Kago
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Kago
backloggd
Bread & Fred
5 days ago
Kago
commented on
Kago's
review of
Assassin's Creed III
@RedBackLoggd it is of my opinion that you don't need to 100% a game, or more specifically you don't need to engage with every piece of OPTIONAL content to be able to have an opinion on a game. seeing as I spent an estimated 5-7 hours on side content, I don't see why I cannot have a say on them, as 5-7 hours is longer than some games entire campaigns.
I don't know what else to say other than our eyes percieve things differently, RDR1 has a specific aesthetic to it not found in AC3. It's world can be distinctly recognized, AC3's not so much. As AC3 goes for pure realism that's just what happens and that's fine, but it leaves the game looking boring now that it isn't technically impressive anymore, that's all it had going for it in 2012.
As for the characters standing still, do I really need to explain why it's boring? we're shown the same still, close-up shots of characters talking to each other over and over. Can you imagine how boring a movie would be if that was every shot? It's static, it's dead, there's nothing to keep my eyes naturally engaged.
on the music, what exactly do you want me to say here? I listened to the main theme from the link and I've already forgotten it. It's well-done no doubt, but it's generic, it's not iconic, it's nothing remarkable. You don't hear anyone mentioning AC3 when talking about video game soundtracks, because no one cares about it.
William was a waste of time because he did nothing the entire story. The only moment he affects the plot is when Desmond has to save him. His relationship with Desmond is just awkward in-fighting in a cave, while the other two characters just kinda stand there in silence. He should've been killed off to waste less story time simply.
On the peg leg and club missions I interacted with them, found them boring, then ignored them for the rest of the game. Peg Leg became ignored because I am not going to collect any trinkets to get actual content, and clubs got ignored because I'm not going to do repetitive tasks to get actual content. I initally forgot what the club missions even were when you mentioned them, I thought you were referring to ubisoft club exclusives or something, but I now remember why I forgot them in the first place.
Onto the naval missions, I can't recall any story thread that actually mattered and the unique encounters lack enough variety to actually feel unique. The ship combat in AC3 lacks any depth to make simply changing the number of ships, the ship sizes, or idk, the rocks scattered about to actually shake up things. Every ship encounter feels the same regardless of these variables. AC4, imo, added enough depth to the naval combat to not have this problem to the same degree.
I feel like it's pretty self-explanatory, but maybe this way will make it clearer; each story mission felt like a set-on rails rollercoaster ride to get you to the next cutscene. Actual gameplay within these missions felt completely automated, like I could do it without actually thinking. The only thing that would change this would be following the in-mission challenges, but I have no incentive to do these challenges, as I don't care about getting an outfit AFTER I've completed the game.
On the bit of not explaining a core system, as a reviewer, I think it's completely redundant to explain every aspect and system of the game, you're allowed to talk about what you want, why you like/dislike something. If everyone had to explain everything within every game they talk about, every review would be filled with the same speech.
I stand by all of my points in this review, you don't have to agree with them, or even understand them. It's just a perspective in the endless sea of perspectives.
I don't know what else to say other than our eyes percieve things differently, RDR1 has a specific aesthetic to it not found in AC3. It's world can be distinctly recognized, AC3's not so much. As AC3 goes for pure realism that's just what happens and that's fine, but it leaves the game looking boring now that it isn't technically impressive anymore, that's all it had going for it in 2012.
As for the characters standing still, do I really need to explain why it's boring? we're shown the same still, close-up shots of characters talking to each other over and over. Can you imagine how boring a movie would be if that was every shot? It's static, it's dead, there's nothing to keep my eyes naturally engaged.
on the music, what exactly do you want me to say here? I listened to the main theme from the link and I've already forgotten it. It's well-done no doubt, but it's generic, it's not iconic, it's nothing remarkable. You don't hear anyone mentioning AC3 when talking about video game soundtracks, because no one cares about it.
William was a waste of time because he did nothing the entire story. The only moment he affects the plot is when Desmond has to save him. His relationship with Desmond is just awkward in-fighting in a cave, while the other two characters just kinda stand there in silence. He should've been killed off to waste less story time simply.
On the peg leg and club missions I interacted with them, found them boring, then ignored them for the rest of the game. Peg Leg became ignored because I am not going to collect any trinkets to get actual content, and clubs got ignored because I'm not going to do repetitive tasks to get actual content. I initally forgot what the club missions even were when you mentioned them, I thought you were referring to ubisoft club exclusives or something, but I now remember why I forgot them in the first place.
Onto the naval missions, I can't recall any story thread that actually mattered and the unique encounters lack enough variety to actually feel unique. The ship combat in AC3 lacks any depth to make simply changing the number of ships, the ship sizes, or idk, the rocks scattered about to actually shake up things. Every ship encounter feels the same regardless of these variables. AC4, imo, added enough depth to the naval combat to not have this problem to the same degree.
I feel like it's pretty self-explanatory, but maybe this way will make it clearer; each story mission felt like a set-on rails rollercoaster ride to get you to the next cutscene. Actual gameplay within these missions felt completely automated, like I could do it without actually thinking. The only thing that would change this would be following the in-mission challenges, but I have no incentive to do these challenges, as I don't care about getting an outfit AFTER I've completed the game.
On the bit of not explaining a core system, as a reviewer, I think it's completely redundant to explain every aspect and system of the game, you're allowed to talk about what you want, why you like/dislike something. If everyone had to explain everything within every game they talk about, every review would be filled with the same speech.
I stand by all of my points in this review, you don't have to agree with them, or even understand them. It's just a perspective in the endless sea of perspectives.
6 days ago
Kago
commented on
Kago's
review of
Assassin's Creed III
@RedBackLoggd I did, it took me around 20 hours. The game being drab is my opinion, I think it looks very boring. My point on the documentary bit is that there is no artistic direction, take RDR1's nature for example. And yes there are countless poor angles, just a bunch of still up-close shots of characters standing like mannaquins. The consistent close ups on the faces are quite puzzling considering how ugly the faces are, look at Farcry 3 for example, which came out the same year. And I found the soundtrack forgettable, I'm no musical expert but I cannot remember a single piece from my 20ish hours of gameplay.
William was in revelations, but the time spent with him in this game was just a waste of time, he should've been killed of honestly. I wasn't expecting player choice, I was saying how it was a missed opportunity that I found odd as it really seemed setup for one.
And no, the side content was not diverse. the frontiersman missions, of what I bothered with, were fine, nothing to really write about. Honestly don't remember the peg leg missions, those were the ones involving an absurd amount of collectibles, no? The naval missions were just fighting other ships again and again, nothing of note there, and seeing as I played on the remastered release for better compatibility on pc, I don't know what exactly the club missions were. and on them being abandoned, I more so was referring to the fact that they weren't in any of the games following III, like the system was abandoned for 8 years then PARTIALLY brought back in valhalla.
my critique was that the main missions were ONLY a vehicle for the story, nothing more.
my parkour criticisms are accurate, it's quicker to just ride around on a horse than parkour, and there are TONS of large open stretches with no parkour options to get across it. It's a much different, slower pacing to get around in the cities than previous games.
I personally wouldn't know how broken the stealth is considering I hardly used it, and the ridiculously long tutorial ties in to the pacing issues this game has in my opinion.
I think it's pretty clear that I didn't watch a play-through of this game, that'd be overly masochist for me lol.
William was in revelations, but the time spent with him in this game was just a waste of time, he should've been killed of honestly. I wasn't expecting player choice, I was saying how it was a missed opportunity that I found odd as it really seemed setup for one.
And no, the side content was not diverse. the frontiersman missions, of what I bothered with, were fine, nothing to really write about. Honestly don't remember the peg leg missions, those were the ones involving an absurd amount of collectibles, no? The naval missions were just fighting other ships again and again, nothing of note there, and seeing as I played on the remastered release for better compatibility on pc, I don't know what exactly the club missions were. and on them being abandoned, I more so was referring to the fact that they weren't in any of the games following III, like the system was abandoned for 8 years then PARTIALLY brought back in valhalla.
my critique was that the main missions were ONLY a vehicle for the story, nothing more.
my parkour criticisms are accurate, it's quicker to just ride around on a horse than parkour, and there are TONS of large open stretches with no parkour options to get across it. It's a much different, slower pacing to get around in the cities than previous games.
I personally wouldn't know how broken the stealth is considering I hardly used it, and the ridiculously long tutorial ties in to the pacing issues this game has in my opinion.
I think it's pretty clear that I didn't watch a play-through of this game, that'd be overly masochist for me lol.
6 days ago
Kago is
now playing
Assassin's Creed III: The Tyranny of King Washington
6 days ago
6 days ago
6 days ago
6 days ago
Kago
finished
Assassin's Creed III
Creeding in the USA! It's boring!
This game was honestly a pretty fat struggle for me to get through, it felt extremely drawn out and I couldn't help but be disengaged throughout most of it. I think a lot of this has to do with the setting, it's really boring! Revolutionary War NA is just not something I'm interested in, especially considering I've already seen so much from this era in my life, but even so, Ubisoft made it boring. They didn't have any good ideas with it, the whole world looked like I was playing through a documentary video a history teacher would show me in school, I mean seriously this whole game is so drab and grey throughout it's legitimately one of the most aesthetically boring games I've ever played.
ACIII is mostly a story about failures, as both Connor and Desmond find themselves failing again and again, this has a lot of potential to be powerful, but as always Ubisoft excecutes it all in the most boring ways possible. What I mean by that is there's legitimately bad cinematography throughout cutscenes, awkward lines additionally voice acted awkwardly, a complete lack of pacing, and a completely forgettable soundtrack. This culminates into story ideas that anyone could respect, but a story that will leave a majority of people, me included, completely bored and disinterested. I was never invested in the story of Connor whatsoever, which is a shame because he has endless potential.
As for the modern story, this is the finale of 5 whole games here and somehow they made me just not care about it, with once again dreadful pacing and uneccesary jargon. Forcing a father-son relationship into the plotline was just a bad idea, Desmond absolutely did not need this and the father contributed literally nothing meaningful. There was also a clear setup for a player choice at the end that could've played into the ideology of the games and made the ending much more memorable, but alas they don't let us make the choice. So, for the finale of 5 whole games, it's just quite mundane, not really showing us anything new then ending as anticlimactic as it could've, it just ends instantly after the big ending moment happens. It felt like the payoff of 5 games was just a crumb of what it should've been.
Finally, onto the mission structure! Ubisoft is really hitting their stride at filler content that wastes your time here, as literally everything outside of main missions and homestead missions are complete filler with nothing interesting going on. It's all collecting meaningless shit, clearing forts, fetch quests for meaningless currency or materials, doing the same world events over and over, y'know, typical Ubislop. As for the main missions, they're EXTREMELY linear and rarely put the player in interesting situations that shake things up, noticably a major lack of stealth situations, especially in the second half of the game. Essentially every mission is just a vehicle for the story, nothing more. The homestead missions are probably the best thing this game does, and it's a bit puzzling why they completely dropped this idea in future entries. The homestead missions basically let you build up a community in the American Frontiers, with characters that partially seem like actual humans and let Connor show off some personality. It's just quant stuff.
This review feels a bit too long, so I'm gonna talk about final gameplay points then call it:
This game marks the downward spiral of the emphasis parkour has in AC. Parkour is somewhat smooth but has mostly been neutered, basically the player has less control and things become more automated. You'll be just holding two buttons mindlessly more than you could've in previous titles. The world is no longer a playground for your parkour, but is more of a cinematic piece to make you feel like you're really in this world, in this games case, really in colonial new york, boston, and yk, the woods. This means you'll be riding around on a horse or running WAY more than previous games, which is frankly boring and eventually I just started fast traveling everywhere. Even in cities, everything is spaced so far away that it's just impossible to flow around everywhere like you could in previous games.
Finally the combat and stealth, it's just more AC combat and stealth. They give you a lot of tools this time around but I hardly ever used them, as I never really needed to. combat is flashy and looks better than previous games. Connor is a pretty strong brute with a tomahawk, how can that not be cool? But y'know, pretty animations aside, it's the same stuff, which is fine, combat has never been AC's strongest aspect. I am a bit dissapointed by the absence of stealth in missions outside of the obligitory trailing missions. Social stealth is still here, there's a lot of gadgets for me to work with, but I'm rarely given opportunities to use them. Really the main times you'll be doing stealth is when you clear forts, which you have basically no incentive to do. You see the problem here?
ACIII felt like an absurdly dragged-out game that leaned into the aspects of AC I don't care about, while shying away from what makes AC special. I'm left with a game that makes me bored, and makes me wish I was playing a different AC game.
If you wanna see my rankings as I go through the series, click here.
This game was honestly a pretty fat struggle for me to get through, it felt extremely drawn out and I couldn't help but be disengaged throughout most of it. I think a lot of this has to do with the setting, it's really boring! Revolutionary War NA is just not something I'm interested in, especially considering I've already seen so much from this era in my life, but even so, Ubisoft made it boring. They didn't have any good ideas with it, the whole world looked like I was playing through a documentary video a history teacher would show me in school, I mean seriously this whole game is so drab and grey throughout it's legitimately one of the most aesthetically boring games I've ever played.
ACIII is mostly a story about failures, as both Connor and Desmond find themselves failing again and again, this has a lot of potential to be powerful, but as always Ubisoft excecutes it all in the most boring ways possible. What I mean by that is there's legitimately bad cinematography throughout cutscenes, awkward lines additionally voice acted awkwardly, a complete lack of pacing, and a completely forgettable soundtrack. This culminates into story ideas that anyone could respect, but a story that will leave a majority of people, me included, completely bored and disinterested. I was never invested in the story of Connor whatsoever, which is a shame because he has endless potential.
As for the modern story, this is the finale of 5 whole games here and somehow they made me just not care about it, with once again dreadful pacing and uneccesary jargon. Forcing a father-son relationship into the plotline was just a bad idea, Desmond absolutely did not need this and the father contributed literally nothing meaningful. There was also a clear setup for a player choice at the end that could've played into the ideology of the games and made the ending much more memorable, but alas they don't let us make the choice. So, for the finale of 5 whole games, it's just quite mundane, not really showing us anything new then ending as anticlimactic as it could've, it just ends instantly after the big ending moment happens. It felt like the payoff of 5 games was just a crumb of what it should've been.
Finally, onto the mission structure! Ubisoft is really hitting their stride at filler content that wastes your time here, as literally everything outside of main missions and homestead missions are complete filler with nothing interesting going on. It's all collecting meaningless shit, clearing forts, fetch quests for meaningless currency or materials, doing the same world events over and over, y'know, typical Ubislop. As for the main missions, they're EXTREMELY linear and rarely put the player in interesting situations that shake things up, noticably a major lack of stealth situations, especially in the second half of the game. Essentially every mission is just a vehicle for the story, nothing more. The homestead missions are probably the best thing this game does, and it's a bit puzzling why they completely dropped this idea in future entries. The homestead missions basically let you build up a community in the American Frontiers, with characters that partially seem like actual humans and let Connor show off some personality. It's just quant stuff.
This review feels a bit too long, so I'm gonna talk about final gameplay points then call it:
This game marks the downward spiral of the emphasis parkour has in AC. Parkour is somewhat smooth but has mostly been neutered, basically the player has less control and things become more automated. You'll be just holding two buttons mindlessly more than you could've in previous titles. The world is no longer a playground for your parkour, but is more of a cinematic piece to make you feel like you're really in this world, in this games case, really in colonial new york, boston, and yk, the woods. This means you'll be riding around on a horse or running WAY more than previous games, which is frankly boring and eventually I just started fast traveling everywhere. Even in cities, everything is spaced so far away that it's just impossible to flow around everywhere like you could in previous games.
Finally the combat and stealth, it's just more AC combat and stealth. They give you a lot of tools this time around but I hardly ever used them, as I never really needed to. combat is flashy and looks better than previous games. Connor is a pretty strong brute with a tomahawk, how can that not be cool? But y'know, pretty animations aside, it's the same stuff, which is fine, combat has never been AC's strongest aspect. I am a bit dissapointed by the absence of stealth in missions outside of the obligitory trailing missions. Social stealth is still here, there's a lot of gadgets for me to work with, but I'm rarely given opportunities to use them. Really the main times you'll be doing stealth is when you clear forts, which you have basically no incentive to do. You see the problem here?
ACIII felt like an absurdly dragged-out game that leaned into the aspects of AC I don't care about, while shying away from what makes AC special. I'm left with a game that makes me bored, and makes me wish I was playing a different AC game.
If you wanna see my rankings as I go through the series, click here.
6 days ago
Kago
completed
Assassin's Creed III
6 days ago
Kago is
now playing
Alpha Protocol
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backloggd
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