Line #27 Fridge/AssassinsCreed


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13	'''Note:''' Individual games have their own Fridge pages:
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15	[[index]]
16	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedI''
17	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedII''
18	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedBrotherhood''
19	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedRevelations''
20	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedIII''
21	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedIVBlackFlag''
22	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedRogue''
23	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedUnity''
24	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedSyndicate''
25	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedOrigins''
26	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedOdyssey''
27	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedValhalla''
28	* ''Fridge/AssassinsCreedMirage''
29	[[/index]]
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31	Put Fridge moments you had about the entire series here.
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33	[[AC:FridgeBrilliance]]
34	* The recycling of [[BootstrappedTheme Ezio's Family]] throughout the series as a RecurringRiff may come off as laziness or trying to cash in on arguably the most popular Assassin in the series, but think about it: collectively, the protagonists ''are'' Ezio's family!
35	* The "A"-shaped logo is meant to resemble the opening of an Assassin's hood. Which, in turn, is meant to resemble a [[AnimalMotifs beak]].
36	* The Templars have controlled human growth for centuries. As such, they would have influenced language. In the real world, we think that an 'assassin' is merely a hired killer. Someone that is a remorseless murderer that is only in it for selfish reasons, like money. In-universe, this is probably the case, but it originally meant someone who was part of the Assassin order. The Templars managed to make 'being an assassin' equal to 'being a soulless death dealer' in the minds of the general public. If they are 'just an assassin' then it doesn't sound like some millenia-spanning conspiracy. Also, a lot of famous people are referred to as being 'assassinated' instead of 'murdered' - a covert implication that the Assassins had something to do with it?
37	* The origin of the term "Assassin" comes from the Arab word "Hashshashin", which is the name of a certain branch of Shia Islam. This is why in the first game you play as Altaïr: a Syrian atheist born to a Muslim father in Masyaf. The Templars would have probably changed its meaning when the Brotherhood began to incorporate more men in its ranks that were non-Muslim.
38	* Why are there no children in the crowded cities of Jerusalem, Rome, or Istanbul? Because Altair and Ezio didn't remember them. One of the tenants of the creed is not to harm the innocent, and children are innocent. Therefore the Assassins don't perceive them as a threat and ignore them. Because of that, children don't enter their long term memory and are not seen by the Animus. The only child that was shown was Ezio's little brother, and he was seen because he was important to him. And in Connor's game, children appear--because Connor is a caring FriendToAllLivingThings. Sure, the orphans are annoying to the ''player'', but Connor who deeply cares about human injustice and suffering would have noticed and remembered them, and therefore so does the Animus.
39	* One of the most prominent features on the conventional assassin armor is that big leather sash over the midsection (it's the bit that has the assassin symbol). Assassin armor needs to be light and provide good freedom of movement, so why put the armor there of all places? Because one of the most incapacitating blows one could receive is to the solar plexus - it makes it difficult to move and draw breath with only a light hit. You may know it as ''getting the wind knocked out of you''. Guarding against such an attack would ensure that an assassin would never get severely handicapped in a fight, and could thus always escape.
40	* Altair seems... different when we read the Codex in VideoGame/AssassinsCreedII, and when we see him in Revelations. In Revelations he has an accent, is calm, compassionate. It could be argued that we see him prior to his arrogance, and then just afterward, but in the original Assassins Creed we don't see a lot of his character development come through in cutscenes, certainly not as much as we see of Ezio and Connor. After thinking about it, it suddenly hit me. In AC we're playing on an Abstergo Animus. They have no reason to show us the slow development of Altair, his reactions, or the full interaction between him and his fellow assassins. In fact, they have a vested interest in not showing it. Where as the Assassins in VideoGame/AssassinsCreedII and beyond, they have a vested interest in showing the strong ties of family Ezio had, the better to remind Desmond of what he's been missing. This also explains the repetitiveness of the original AC, Abstergo didn't care about side quests, or supporting characters, they just wanted to blow through things as fast as possible, to do the minimal amount required to get the job done.
41	* And related to the above; both times in the Animus are more fitting the respective ideas of the two factions; The Templar operated Animus is rigid, almost cold. Sidequests are repetitive, simple, and oriented toward achieving goals. The people you help are often faceless, you don't find out their stories, you simply handle their problems and that's it. Interaction with others is limited to what you need to do and no more.
42	* By contrast the Assassin operated Animus is all about the people, sidequests range in options and some of them are just random side things you do for money or for the sake of completion. You make friends, and the friends you do make you talk to at length, you get involved in their lives and their situations.
43	* Related to all this, in Black Flag we get another Abstergo Animus but this time it operates basically the same way Rebecca's did. Why is that? Because the "Employee" doesn't know anything about Abstergo being Templars or that Assassin's are real and is only supposed to gather material for a movie. Or that's what he is being told. If they made him go after [[spoiler: the Observatory]] from the get go he would get suspicious. Why are they so focused on that and not Edward's life in particular? So we get many, many side-quests and lots of possibilities just like Desmond did with "Baby".
44	* The announcement of "Unity" revealed a bit if foreshadowing from Assassin's Creed III where Desmond and William discuss how Templars and Assassins have never been able to work together. In particular, William mentions that the two sides "have never been able to achieve unity." One of the early trailers for this game reveals Arno, an Assassin, freeing and fighting alongside Elise, a Templar.
45	* Some fans of the series wonder why Desmond would ever want to leave his life as an Assassin to become a bartender in New York, a much less glamorous lifestyle. Now, outside of the video games, why would anyone ''want'' to be an Assassin?! They only look glamorous because they're fictional characters in a video game where you respawn after dying! Jumping from building to building, murdering world leaders, and constantly being on the run from a much larger and much more powerful organization doesn't exactly sound like fun to me! One wrong step, and you're dead. And guess what? You can't restart the mission from an earlier checkpoint if you die in real life.
46	* Something this troper thought of while playing [=AC3=]: the parallels between the Templar and Assassin initiation ceremonies. Both involve the ring finger: Templars give their members rings to wear, while the Assassins used to cut the fingers off for use of the hidden blade. Even after the blade had been adapted, they still branded the finger with hot pincers. This reflects the difference between them. The Templars get a luxury item, a status symbol that marks them as ‘above’ others. Meanwhile, the Assassins suffer and sacrifice for the sake of their creed. Or to simplify further: selfishness and selflessness.
47	* In Assassin's Creed Origins, the Ibis taunts Bayek about his son's death by referring to him as "father to nobody". Meanwhile in Assassin's Creed 1, Altair Ibn-La'Ahad can be translated as "Altair, son of nobody". As the co-founder of what would become the Assassin Brotherhood, Bayek is in a sense the "father" of Altair.
48	* In the majority of appearances, the Assassins have generally treated men and women as equals even when operating in settings that were historically very patriarchal. This might look like a flagrant case of PoliticallyCorrectHistory on the surface, but there is one very good reason to have assassins of both genders: in a society where women are expected to StayInTheKitchen and take on servile roles (as was the case in many of the series' historical settings), a woman is less likely to draw suspicion than a man simply because she's easily underestimated making her ideal for infiltrating otherwise heavily guarded places and observing/surprising a target. Historically, it's actually been a common practice to employ women as spies for this exact reason.
49	** It probably also helps that the Hidden Ones were founded in Egypt, a civilization that offered a lot more rights to women compared to its contemporaries, making it easier for women to develop the skills needed to be an assassin and for their presence in the order to become normalized. The fact that one of the founding members and a big hero of the Assassins was a woman is likely also a contributing factor.
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51	[[AC:FridgeHorror]]
52	* Truth and Gods:
53	** There are no gods, only mis-remembered stories about a powerful race of Precursors who left behind pieces of their technology. And no human being has ever been able to accomplish anything of note without that technology. Every great political, social, or spiritual leader in human history has made use of a Piece of Eden to further his or her agenda. Every great technological or cultural achievement has been a lie, an illusion, or a smokescreen, to serve some other end. Even the Apollo Program was part of a larger Templar plot. Human achievement is worthless. Human morality is meaningless. there is no good or evil; there are only human beings with hypnotic devices that make us think what they want us to think. And it's only by happy coincidence that some of the devices fell into the hands of people who are basically good.
54	** Which in turn prompts the Assassin's Creed: "Nothing is true. Everything is permitted".
55	** The only thing that keeps it from being a CosmicHorrorStory is The Great Old Ones are all dead. [[spoiler: And then the ending of AC 3 happened...]]
56	** [[spoiler: Which, along with Tyranny of King Washington, makes the FridgeHorror even worse. Humanity was NEVER free, as the Pieces of Eden were used to control all great leaders and figures, Assassins or Templars, without any of them realizing it, just by being close to them. Everything YOU have done as Altair, Ezio, Edward, Haytham, Connor and Desmond was all for Juno's plot. For all you know, most if not all your targets were heroic figures turned into BrainwashedAndCrazy [[UnwittingPawn Unwitting Pawns]] of Juno. It then makes you realize the IronicEcho in the Assassin's Creed: "Nothing Is True, Everything Is Permitted". Only it doesn't apply to philosophy or morals, but ''your very perception of reality''! Everything you see in the game, from the moment you approach a Piece of Eden, may be illusions programmed inside your and your ancestors' brains. Despite all your and mankind's efforts, despite all the Assassins and/or Templars did to create a better world, you are still pawns to a megalomaniacal race that fancy themselves Gods. And as shown in ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIVBlackFlag'', they STILL exist, either as {{virtual ghost}}s or as TheVirus upon Mankind's DNA. Franchise/TheMatrix is real, ''and there's no escaping it...'']]
57	** Another (though just as philosophically horrifying) way of interpreting "Nothing is true, everything is permitted." is that on top of being no gods, there is no afterlife, no Heaven or Hell, no karma. Even some atheists like the idea of Hell, that there's some form of justice for the wicked. But in the world of Assassin's Creed, there isn't. You won't go to Heaven if you live a good life. You won't go to Hell if you do evil. Which even the relatively moral Assassins (compared to the Templars, anyway) can accept outright murder as a tactic - you can kill, and there's no eternal consequences for it; "Nothing (people believe about the immortal soul) is true, everything (a person can do) is permitted (by the cosmos)."
58	* There are several occasions when Desmond relives "intimate" encounters his ancestors (namely Ezio) in the Animus... So if you think about it, Desmond has pretty much had sex with a quite few of his great-great-great-great grannies. That must make for some awkward conversations after he takes a break from the Animus. Also, could lead to some rather uncomfortable manifestations of his ancestor's "skills" the Bleeding Effect. Can you say "awkward"?
59	* The fact that people who use an Animus can snoop into people's private lives. The fact that Abstergo use this corporately means that they can snoop into the lives of anyone they want to. Secrets can be revealed, including plans that the previous residents of the USA had, and Military Secrets.
60	* There are no Gods and no afterlife. Which means that if we’re poor or got a very horrible life, and then die, there will be not a "gain". Just live one "Hell".

Context Fridge / AssassinsCreed