About a month ago, after reading our very own Nairon’s glowing review of Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, I decided to finally give the game a go, seeing as we were in a bit of lull as far as new releases were concerned. Even though Prince of Persia was an IP whose games during its glory days of the PlayStation 2 generation were titles that effectively got me to fall in love with this medium, my opinions on their creators had mired as the years progressed. From the myriad of allegations of workplace misconduct at the executive level, creating toxic work environments (particularly for women), to the many scummy business practices that continues to see the publisher siphon their content offerings across a ludicrous number of premium editions for each new release, Ubisoft had become a shell of the company I once admired.
Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but feel a childlike giddiness to see them return with a Prince of Persia game in 2024. Seeing it be a 2D Metroidvania with a focus on combat and manoeuvrability got me even more excited. However, I still wasn’t ready to give my hard-earned cash to a company whose publishing wing and executives were what I would consider the bane of modern day gaming. I considered my options, and decided instead to subscribe to their subscription service, Ubisoft+, with the full intention of unsubscribing after a month and with the completion of The Lost Crown. So off I went into this mythological Persian world, with a cheeky smirk in thinking I’d pulled off an anarchist feat in flipping it to the “corporate man.”
After a few sessions, and before plunging back into the boots of Sargon, I took a moment to curiously peruse the Ubisoft+ library. While going through the games on offer, I will admit I was fairly surprised to see just how many titles there were. Ubisoft’s willingness to dive so deeply into the subscription model with their entire library on offer for a monthly fee of $17/month, including every future release day and date, is interesting. Especially when considering the aversion most gamers still have towards the subscription model and its concerns in regard to media ownership and preservation. Couple that with executives at the company who outright say that players should get comfortable with not owning their games, and I don’t blame them. Still, from a sheer value perspective, Ubisoft+ is quite enticing, especially if you’re into the company’s two tent pole titles: Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry. Though I was never particularly a fan of the latter, the former was a series that I would have at one point considered my all-time favourite.
The Good Ol’ Days
The DNA of Prince of Persia has and always will be within the colossus that is now Assassin’s Creed, irrespective of how far the series has gotten from its roots. I still remember playing through the first Assassin’s Creed as Altair Ibn La’Ahad, being mesmerized by the graphics of my newly gifted Xbox 360, and roaming the streets of The Holy Land during the third crusade. I remember having that same feeling be reignited only a couple short years later when Ubisoft’s second outing took me to Italy and into the shoes of Ezio Auditore da Firenze. Unfortunately, as the years went on and Ubisoft decided to milk their growing cow to a milquetoast annualized blockbuster, that special feeling I once had for this series quickly dissipated, with each following game after Assassin’s Creed II losing more and more of the lustre that made this series special. I wouldn’t play an Assassin’s Creed after the third installment, and had allowed the series to come and go each year without much thought.
It was in 2020 that I would dive back into the series with Assassin’s Creed Origins, a game that I’d bought on a whim when it was discounted to less than a couple Andrew Jacksons. To my surprise, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Origins, and even consider Bayek to be one of my favourite protagonists in gaming. Ancient Egypt was wonderfully recreated, and the game overall had a polish that I wasn’t used to from when I’d stopped playing these games back in 2013. I was impressed, though would be lying if I said that I didn’t see the symptoms of annualization embedded within the very fabric of its design; from its bloated map to its passable albeit unremarkable gameplay. I wondered if the Asssassin’s games prior had some of these similar issues, or if these were new ailments that were due to the series going fully open-world RPG. Well, this question I’d posited nearly four years ago has now been answered, though in a way I never expected.
I can’t tell you why I chose to boot up Assassin’s Creed Unity while mundanely scrolling through the Ubisoft+ catalogue. Of all the titles in the series that I hadn’t played, why I chose the one that had arguably marked the downfall of Ubisoft with its atrocious launch, and is often considered by many as the series’ low point, I haven’t the slightest clue. Maybe it was the random video essay that I’d gotten recommended to me by YouTube some time ago that had a title which read something to the effect of, “Why Assassin’s Creed Unity Is The Best.” Maybe it was some urge to take a virtual tour of the French Revolution and see Jacques-Louis David painting Marat. Or maybe, somewhere in the ether, existed some otherworldly invisible being who knew of my now lost love for Assassin’s Creed, who wanted to instill in me once more that same feeling I’d gotten all those years ago, and pushed my thumb towards the thumbnail of AC Unity; fully knowing the secret masterpiece that this game truly is.
Class Revolt Never Looked So Pretty
Alright, maybe “masterpiece” is a tad hyperbolic a word to use. But now around a dozen-or-so hours in as Arno Victor Dorian, and I can say with confidence that this may truly go down as my favourite Assassin’s Creed game of all time. From the moment I booted it up, I was greeted with a very nostalgic sequence that introduced me to the revamped “Animus,” a facet of the series that has long been abandoned. Once I got into the game proper, being introduced to our protagonist as a child, I was instantly taken aback by just how good the facial animations and lip-syncing were. I’d grown accustomed to seeing video compilations mocking modern-day Assassin’s characters, with their lifeless eyes and robotic expressions due to lacklustre motion capture showing emotions no more riveting than a thumb. But within the first few cutscenes of Unity, I was invested. This reaction of mine, however, would pale in comparison to when I’d take my first stroll through a bustling (and terrifically chaotic, if not a tad morose) Paris as an older Arno.
Words cannot express just how phenomenally “alive” this world feels. I know that word is overused amongst us gaming journalists, but this is an example of when the word couldn’t be more apt. Each and every alleyway of Le Louvre, Île de la Cité, Le Marais, La Bièvre, Les Invalides, Quartier Latin, and Ventre de Paris feel so intricately hand-crafted and as if you were walking through a time capsule. There’s such a clear and thorough art direction that showcases the grit, the oppressive dirtiness, and the division of class that the French Revolution is known for. All of which propels this feeling of anger that teeters at this boiling point and is so well-integrated within the architecture, sound design, and textures of the visual presentation of this game. It’s an atmosphere that’s simply engrossing in more ways than one. So much of this atmosphere is brought to life tenfold by the mind-boggling number of unique NPCs. There’s a reason why even ten years later this game struggles to run at a consistent 60fps at 900p on the Xbox Series S. Sure, Ubisoft’s negligence in optimization shouldn’t be overlooked, but I wouldn’t be surprised if even a properly optimized Unity would put modern consoles to their knees if trying to run this game in all its glory.
It’s actually why I decided to play this game via Amazon Luna, as doing so allowed me to get access to decent PC rigs via the cloud and play the game at a higher framerate while also being able to toggle on all the bells and whistles. And let me tell you that once I did, I was shocked at how beautiful this game looked. Understand that it was only a couple months ago that I played through Alan Wake II, a.k.a the most visually stunning video game I’ve ever played and my personal GOTY for 2023. So when I tell you that there were moments during my time in AC Unity that had me just as in awe, know that I wouldn’t say such a thing loosely. The lighting effects and level of fine detail in some of the interiors, the textures and atmosphere while just roaming around the streets, and the sheer density of each district that, though you can still see some of its cracks, manages to not fall apart and still keep a sense of immersion, is simply stunning. It’s not perfect, of course. Yes, you can definitely see plenty of repeated NPCs, including those that get stuck on a loop and/or clip through a wall. There are obviously some repeated assets and interior layouts as well. But nevertheless, there’s a level of modernity in the game’s visual presentation that frankly I haven’t seen done by even some of the biggest games coming out today.
Parkour!
When Ubisoft first showcased the Assassin’s Creed series, a staple feature of its titles was parkour. Lache-ing from beam-to-beam, scuttling up walls, and acrobatically gliding across ancient rooftops was all a part of its core gameplay identity. This core feature was a part of Prince of Persia’s DNA as well—albeit to a lesser extent—but fully realized in AC. Unfortunately, as the years progressed, and especially where the series is now, this once staple identity has been forgotten by the wayside; relegated to players simply having to hold on to the right trigger for their protagonist to automatically maneuver through the world with blasé animations.
Ask any fan of the series, or type in “Assassin’s Creed Unity Parkour” on YouTube, and you’ll understand why this game is heralded as the peak of the series in terms of its deep parkour system. Though it took a little while to get acclimated, and my frustrations built up to a near rage each time my Arno would glom onto a piece of architecture with an annoying stickiness, I couldn’t help but revel in joy once I got the hang of things. It’s an absolute blast bolting through Paris, watching slick animation after slick animation as Arno flings off of one ledge to barely grab onto another, shimmies across handrails, backflips into windowsills, and dives under carts. There’s an almost meditative flow state once you get rolling, and the precision required on your part as the player is engaging and so much more enthralling than simply holding down a trigger and being a passive participant in the parkour; a feature that was once supposed to be one of the selling points for this series.
The Future
Assassin’s Creed Unity isn’t perfect, far from it. Its story detracts and often undercuts the rich history and important social dynamics of the French Revolution. Its characters are all performed well, but the narrative feels, at least thus far, disjointed and somewhat hollow. The combat is also incredibly janky, with imprecise controls and wonky animations that are at times buggy. That being said, the visual presentation, the sense of immersion, the polished stealth gameplay, and the top-tier parkour mechanics are easily the best the series has ever done. It feels like this was a game wherein Ubisoft actually tried. I understand its release was a buggy, unoptimized dumpster fire, but seeing it today post patches and sans glitches is a showcase of what the studio was at one point capable of. It’s a shame, because they still have some talented devs around the globe. As mentioned, Origins is a genuinely great game, and they’re still the only studio that have (mostly) accurately digitally recreated some of the most important moments and cities in our history. Yet, executives like Yves Guillemot, and their continual questionable business practices alongside an insistence on vomiting out multiple titles a year, keep them from making truly inspired video games.
At one point, Ubisoft were a mid-sized company making compelling titles like Prince of Persia. Memorable titles that I remember fondly from my childhood, made by a company whose “swirl” logo excited me every time I saw it come up. Unfortunately, when I see that “swirl” logo now, it’s accompanied by a host of other feelings, most of which aren’t positive. Because that logo now belongs to a company that has grown into a behemoth. A behemoth that turned a once unique stealth game about Assassins and Templars into a global transmedia brand. This expansion has not only come at the cost of their games’ quality, but more disconcertingly to that of their employees. However, if any subset of this company gives me hope, it’s those over at Ubisoft’s support studio in Bordeaux. The makers of the most recent AC game, Assassin’s Creed Mirage, have been touted by many fans as having created a game that’s a “return to form.” Even though some of its budgetary constraints are clear, and its story supposedly isn’t particularly riveting, it’s what many are saying is the first “true” AC game since Unity. Though Ubisoft will continue their unquenchable thirst for maximizing profits from this ever-growing cow, here’s hoping they give Bordeaux another shot at refining their skills to give us another classic Assassin’s Creed experience.
