Story is the most dissapointing part of the game.

[Michanicks]

First, i begin with the things i liked

What i liked in modern story.
+ I liked game has shown us the escape;
+ I liked the introduction of Shawn and Rebecca, they are nice and interesting characters;
+ I liked how our hideout looks like;
+ "What. The. ♥♥♥♥" moment was one of the greatest plot twist in the gaming history;
+ If you consider "The Truth" as part of the modern story, then it's an another great thing. It's one of the reason to prefer older AC games over new ones. I don't consider AC2 as "smart game", but The Truth puzzles, glyph icon references, conspiracy, subtleness, and idea itself is 10/10 content.

What i liked in the story of the past.
+ The beginning: being an italian noble, brawling on streats wall to wall, having a great life, and, as much revenge plot kickstarter being a thing that don't deserve a praise, it's still feels great and being on the right place. For me it's the most comforting part of the game;
+ Leonardo da Vinci is best videogame secondary character i ever know.

But "great story" turned into "mediocre story with few great elements" for me because of many many flaws i just can't ignore. All games have flaws, but AC2 get SO MUCH PRAISE, deserved and undeserved, so my expectations are high as well.

Things i disliked in modern story.

- Initial escape was too easy.
There is only one thing can justify it - Abstergo did let them go on purpose BUT it's only supported by a plot twist in the next game many people consider a retcon caused by the problems with Lucy voice actress. You may assume they were preparing plot twist for the next games, but we have yet to see Yonaguni and Apple Satellite, and after tens of the relises devs are preferred making an Assassin's Creed game that has neither Assassins nor Creed, so you can't say for sure "questions are created intentionally to be answered in the next games";

- The finale of story is stupid no matter what.
If Templars REALLY wanted to capture us, they could bring much more people (i've seen videos about american cops trying to take down a junkie without spilling blood with numerical adwantage 12:1), bring tazers, pepper spray, pepper balls, rubber bullets, beanbags, riot shields, helmets, ARMOR PROTECTING FROM KNIVES EVEN COPS HAVE, flashbangs, tear gas, connect the police, connect the SWAT but all they did is bringed like 12 guys against 4 people who happens to be their arch enemies ASSASSINS when two of them did cut through the similar guards during escape UNARMED without much problem. I wouldn't really mind fighting 60 guards at the same time, it would weaken the flaw i will write below;
If they REALLY didn't want to harm or suddenly kill us, with mentioned things above, to capture all the important assets and they wanted to be careful, then you are underestimate how metal batons and even bare fists could harm and even kill a person. Mentioned pepper spray yet may be deadly is still much safer than pomelling someone with a metal. And even in such case bringing more men, cordon off the territory so nobody couldn't drive away, breach from all possible sides or/and use the helicopter to follow the escaping truck will not harm.
If they just wanted to force us to move and search for more of Eden stuff using the Lucy as mole then why the hell Vidic has come? Risking such important asset and for what? If there wouldn't be no Vidic then the worst could happen with the story is it becoming less artificial and unlogical. The first time we see Vidic, he is get 5 steps close to the people who are happens to be an ASSASSINS and may even carry the guns even non-assassin criminals using and he is saved by the magic of teleportation - he just dissapearing when player gain the control. And then i run up to him, waited a good 5 seconds real person could easely climb into truck with Vidic and kill the old ded barehanded, but to make things worse, we weren't barehended, Vidic watches how we slice the guards for a leather belts with a hidden blade, and also theoreticaly could have a guns as any american criminal could have.
ALSO he has driven away in the only truck that was in warehouse from beginning of the game! What truck (or exactly van as someone of the crew has said) did assassins used then?

- The assassin's initial goal for the whole game is meaningless.
They want to teach Desmond the tricks of assassin from the past, but they should be near to worthless in the modern world to even waste time on that specific task. It would be ok as convinient side benefit, but i see the problem in it being a main mission of the our group. Real world (especially when powerful Templars are still there having control over nearly everything, glyphs confirm that) has cameras, trip lasers, scaners, alarms, passcodes, lock of the different types: mechanical, electronic, passworded, biometric, there is cars, motorcycles, planes and helicopters, internet and phones sending information faster than any of the couriers, all the less-letal weapons i listened above and also just lethal every cop, soldier (and, obviously, templar) has, with armor that perfectly protecting from the blades, parkour unfriendly buildings and many, many, many other things.
Ezio will not teach Desmond how to use the firearms (his pistol is too different from modern guns), how to pick locks, how to hack electronics, how to drive the modern vehicles, how to fight multyple enemies with automatic and semiautomatic firearms, most of his abilities are outdated in modern world.
Desmond maybe know now how to wield a mace, but once he is sprayed with a mace - fight is over for him.
If team would try to find exactly something special in Ezio memories before Abstergo does, maybe even initially because of the Object 16 files, it would be much more smart and believeble. But no - both Prophecy and The Truth are completely unexpected twists by assassins.
So, modern story has: stupid beginning, stupid middle, genius plot twist and stupid ending.

Things i disliked in story of the past.

- Plot kickstarter doesn't bring any bonus points to the game.
Well, i had to repeat that point to list all the things i consider bad due to legendary status of the game. It's decent, but you can't praise the plot of the game by saying you have to revenge the death of your loved ones. You may say it's not what story about, but before officially become an assassin he has killing people to get closer to the the Spaniard, and even Ezio still mention the revenge at the end of the game, after 23 years have passed;

- Ezio is already a killing machine from beginning of the game which is downplaying his Monterrigioni trainings.
More specific examples, he already know how to counter and taunt yet for some reason Mario is teaching player instead of Ezio. And combo-kills and deflect kills? Ones of the most powerful fighting moves are known by our protagonist from the beginning. Would that game be worse if fight would be harder before Ezio get assassin trainings for months?;

- Morale is black-n-white.
Yeah, there are coming bits of grey from the Shaun standpoint and fridge thoughts about assassins alliying with the mercenaries, thiefs, courtysans (all sort of the scum) and Medici family, but compared to AC1 it's a VERY big shift in the morale scheme and mentioned "grey morale" thoughts are never shown to be true by devs. Leader of the thieves even says "let's return what [the rich templar] has stolen to the people!". The Robin Hood, мать его;

- Villains are absolutely cartoonish
Coming from previous point. You can't believe such characters can be real, they are mustache twirling ruthless basterds, in the animated biographies they are constantly betray, kill, torture and regurally being the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ who just NEED to be killed so the society becomes much clearer. I hate the assassination on the Medici scene because what even a Templars they are?! Coming to kill someone well known and noble in person, with the disgusting faces distorted with rage, with the weapon they have shown on their meeting with the words "look how much stuff do we have on that table!" (Templars are so rich and powerful :/). And also classic "killing the failed minion" scene with mandatory not-threating words, like it wasn't bad enough;

- You absolutely can't feel flow of the time:
When i played that game in the childhood, i didn't even realised 23 years has passed since NOTHING is changing, nothing! Only Ezio is growing beard when he turns 40 yo, but that's all. No character changing visually (especially noticeable with Claudia, who was 17 years old at beginning and almost 40 years old at the end). No character changes visually neither changing their clothes, citizens have the same clothing style, guards have the same armor, no new buildings constructed and if you think i ask for too much then i say the Czechs were able to show how much world is changed after our main character's spent 6 years in prison in Mafia 2. I really don't ask for much, just give character a different look after 10 years is passed and i will be happy. Damn, even if loading "consctructing" screens for new chapters would have a remarks like "2 years passed" it would be much easier to notice and realise.
Like example, we come to the Villa of Auditore, we train with uncle for like 5-10 minutes and then (when sky didn't even changed its color) we hear from Mario man that Pazzi family is harassing our allies for a long time because we are hiding at Monterrigioni.
Also, replaying the game trying to keep time on track i noticed many stupid moments when you complete the mission, then few years passing and there is person who gave you the mission asking you: "Hello, Ezio! How that one mission went?";

- How do you jump that high? - Oh, all you have to do is jump and grab the ledge - Okay, thank you very much!
Game constantly reminds us it's a game, not a immersive tale both story-wise and gameplay-wise;

- Rodrigo escapes multyple times in VERY stupid ways
First after fighting him in Venetsiya Venice we are winning, but then he is somehow kick us so hard that's winning enough time for him to run away (he is lost in the battle, he is fatter than Ezio, older than Ezio, never shown knowing parkour unlike Ezio, has les convinient clothes AND DEVS EVEN SHOW US HOW SLOW HE IS RUNNING AWAY!!!) and nobody out of like 10 agile assassins even trying to chase him down.
Second in the Rome. He has a full control over us, he stabs us once in the stomach... and leave. And we threat that wound like absolutely nothing has happened. Oh, we are so lucky he didn't stab as 50-90 times like real criminals usually do when they try to kill someone, didn't slice our throat, didn't cut our whole head off, didn't stab our eyes out. That would be so inconvenient. That scene exist ONLY for the reason to make us stay still when he is moving to very-very-very important cosmic sci-fi place you could suddenly open by leaning on the wall or look at it through the big round well at the ceiling.
There is another story inconveniences with that: Ezio got stabbed in the stomach previously and passed out for long enough to grow a beard and now he is stabbed again the same way, but wake up after few minutes. If you think Apple has saved him, then i should remind he has the Apple the first time too. And no, completing the Map couldn't empower the Apple because the Map was written with the help of Apple, by Altair, it gave him knowledge to do so, there in no logical way how the product could empower the instrument with the power of... affecting the another absolutely unrelated thing as negleting some of the owner wounds.
Also staff magic didn't work against us first time because of the Apple, but then after fight with the Pope it's suddenly begin to work for no apparent reason.

- Not justifying sparing Rodrigo by good reasons.
Aka leaving our nemesis alive after 23 years of chase and thousands of kills when we finally have a chance to finish it for good.
There was so many SMART reasons to not kill Rodrigo!
"No, i will not turn you into martyr... not gonna make Crusade on Assassins too easy for the Templars"
or
"No, the proper way to punish you is leaving you to realise all your life, all your searches, all your work was for nothing. That's the real suffering you deserve. I rather leave you the choise of finishing your pathetic life by yourself."
or
"The Apple said me you gonna be killed by your own son in AC:Brotherhood, now live with that lol".
But instead we get stupid "Killing you not gonna bring my famili back", so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ what? Not killing him doesn't bring your family back either! After killing you may keep grieving but with knowlegde you have avenged death of your loved ones.
That exact thing made TLOU2 plot go from bad to worse.

- Every sane person would just rehug the Leonardo.
Seriously, it's the shortest QTE just for the sake of pissing the player off!
And doesn't connect with the story of the live-long friendship.

- The story of sidequests is harming overall assassins picture.
I talk about political assassinations, which are not to help the Assassins, not to revenge our loved ones, we just do it for the man who happens to be our ally. Game doesn't highlight those quests as either good or bad thing, we do it because Lorenzo is potrayed as good guy in the main story.
My headcannon is we do it so we have a powerfull friend and templars wouldn't simply attack the Monterrigioni, being afraid of unreasonable war with Florence. If devs would do that the actual thing, i wouldn't be dissapointed because of these quests.

- "Wow, they all were actually assassins all along!"
Ezio is getting very surprised (and probably player supposed too) when characters he has meet for like 1-3 missions actually were a part of the Elder Assassins Order he's actually in. I had no problem with many characters having little part in Ezio life, but suddenly ALL of them being much more important than we though for no apparent reason? My reaction was "eh?", not a "wow!" Also there is no point of having two nearly identical Madames in provocative clothes, running brothels and giving wise advices to the protagonist, It's diminishing their character and role.

- There was so many side characters developers couldn't even show and use them properly.
At the end of the game i couldn't even say anything about La Volpe besides he being a thief, Machiavelli is just exists there, Paola and Teodore are nearly the same, Bartolomeo whole personality is just "i like to fight", i'm surprised he is an assassin at all. AC:B has less side characters, so devs had easier time to make them decent.
But to be more fair, i need to say that i really liked the Antonio and Leonardo, i think they are good characters. Rosa just dissapearing from the story is ok for me, it's happens to people in real life often if they aren't important to you. If she would be an another assassin, i would just rip my hairs out. I know what happened to the actress, but that's another game, another story.

Afterword

I really like that game very much.
But that's also the reason why story is so dissapointing for me.

[Punished Rusty Shackleford]

given that it was the beginning of a trilogy they had to lay a lot down a lot of ground work. AC2 is def the weaker entry of the Ezio trilogy and they are sorta up against the wall because they are dealing with real timelines and real people and they can take some liberties, you can't just kill off the Rodrigo Borgia because he actually existed and he didn't die in the year Ezio confronts him at the end of the game. But I agree that this is the weakest of the 3 games with Ezio.

[feel it break]

I always liked the story back when the game came out. Or at least 90% of it ... I mean the ending feels rushed and also I have the impression that the writer changed or the general idea behind it all. Seems like they wanted to suddenly implement all this extraterestial stuff.

I also think the start is the strongest part of the game because the characters truly develop there... When you reach venice not a single character gets anymore depth.