together in some clever twist but that doesn't appear to be happening.

I'm currently searching for a man in robes who stole the artifact from me after I stole it back from the guy who previously stole it from the chic I gave it to so it wouldn't be stolen...(see tedious). How much longer is this game cause I'm thinking of shutting it down, the plot apparently is just filler, too many characters introduced only to delay progression and be assassinated 10 minutes later.

I was impressed with the early story in Florence but Venice, though pretty to look at, is boring with nothing interesting outside of Carnivale happening in this highly detailed location.

My overall dissapointment is this game presents itself as an intelligent, cryptic, mysterious, prophetic, puzzle-solving endeavor but there is really nothing deep, revelatory, or meaningful happening at all, it's nothing but a simple but repetitive revenge tale stoked in Christian imagery and references. Instead of training to be an assassin Ezio could of easily just attended a couple of weeks of Sunday School, same results...

[FluffyNo3]

Not sure what you're on about. I 100% the game and it only took me 38 hours

[Ragabawy]

Hey there...

I totally agree with you that the controls sucks. I'm playing it right now with a controller and it never fails to frustrate me, from awful directions - especially when free running, to input delays due to stupidly long animation of certain moves. It sucks, I know, but planning ahead always is a good idea. Enemies take time to attack, attack patterns are fairly predictable, free run courses are more than obvious and can be easily and quickly scanned with your eyes to plan your next move or direction. Try it, try free running, or battle, with these things in mind and you'll see how fluid controls will get.

As for the story. Any "Open World" game has this issue, letting you roam and discover as you like, while totally neglecting the main story line. And if the player spent more time on side quests and less time on the main story, the story tanks so hard for the player. This happens with every "Open World" game, and I have yet to come across any game the balances story and side quests properly.

My personal experience with this problem would be MAD MAX (2015) , I spent so much time driving around the world and engaging in many vehicle combat fights, because it was so fun, and skipping the main story till I had nothing else to do, till the point when I just kept asking myself what the hell am I doing??? why am I doing this??? but I was just there, do I have to go back?????

As for Assassin's Creed 2. Yes, you are right. The missions within the story are truly repetitive and gets boring so quickly, but the main story missions are not the only source of lore to it. While for sure it has the most part, you still have a lot to uncover. From the deciphered Altair diaries from codex pages, to the random messages you get after certain missions or when engaging in a courier errand, to locations and characters bio when encountering any, to just walking by the city and listing to what heralds are saying about current news and events that are literally shaping the world around you. Not to mention the story is based on true historical events that happened and true historical figures that actually lived and caused these events, even if it's not accurate, it makes for quite a thrill when you look it up on Wikipedia. This is why I love this game so much and returned to it now on PC. No wonder truly why Assassin's Creed 2 has one of the best stories ever told in a video game. Read about the main antagonist of AC2 on Wikipedia [en.wikipedia.org]

Look up AC2 story line on YouTube and see how awesome it's. Of course, turning this story into gameplay surely has it's short comings like, say it with me, repetitive and boring missions to advance a story in a wide open world in a 10-15 years timeline. Plus, it was 2009 back then, this type of repetitiveness was expected, play any AAA game from that period and you'll see, and most people and critics didn't mind it at all. Check AC2 Metacritic [www.metacritic.com]

For sure, progressing the story so rarely can destroy the joy of uncovering it, and you should never do so. because, the side quests and collectibles in any "Open World" game are made to keep you engaged AFTER you finish the story. Yes, you sometimes have limited time to take part in certain quests, and you certainly need to do so to grind for a certain skill or weapon, or the main story simply requires it. So, I'll go ahead and say that the way you approached and played the game was totally wrong. Plus, you should play any game for the fun factor it's offering, not achievements. It feels nice 100%ing a game, but no one cares about your "virtual achievements" in a video game. When was the last time you checked someone else's game achievements? Neither did any one checked yours.

You're near the end of the game, a few more missions and you should be fighting that caped man soon . But I'll recommend that you start a new game and focus more on the story and the things I pointed out above than side quests or collectibles, you already have 80 hours in this game, another 10-15 hours more should be fine.

I'd appreciate it so much if you gave this great game another chance, and I'm truly looking forward for your followup to this discussion.

Thanks. and have a great day.

[The Brown Hornet]

Originally posted by Ahmad96Ragab:

Hey there...

I totally agree with you that the controls sucks. I'm playing it right now with a controller and it never fails to frustrate me, from awful directions - especially when free running, to input delays due to stupidly long animation of certain moves. It sucks, I know, but planning ahead always is a good idea. Enemies take time to attack, attack patterns are fairly predictable, free run courses are more than obvious and can be easily and quickly scanned with your eyes to plan your next move or direction. Try it, try free running, or battle, with these things in mind and you'll see how fluid controls will get.

As for the story. Any "Open World" game has this issue, letting you roam and discover as you like, while totally neglecting the main story line. And if the player spent more time on side quests and less time on the main story, the story tanks so hard for the player. This happens with every "Open World" game, and I have yet to come across any game the balances story and side quests properly.

My personal experience with this problem would be MAD MAX (2015) , I spent so much time driving around the world and engaging in many vehicle combat fights, because it was so fun, and skipping the main story till I had nothing else to do, till the point when I just kept asking myself what the hell am I doing??? why am I doing this??? but I was just there, do I have to go back?????

As for Assassin's Creed 2. Yes, you are right. The missions within the story are truly repetitive and gets boring so quickly, but the main story missions are not the only source of lore to it. While for sure it has the most part, you still have a lot to uncover. From the deciphered Altair diaries from codex pages, to the random messages you get after certain missions or when engaging in a courier errand, to locations and characters bio when encountering any, to just walking by the city and listing to what heralds are saying about current news and events that are literally shaping the world around you. Not to mention the story is based on true historical events that happened and true historical figures that actually lived and caused these events, even if it's not accurate, it makes for quite a thrill when you look it up on Wikipedia. This is why I love this game so much and returned to it now on PC. No wonder truly why Assassin's Creed 2 has one of the best stories ever told in a video game. Read about the main antagonist of AC2 on Wikipedia [en.wikipedia.org]

Look up AC2 story line on YouTube and see how awesome it's. Of course, turning this story into gameplay surely has it's short comings like, say it with me, repetitive and boring missions to advance a story in a wide open world in a 10-15 years timeline. Plus, it was 2009 back then, this type of repetitiveness was expected, play any AAA game from that period and you'll see, and most people and critics didn't mind it at all. Check AC2 Metacritic [www.metacritic.com]

For sure, progressing the story so rarely can destroy the joy of uncovering it, and you should never do so. because, the side quests and collectibles in any "Open World" game are made to keep you engaged AFTER you finish the story. Yes, you sometimes have limited time to take part in certain quests, and you certainly need to do so to grind for a certain skill or weapon, or the main story simply requires it. So, I'll go ahead and say that the way you approached and played the game was totally wrong. Plus, you should play any game for the fun factor it's offering, not achievements. It feels nice 100%ing a game, but no one cares about your "virtual achievements" in a video game. When was the last time you checked someone else's game achievements? Neither did any one checked yours.

You're near the end of the game, a few more missions and you should be fighting that caped man soon . But I'll recommend that you start a new game and focus more on the story and the things I pointed out above than side quests or collectibles, you already have 80 hours in this game, another 10-15 hours more should be fine.

I'd appreciate it so much if you gave this great game another chance, and I'm truly looking forward for your followup to this discussion.

Thanks. and have a great day.

I literally just completed the game, turns out I was near the end when I posted this rant, with that said I actually did like the ending. I was not expecting such a.... lets say prophetic, somewhat wall breaking conclusion. Of course I could of looked the story and solutions up on youtube years ago but I'm real good at avoiding spoilers. I am familiar with the Renaissance era, the historical characters, the Easter eggs in the letters, Michelangelo in particular; That stuff was cool for the first half of the game but by the end I wanted the main story to be more aggresive and impactful. For instance he avenged his families murders way early in the game yet the assassinations just went on and on. It really did take to the end of the game to have a true WTF moment and I debate if it was worth the grind.

Though I started AC2 some years ago as my first AC game I didn't get far because of the controls...that experience caused me to avoid all AC games ever since. But recently I've been playing Black Flag and found myself enjoying that immensely. This prompted me to go back and revisit AC2 and that's when the disappointment began anew. I probably subconsciously compared AC2 to Black Flag becoming angry with the movement, controls, graphics and lack of sea exploration and battles. If anything its a reminder to not start with a newer title first, play games in order of release for a more pleasant experience.

But now that I've officially 100% the game I can reflect on the amount of craft that went into this title, the languages, dialogue, voice acting, character design, parkour, and most importantly the cities and environments are clearly Triple A and still impressive despite being 9 years old. The story being a bit slow to get going may also reflect that gamers 10 years ago may have been a bit more patient. and open minded.

[Ragabawy]

Glad to hear this from you, and hope you have more fun in the other AC games.

[BloodyMares]

This is an excellent example of the gamers of today being spoiled by all the graphics and technological progress that allowed the games to evolve. That being said, older games required more creativity from the developers because they had to figure out a way to craft something meaningful with all the limitations of that time. And that I can admire. Too bad that I don't have any motivation to play newer AC games because they dropped the storyline that started in AC1 and was teased in the end of AC3.

[In the Name of Stahlelektroden]

Playing the game now and it absolutely takes a nosedive in quality with Venice. Starting with Thieves Guild, it just went downhill.

[Annie]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.