E3 Makes Me Happy

It’s that time of year, and I highly recommend keeping an eye on Kotaku this week if you’re at all interested in E3 and video games and awesomeness.

I don’t feel like it’s the duty of my (this) blog to report on news. Actually, I don’t feel it’s the duty of my (this) blog to report on games at all, but since being a geek covers such a wide range of things (just look below for some recent awesomeness by Jeremy) it’s only natural gaming should make its way into the mix.

I realize I’ve said nothing so far, and I apologize for wasting your time… so I’ll get to my point. Look at this bigger-than-God’s-balls sized poster. For Assassin’s Creed 2.

The point I want to make is that I’ve never cared much for Ubisoft. Now, I don’t mean that in a “I HATE THEM” way… far from it. I just mean they’ve never quite been on my radar. Lately, however, they seem to have found a way, and I doubt I’m the only one who feels this way.

Assassin’s Creed was awesome. Too long and a bit fatiguing by the end, but still very awesome. And the little bits of info we’ve known about the sequel so far have suggested Ubisoft are taking what was so awesome about the first game and making it better. So… I find this poster fitting. We’ll see.

I’ve very excited to learn more about the game. I hope we get some great stuff out of Ubisoft this week.

Assassin’s Creed

I bought Assassin’s Creed on the 8th and didn’t actually play it until about a week and a half later. I finally finished it and I have to say I really enjoyed it.

As far as the (spoiler-free) story goes, a dude named Desmond Miles is kidnapped by a corporation called Abstergo. They’ve developed technology, called the Animus (a bed-like thing that one lays on), that allows a person to relive the memories of his or her ancestors by accessing stored memories in their genes.

Abstergo are particularly interested in one such ancestor of Desmond’s — an assassin by the name of Altaïr. The game follows the course of Altaïr’s mission to hunt down nine targets, all the while injecting bits of Desmond’s own story by way of breaks taken from laying in the Animus (Desmond has to sleep, of course).

The gameplay is pretty solid, but this is where it’s received most of its criticism. It is repetitive. It’s loads of fun, though, and where some see repetitiveness, I see reliability. It does what it does very well. My only advise to Ubisoft would have been to actually make Assassin’s Creed shorter. There’s nothing wrong with making a short game, just take a look at Portal. I did eventually find Assassin’s Creed being drawn out a bit too much toward the end, and just wanting to know the bloody end of the story already. Like I said, if the game was shorter and delivered the story a bit faster, I think the gameplay would have been received a lot more positively.

The story was fantastic, I thought. This is what will get me to buy Assassin’s Creed 2. I need to know where they’re taking this plot. Assassin’s Creed 2 won’t follow the amazing adventures of Altaïr, however, but that of an assassin called Ezio.

The game also has a pretty damn good soundtrack. I mean damn good. The voice acting was superb as well. Despite the drawn out, repetitive gameplay, the game is a brilliant piece of work and I think every gamer must give it a chance. Rent it, buy it, borrow it, do whatever you need.

Not much is known on Assassin’s Creed 2, but I wait with anticipation!