Assassin´s Creed Mirage Quick Review

 

I've had something of a rough relationship with the Assassin's Creed franchise of late. I always thought the games were verging on 'Soulless' as they slowly circled the drain but it wasn't until we reached the RPG age were we really saw the bubble begin to burst and the limits of creativity start to cease. From Origin's beautiful but lazy world which lost the personality of previous world spaces, to Odyssey's outrageous padding to extortionate lengths to Valhalla's everything. I'm not kidding either- Valhalla's length, pathetically miniscule narrative, eye brow raising acting from core members of the supporting cast, lack of focus- all Valhalla has going for it is half decent combat- which still doesn't feel as satisfying as the Ezio days in their prime. I really thought that Ubisoft had truly lost the plot and was absolutely not willing to offer them the benefit of any doubt when the kowtowing began begging people to give them another chance for Mirage.

Valhalla was their most successful entry ever, afterall- and given that monetary gains is literally the only north star for a studio as creatively bankrupt as Ubisoft, there was little reason to believe the disgusted reaction of those who care for quality touched literally anyone at the studio. But... I should have taken into account the fact that Ubisoft would love to make similar profits for less effort- those introducing smaller side games as mainline entries that are quicker to make does fit into that profit margin. But would making the game smaller be enough to rekindle what was once genuinely unique about the Assassin's Creed franchise like the developers insisted? Or are we just circling the drain yet again fooling ourselves that this is a high value franchise?

Mirage does indeed strip away a lot of the superfluous fluff that has come to dog this franchise, from the hopelessly lost modern day narrative that nowadays meanders with pointlessness- (it isn't gone exactly, but all the set-up was done at the end of Valhalla for those who actually stuck out that 130hr snooze fest. All thirty of us.) all open world side objectives are tired directly towards reinforcing the gameplay loop in some significant fashion, and the 'Investigation' style story telling method they inherited from the RPG saga of games is centralised around a single target with only five branches- meaning you can actually keep abreast of clues. The actual character introductions are still prototypically weak for a Ubisoft game so you can't actually figure it out like you could with Odyssey- (which is what made the investigation tab so good in that game) but I could follow the thread of the plot. I appreciate that.

Speaking of little things I appreciate- goodness I forgot how much I missed the codex entries! Part of the charm of these games was visiting some far off culture and reading small write-ups about how significant this particular building was or how that aspect of life functioned. All that had been relegated to the optional 'educational mode' since Origins- but I'm so glad it's been brought back for Mirage. I genuinely love these tiny bite-sized lessons into aspects of the world I'm actively invested in and find the aspect of these being real-world info pockets all the more interesting. There's none of the flavour of the Ezio saga data entries- but I get they're trying to find their feet again- I'll give them space to figure it out.

Mirage's mantra seems to be 'bringing stealth back to Assassin's Creed' after that style of play had become whittled down in Odyssey and straight up discouraged in Valhalla- and to this end the team actually did a respectable job. Nerfing healing avenues and gutting combat are supremely inelegant ways to force stealth as the viable playstyle, but actually developing patrol routes for areas, multiple entry angles and giving us tools that aid a ghost-like approach actually work pretty well. I think the team might be a little rusty with how they handle such tools, however, because the smoke bomb is insanely overpowered and probably should have been reconsidered on the design floor. When you can easily wipe out an entire room of already aggroed enemies by dropping a single smoke bomb- maybe there's a balance concern or two.

Actually the biggest problem this game's stealth really has is the fact that this entire title has been built on the bones of Valhalla- a game clearly not made to facilitate stealth. You'll enter full blown fights with a couple of guards and brutally murder them in vibrant slashes a single corner away from another guard who simply didn't hear any of it. You can alert a pick-pocket victim, jump into a haybale right in front of them and just wait the two minutes of guard searching before doing the exact same action again with everyone haven forgotten you. They've even regressed in the way they handle the all important 'escape' pillar of gameplay- back in the Ezio days you'd have guards rush out ahead of you and preparing chest swipes to catch you running past- in Mirage I literally jogged away from full-notoriety chases whilst fiddling about on my computer playing Dying Light as the same time- there's clearly some wanting developments in the stealth department.

Where the experience is most focused, however, are the returning 'Black box' missions as they were once coined for Unity. Essentially pitched as playgrounds with a major target you are free to hunt down anyway you like- like a typical Immersive Sim would do it- Mirage realises this in perhaps the least impressive fashion this series could manage. Essentially you have the freedom to approach some targets with two or three options, but a single cinematic tailor-made assassination opportunity the game wants you to use. Otherwise you can just jog up and clumsy slap them until they fall over- those are your options. I like the idea- but unless you have level designers with the kind of fire in them that the Hitman developers at IO boast- it can end up as a bit of a wet fart in execution. 

Overall I am actually shocked to say that I enjoyed my time with Assassin's Creed Mirage far more than nearly every other title in the Assassin's Creed franchise over the past 10 years- and that is because this game didn't linger long enough to get on my bad side. Other than several horrific crashes I suffered through this game gets exactly to the point, executes it's mission and sods off on a decently high note. I miss the days of lean Assassin's Creed and recall how the best paced game in the franchise was actually the slick Brotherhood- for which this title is a pale comparison- but I can see the rough inspirations. I would actually go so far as to give this a C+ Grade, against all belief. I shock even myself. Still- nothing truly interesting from a narrative standpoint- particularly given that the twist is well known by anyone who endured Valhalla- it was only ever a question of how they were going to pull it. I guess the only thing I really learned is that apparently Basim knew the entire time, which clarifies a bit of Valhalla's two hours of actual narrative I suppose. Here's hoping someone on the team really notices the power of not overstaying your welcome.

Restoring Assassin's Creed?

 Fat Chance!

For a reason I cannot even formulate; apparently Assassin's Creed wants to go back to it's routes. Somewhat. Despite the consistency of Ubisoft in recent years, both in growth and in the games that they make benign carbon copies of one after the other; Ubisoft are going to rock the boat with their next AC game and I do not know why. Haven't their latest RPG outings made stupid amounts of money even as the average review grade have tended down? I'd have thought that was the perfect trajectory for Assassin's Creed's management because it just gives them an excuse to reap the same benefits whilst denying their employees of bonuses. But I guess one rogue soul in the developers room grew a consciousness because going forward Assassin's Creed is going to be publishing a 'back to basics' spin off title known, at least currently in the development stage because all these games go through a little rename before reveal, Assassin's Creed Mirage.

Such comes from recent leaks out of the Ubisoft development studios, and whilst I'm usually the first one to exercise that all-important grain of salt whenever it comes to discussing the validity of leaks like they're facts, (the GTA VI one about Bonnie and Clyde protagonists is total bunk, mark my words) when it comes to Ubisoft they are, and have always been, the leakiest of ships. There was a time when Bethesda were pretty bad for it, but the absolute lights-off development of Fallout 4 was a turning point for them; nobody knew that game was dropping before the tease livestream and then we all learnt it was due for later that same year! No, there hasn't been a single release in Ubisoft's past ten years that hasn't made headlines months before the reveal; to the point where I'm mostly confident that the Ubisoft teams leak them intentionally ahead of time to gauge public interest before they devote their full attention. It would make more sense than assuming they're just incapable of keeping a single secret ever.

So when I hear tell of an Assassin's Creed Game that is going to be set in the wide city streets of Baghdad; is going to try and recreate the massive crowd technology of Assassin's Creed Unity in order to achieve those streets and is aiming at a return to the stealth action the series was based on, I know that it's for sure what's happening. But then I have to really confront what is being said here and ask; do Ubisoft really have the ball like they think they do? I mean sure; stealth was a big part of old Assassin's Creed that got stepped on by the newer titles, but there was a fair bit of being that hood-donning whirlwind of death in those games too. Assassin's Creed 2, Brotherhood and Black Flag, each some of the best in the franchise, each lauded the absolute brutality of their action combat as key selling points. Move too far away from that to underpower the player and you get... well, fittingly enough you get Assassin's Creed Unity and it's slow and frankly annoying combat.

But there is a charm in going 'back to basics'. No more discount 'Nemesis system', no more painful 'over arching' metagame that forces you to relieve the same endless 'do this task' over and over and pretends it's content. Just back to the focused high quality main campaign will small chunks of content... spread over a world of mindless collectathon items- look, the Ubisoft Formula had its roots for a while. If they want to make an Assassin's Creed to break the mould, going 'back to basics' is only the beginning. They need to evolve, take risks, be different to the games before it; and maybe spend a little more time planning what they're going to make before they just jump into development and allow the muscle memory of ten years to kick in like they have always done up until now. I know that's currently impossible with the sheer rate of output that the Ubisoft machine demands out of them, but maybe that's evidence that Assassin's Creed needs to tone down that ungodly churn!

So what lessons can this bold new face of Assassin's Creed learn and where can they learn them? Well there's some fundamental theories of basic world building that Breath of the Wild is a masterclass on, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima and any action game of that calibre can teach them how to make action fun and stealth? Well if they want to get creative with and add that dose of approachable ingenuity they've been desperate to nail since the whole 'black box mission design' disappointment of Unity; 'Hitman: No Subtitle' or Metal Gear Solid V. Both different styles of game but with an incredible amount of replayability in the way they designed fundamental systems that interacted with each other in a way that designed gameplay opportunities rather than orchestrating highly scripted sections of gameplay with specifically designed alternative routes. None of these inspirations and ideas are easy, and absolutely none of them can be replicated in the same timeframe that Assassin's Creed games are usually developed in; which is why a change needs to come.

Is there hope for Assassin's Creed in the coming future? Or is this all just another waste of time where people get their hopes up for a Ubisoft that plays like they're going to listen before letting us all down for the hundredth time? Well, I'm not confident. I've said it before and I'll say it till I'm blue in the face; there's something rotten at the top of Ubisoft and that withers each and every one of their fruits before they can reach the store shelves. All the talk about 'accountability' and 'fixing themselves up' has been idle pandering; they've let the world and themselves down consistently. Giving them the benefit of the doubt at this point would literally be like laying your whole body down in front of a serial killer elephant; not a wise move.

Ubisoft absolutely will screw up the basic narrative, making all the characters surface deep and quirky so they can stuff as many faces in the plot as they possibly can. They will find some way to monetise the game in the most infuriating way; pawning cosmetics under the vain belief that just because they're no gameplay effecting, that makes them harmless, disregarding how that excuse only works in free-to-play online games; in a single purchase single player game we except the good stuff in the thing we bought! They will fail to strike a balance that keeps the gameplay loop feeling fresh and end up egging the player on for so long they lose interest, making the final ten hours, and the proceeding DLC, a soul-sucking chore to go through. And they will disappoint in their core promise to reignite what made Assassin's Creed promising. Because falling short is just what Ubisoft does best.

The problem with this franchise is, contrary to Yves insistances, Assassin's Creed never had a plan for where its franchise would go, and when you're developing a connected narrative mega universe, winging it as you go is kind of a fool's game. They had no spine or soul to limit their ambition, which in turn would allow that ambition to be fine tuned into what makes the series work best, and so Assassin's Creed just became another mis-match of ideas that the current development team thinks might workfor the moment, and it kind of does for a bit before it gets boring because at this point the fans don't even know what they want out of these games. The identity is just so damned muddy that fan's own desires are a mystery to them. Mirage has some big shoes to fill if it's going to magic us all back to caring about this franchise and personally, I'm pretty confidant it's going to fail.

Assassin's Creed Overload

 If I ever hear the words 'Hidden Ones' again, so help me god...

Do you remember the age you were when hearing about not 1, not 2, not 3 but 4 new upcoming Assassin's Creed games would have still been exciting? Do you remember that? Because I can distantly recall a moment before Valhalla, before Origins and before Unity when that would have sent me spinning around the moon. Now it makes me groan as I picture a market totally saturated by low-effort, rapid production, video games that slowly drown out the sense of the world with their incessant repetition and squandered creativity. Ubisoft is not a big enough company to successfully pursue 4 major projects at the same time whilst giving them all significant enough amounts of attention to be the games they are meant to be. Assassin's Creed is going have what little life the games still had in them sucked dry. This was a grim showing from the Ubisoft teams.

It's such a shame as, there was some genuine excitement bobbing about a brand new Assassin's Creed game that was coming to bring back the franchise to it's roots, a game that was codenamed Assassin's Creed Mirag- wait, that was the full name? (Damn, Ubisoft leaks are getting wild; I wonder if there's a single development team in that entire company that doesn't have a direct line with leakers... It really does make it hard to surprise anyone nowadays.) But all that excitement seems kind of muted thanks to the dual fact that we have absolutely no gameplay proving their affirmations that this is an Assassin's Creed game back in the style of the old games that we loved, and that there will be twenty million other Assassin's Creed projects getting in the way of this singular one which is supposed to be good. Having your cake and eating it at the same time is really what's going on here. Ubisoft want to reach out to old school fans, stroke their RPG fans, bolster their mobile game fans, and wrap them all in a merciless Metaverse designed to trap you in a never ending dance of hooded murder hobos.

First we do have a pretty cool looking cinematic in Assassin's Creed Mirage. It's Baghdad streets seem eerily reminiscent of the origins of the franchise; Jerusalem, Acre and Damascus, with a bit more of the richness and volume of Revelation's Constantinople. Our new hero is a Valhalla alum, just as the leaks teased, meaning we already know his story is going to end with him becoming a master assassin just like Ezio's did; but considering we're on the whole 'play the hits' train, I can understand why the team went for symmetry there. Stealth is said to be the focus this time around, which means a renewing of the all-powerful hidden blade and the need to run as well as fight; which this trailer plays some lip service to. I just wonder if it's not just a bit too familiar. (Hah, this is a Ubisoft game, so I suppose that's kind of the Modus Operandi, huh.)

What I mean is; we've already explored a couple of settings eerily familiar to this one. When we look across the skyline of Baghdad and we can see many shapes similar to Constantinople, obviously because of the architectural heritage of the places. Even the Assassin's Tower, where we'll be taught how to stab good by the mentor character portrayed by Shohreh Aghdashloo, which the Ubisoft team wanted us make sure that we knew, looks similar to Masyaf from afar. There's going back to where it all began and then there's re-treading the grounds we've already walked before, and the gaming community has already been forcibly fed that bitter pill after the whole 'The Last of Us Part 1' debacle. (At least I don't think Ubisoft have gone quite so crazy that they're going to start throwing 70$ price tags at us. They'd be opening themselves to war if that were the case.)

But that's just one of the projects that Ubisoft are eager to drown us all within. There's also the big new RPG style Assassin's Creed game flying our way that is going to be set in Ancient Japan! Yes, after all this time we're finally going to that one time period that Ubisoft said they'd never travel to because it would be too obvious. (Of course, that was before they hit a slump and started pissing people off.) It's called Codename Red for the time being and... that's about it. No word about what they're going to do with the game to try and claw back some interest, especially now that they've faffed around so long that people have 'Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice' and 'Ghost of Tsushima' to compare it against. Honestly, their 'RPG done light' style of development is kind of emblematic of everything wrong with Ubisoft as a company; so the less I see about it, the better.

Oh, and then there's Assassin's Creed Codename Jade... we're really doing the 'codename' stuff, huh... Here is a game set in old China, and it's a mobile game. Oh no. The team were very excited about this game, enough to actually show some in-engine gameplay where they wouldn't dream about such disclosure when it came to the real games, Mirage and Red. They also were so excited to talk up a big game about how it's going to be the first Assassin's Creed game where you get to make your own character, that they screwed up and lied with that very statement. The first game to do that was the short lived mobile bomb, Assassin's Creed Identity; and this game is just a reattempt at that sort of project only with considerably more resources thrown into it. Isn't it telling when even Ubisoft can't tell the difference between their own products...

Then there was Assassin's Creed project Hexe; a game that we're already seeing people declaring their favourite looking game out of the line-up. Kind of upsetting, given that all it showed off was a twig-made Assassin's Logo hanging alone in the woods and literally nothing else besides. Hexe means 'Witch' in German; great, big whoop. If you literally can't even be bothered to share the time period, why announce the damn thing? This is like Bethesda gabbing about The Elder Scrolls Six when the game was still probably more than a decade away; there's nothing to talk about! Oh, and of course there's also Assassin's Creed Infinity which is their whole Meta-connected platform so they can try and hook people into a never ending live service that is going to be crammed full of MTX that will start small and then begin to build until it gets unbearable, normal folk will be driven away from the service for greener pastures and the game will continue to be supported by whales until it ultimately withers because of lack of general interest. There, I just summarised the entire to-happen lifespan of that crappy idea; can we scrap it now and pretend it was never announced?

Taking on too much at once is a recipe for screw ups. And even if every game turns out to be the very best that Ubisoft can possibly manage, which is 'above average', it will just lead to Assassin's fatigue even more than we're already seeing. Just as with the MCU, people get tired of the same thing too often; and this is looking like an oncoming army of the same thing upsettingly regularly. Even if they had just announced Infinity that would be concerning enough on it's own. But one game looking back, one looking forward, one for mobiles and one for mystery? Who exactly is going to make all of these games? Your staff? Because unless they've all sold their houses and families and grown four sets of arms, that seems unlikely without working their whole bodies to nubs. At the very least I can say that Mirage is trending towards a direction I like in theory, because we're still yet to have any tangible gameplay, and everything else... it all sounds like Ubisoft is heading towards a brick wall at high speed.