This review contains spoilers
The gameplay is in my opinion as close as it got to a well-polished product with the franchise's parkour undoubtedly at its peak in this entry. It feels fluid, responsive, and fast; and on top of this, the animations feel correct with no awkward movements in between each jump, and each climbed object. Everything on the map seems to have been precisely put together to make parkour a priority, facilitating traversing and stealthy assassinations.
In what respects to combat I'd have to point out that personally, I'm not a fan of choreographed fights most of the times because they can be a little bit restrictive, but this game in particular with its parrying and dodging system, large range of combos, and the different tools at your disposal, makes it easy to encounter large sums of enemies without making it hard or tedious. It all works as intended.
In regards to the story, I really liked how up to sequence 3 (out of 12) you play as Haytham Kenway, the head of the Templar order operations in the American colonies. This brief bit of the story gives you an introspective view few times explored in the franchise of the Templars characters having a heart, ambitions, emotions, and love.
The plot was actually pretty good and memorable. I liked how the writers intertwined the Templar and Assassin's long dispute of power, along with the Loyalists against the Patriots, and the dispute of territory between both parties with the natives. I gotta admit that putting it all together must have not been an easy task, and it shows...the game has some pretty serious pacing issues at times.
In what respects the characters, I gotta admit that apart from Achilles, the antagonists were way better written than the assassins, yes, including Connor. He seemed to not have any clear intentions or motives, he went where the side characters and circumstances told him to, no charisma, and no meaningful dialogue, Pretty bland for a main character.
Lastly, I wanna talk about the setting and open world. The American Revolution is without a doubt an interesting period, but the key historical characters and the localization can be a little bit alienating for a non-American; Luckily the writers did a good job at keeping the main character in constant motion, going from town to town, with some nature in between, and some ship sections here and there, making the player not feel stuck in seemly looking towns, with few landmarks that could add a little bit of visual variety.
Overall pretty good game if you need something to kill time with, around 16hs for the main story is pretty good.
In what respects to combat I'd have to point out that personally, I'm not a fan of choreographed fights most of the times because they can be a little bit restrictive, but this game in particular with its parrying and dodging system, large range of combos, and the different tools at your disposal, makes it easy to encounter large sums of enemies without making it hard or tedious. It all works as intended.
In regards to the story, I really liked how up to sequence 3 (out of 12) you play as Haytham Kenway, the head of the Templar order operations in the American colonies. This brief bit of the story gives you an introspective view few times explored in the franchise of the Templars characters having a heart, ambitions, emotions, and love.
The plot was actually pretty good and memorable. I liked how the writers intertwined the Templar and Assassin's long dispute of power, along with the Loyalists against the Patriots, and the dispute of territory between both parties with the natives. I gotta admit that putting it all together must have not been an easy task, and it shows...the game has some pretty serious pacing issues at times.
In what respects the characters, I gotta admit that apart from Achilles, the antagonists were way better written than the assassins, yes, including Connor. He seemed to not have any clear intentions or motives, he went where the side characters and circumstances told him to, no charisma, and no meaningful dialogue, Pretty bland for a main character.
Lastly, I wanna talk about the setting and open world. The American Revolution is without a doubt an interesting period, but the key historical characters and the localization can be a little bit alienating for a non-American; Luckily the writers did a good job at keeping the main character in constant motion, going from town to town, with some nature in between, and some ship sections here and there, making the player not feel stuck in seemly looking towns, with few landmarks that could add a little bit of visual variety.
Overall pretty good game if you need something to kill time with, around 16hs for the main story is pretty good.