Assassin's Creed

Something like chain kill is in Liberation, but you can only use it in combat.

Oh yeah, and Valhalla has the teleport assassination as well. It is, at least, an optional special attack you can ignore.

Honestly, while the trailers were full of these flashy attacks, I never really used them, since combat was often hectic enough without having to remember to trigger them at the right time.

I kind of like the teleport chain asassination.

• All of this is supposed to be taking place in a simulation. Since AC 1 you were always given these "and Altair somehow got here, laid the person down, talked to them, and left" scenes. Its a neat visualization of Gameplay and Story Segregation because we know this is all just a simulation. Did Basim kill those dudes? Yes. How did he do it? Doesn't matter, but we can confirm that he did. Granted, its lazy, but I think the aesthetic of AC has always incorporated some level of suspension of disbelief - Assassins don't ever kill civilians, your health is a synchronization meter, the Animus handlers zoom through sections of the Assassin's life, the mission can go through even though Ezio historically made it through undetected or killed the bad guy with his Hidden Blade instead of the arsenal the player has.
• It might be like Batman Arkham Knight's "Fear Takedowns" or Splinter Cell's "Mark and Execute" where I think you only get a limited number of these. Sure he can teleport, but its only going to work once.
  • Going back to the abovee above, it feels like visual shorthand for the fact that Basim is a digital representation of the original Basim and the player isn't actually him.

That said... its definitely some Nightcrawler sh-t. But frankly after Valhalla's superhuman viking antics I'm okay with this.

Edited by FOFD on Jun 13th 2023 at 10:21:55 AM

You see in the gameplay trailer there's a murder bar that depletes as he plans the assassinations. Seem to be enough for 4 chained kills, though he only does 3.

the whole "it's a simulation so its why he can teleport murder" makes me hate it even more if that's the explanation lol.

I think what he means is more that it is a simulation, so it only shows the actual murders, not the movement in between.

Man, I can't believe we never had these videos from Skallagrim in here (I think, at least).

Would a hidden blade actually work?

Well, it's not particularly more practical than just hiding a knife up your sleeve (which is easy enough with wide-sleeved fashion). And there have actually been historical contraptions that deliver a knife from your sleeve to your hand so you can grab the handle and just use it normally.

As for inconspicuousness, well, once you stab someone, it doesn't matter much whether or not you hid the blade, it's going to be pretty damn obvious.

Another problem is, of course, accidental release of the blade and cutting yourself. You could have a safety, but you'd want to release that with your other hand, and at that point, you might as well just go for a regular sheathed knife. And the mechanism could fail, which is much less of a problem with a regular knife.

Even if you go with the hidden blade anyway, it won't be very effective, because the pressure in the opposite direction can only be countered by friction with your arm, basically, which can only do so much, especially once your gear starts loosening up, which is very likely when you do a lot of parkour. And bracing the thing against your elbow would just injure your biceps when you stab someone.

He also mentions the bagh nakh, an Indian assassination weapon that is, frankly, a lot cooler than the hidden blade, and actually historical. It is basically a brass knuckles that gives you claws on the inside of your fingers. You could just conceal that in your hand and tiger swipe someone.

And a few years later, he actually got a working version to test with:

He does end up refuting some of his own points. He demonstrates that a trigger with a wire can actually work quite well, because the fingers naturally need to move out of the way of the blade to work, and that the hidden blade draws less attention because you can arm and withdraw at a moments notice.

He also comes back on his point that you can use less force, assuming that it wouldn't matter much for soft targets.

Cutting off the ring finger is still rather unnecessary, though.

Also, turns out the outside wrist carry of Valhalla is actually the more practical way to use a hidden blade, because it allows you to hold on to a strap or support while you punch.

That's actually how Darius, the hidden blades creator, used it. I guess, retroactively, the Assassin's took to preferring it concealed.

Edited by Avenger09 on Jul 28th 2023 at 1:53:17 PM

I was reading up on Sparta on Bret Devereaux' blog, and it made me realize just how ridiculous the central plot of regaining Spartan citizenship really is. Because it is impossible. No one, under any circumstances, could become a Spartan citizen, ever. Once you were out, you were gone from the system.

You could literally win the Peloponnesian War for Sparta (as Lysander did!), and you would still not be granted Spartan citizenship.

Why is Asgard covered in Greek and Roman art and architecture

It's a neat little reflection of Lunden, I guess, being a Dane-Norse society built on the ruins of a Roman one, but why is the afterlife like this

Because all afterlives are really ancient aliens' Matrixes because humans are unimaginative.

They are not aliens, but precursors. There is a difference.

In-story, this can be explained by Eivor interpreting those Isu memories with things she knows. Since she is familiar with both Norse and Greco-Roman architecture (the latter from English ruins), it is at least plausible that she could imagine both styles.

On a deeper layer, the Isu were a global culture with presumably mixed architecture, and the blue guys are specifically the Isu who became the Greek gods, so it makes thematic sense that their realm has Greco-Roman architecture, if nothing else.

On the meta level, the game developers also have a tendency to recycle assets. If you play these games a lot, you start to notice bits and bobs, up to and including architecture. It is basically the same reason that there are so many iron age Greek objects in Atlantis, despite it supposedly being a super advanced Isu city where they feel really out of place, or why the Egyptian afterlife is filled with the same ruins and houses as the main game, though that last one is a bit more justifiable, I guess.

Imagine my surprise at seeing Bronze Pericles statues along the bifrost

It's also neat to note that all the Roman bits in Asgard are either lower in elevation, or else in ruins. A bit like the Asgardians came across Roman ruins and built on top of them.

Tarnished Archaeologist, who does lore videos on Elden Ring based on archaeological methods, calls this "Iconographic strata"

It's just that after the incredibly vibrant and visually distinct Egyptian and Greek afterlives, seeing the Norse afterlife being so Roman is kind of jarring. Are we supposed to think the Asgardians built their realm on the corpse of another fallen civilization?

Edited by blkwhtrbbt on Sep 25th 2023 at 9:42:26 AM

I think that fits very well with how Eivor sees the world around her in England: Anglo-Saxons and Vikings building over the ruins of the Romans.

What it ends up feeling like is that the Romans predate the Asgardians XD

It does look a bit silly from a gamer's perspective, but I like that they paid attention to Eivor's psychology like that. Granted, I would rather have seen the Isu world as it actually was, but this was an interesting idea too, and probably the best way to tie Norse mythology to the Isu.

Skill Up's review of the new game. He's... not kind to it. Calling it "the worst written AC Game I've played, lacking memorable character, or even a plot". Notes that the gameplay feels dated with no real innovation (Though the core loop still works well). Baghdad looks nice but no effort was put in differentiating its districts. Apparently the game opens up really strong, but things fall apart after the intro.

Edited by Ghilz on Oct 4th 2023 at 10:07:04 AM

Oh, so it actually plays like the Assassin's Creed I remember and not like an RPG or a Gacha Game?

Yes. He does note its the best part of the game. Just that the gameplay does not evolve from hour 1 to hour 20

Edited by Ghilz on Oct 4th 2023 at 10:39:18 AM

I mean, wasn't that kind of the point, returning to the original gameplay? Calling it dated sounds rather negative and missing the point.

I think the point was that after several games each doing something new, a pure return to form feels weird.

Maybe, but that's what a lot of fans were clamouring for, so it seems a bit odd to complain about getting what they wanted.

Thats not what he's doing.

Anyway, game's at 7.7 on Metacritic atm

Edited by Ghilz on Oct 4th 2023 at 12:46:55 PM

An issue is and I think this is a problem for the series as awohle. As what people want assassin's creed to be varies.

Someone else over on reddit summed it up well

So yeah this game goes back to basics. But that isn't really going to appeal to everyone.

Very true, there were certainly later entries like Black Flag or Odyssey that I really enjoyed, even though it was not really part of the original core gameplay.

I made a thread specifically for Mirage.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16964304020A30667900&page=1#1