This review contains spoilers
I’ll start by saying Mirage is definitely a step back in the right direction for the series. The social stealth is much more similar to older games and you are generally strongly incentivized to stay out of combat where possible. This alone is with noting because Valhalla was probably the complete opposite, where true stealth was exhausting to pull off and never really landed.
The combat is much simpler than in Valhalla but I think it worked to the game’s benefit. Enemies don’t wait for other enemies to finish attacking you, so if you fight multiple enemies at once you have to keep track of what all of them are doing. Enemies glow yellow when you should parry and red when you should dodge, and generally it happens quickly enough that I don’t always press the right one, which I think is the right level of challenge. Some tools help Basim manage these fights - of note are the smoke bombs which will turn the tides quite quickly. The tools are limited, which balances well with the game combat, ensuring you use them when you need to and not as a crutch. In this way, I think the combat represents a nice medium between the more complex RPG combat if recent games and the counter based system of older ones. It was certainly a highlight.
The story is interesting enough to follow along. The primary targets are generally straight evil yet also have no presence and I found that a little disappointing. I find Assassin’s Creed’s best targets tend to have either complexity or an intimidating energy that radiates from them. Many of the earlier ones in the series (the Borgias, Charles Lee, etc) are clearly awful people but also manifest it well and have presence. The black box style format of the assassinations was a pleasant return and I was happy that there were genuinely multiple ways to approach the enemy. The ending is interesting (and expected, if you’ve played Valhalla). The twist at the end was something I actually didn’t expect and was pleasantly surprised I managed to be surprised. And most importantly, we are once again actually playing a Hidden One/Assassin, which we haven’t really done since Origins technically and honestly Syndicate. Feels good!
The parkour is as good as it can be on Valhalla’s engine. I was impressed at how nice it ended up feeling, especially after switching the controls to better match earlier games in the series. The music is generally good, except for some weird edgier sounding tracks (particularly the credits). Baghdad is nicely realized and was lovely to wander around. The game doesn’t overstay its welcome and is quite enjoyable generally. The length is basically perfect.
Some critiques that knock it down a bit. The cutscenes do not look good and needed some work. It’s almost like they’re FMVs done in the style of the renders. The game still is missing a little magic that some of my favourites in the series have (Syndicate, Black Flag, etc). The character models sometimes look good but also look somewhat dated for 2023. Some bugs that got irritating and odd crashes that need to be fixed.
In short, it’s not perfect, but it is an excellent shift back to the right kind of Assassin’s Creed and I’m aware of the limitations placed on the game. Considering it was a relatively young studio with a smaller budget, working off an expanded DLC of a larger game, with a lower price, I’m impressed with what they came up with and would like to see them further iterate on this style to get closer to how good the best in the series have felt.
The combat is much simpler than in Valhalla but I think it worked to the game’s benefit. Enemies don’t wait for other enemies to finish attacking you, so if you fight multiple enemies at once you have to keep track of what all of them are doing. Enemies glow yellow when you should parry and red when you should dodge, and generally it happens quickly enough that I don’t always press the right one, which I think is the right level of challenge. Some tools help Basim manage these fights - of note are the smoke bombs which will turn the tides quite quickly. The tools are limited, which balances well with the game combat, ensuring you use them when you need to and not as a crutch. In this way, I think the combat represents a nice medium between the more complex RPG combat if recent games and the counter based system of older ones. It was certainly a highlight.
The story is interesting enough to follow along. The primary targets are generally straight evil yet also have no presence and I found that a little disappointing. I find Assassin’s Creed’s best targets tend to have either complexity or an intimidating energy that radiates from them. Many of the earlier ones in the series (the Borgias, Charles Lee, etc) are clearly awful people but also manifest it well and have presence. The black box style format of the assassinations was a pleasant return and I was happy that there were genuinely multiple ways to approach the enemy. The ending is interesting (and expected, if you’ve played Valhalla). The twist at the end was something I actually didn’t expect and was pleasantly surprised I managed to be surprised. And most importantly, we are once again actually playing a Hidden One/Assassin, which we haven’t really done since Origins technically and honestly Syndicate. Feels good!
The parkour is as good as it can be on Valhalla’s engine. I was impressed at how nice it ended up feeling, especially after switching the controls to better match earlier games in the series. The music is generally good, except for some weird edgier sounding tracks (particularly the credits). Baghdad is nicely realized and was lovely to wander around. The game doesn’t overstay its welcome and is quite enjoyable generally. The length is basically perfect.
Some critiques that knock it down a bit. The cutscenes do not look good and needed some work. It’s almost like they’re FMVs done in the style of the renders. The game still is missing a little magic that some of my favourites in the series have (Syndicate, Black Flag, etc). The character models sometimes look good but also look somewhat dated for 2023. Some bugs that got irritating and odd crashes that need to be fixed.
In short, it’s not perfect, but it is an excellent shift back to the right kind of Assassin’s Creed and I’m aware of the limitations placed on the game. Considering it was a relatively young studio with a smaller budget, working off an expanded DLC of a larger game, with a lower price, I’m impressed with what they came up with and would like to see them further iterate on this style to get closer to how good the best in the series have felt.