Replaying Assassin’s Creed III brought back pleasant memories of a time long forgotten: an era when AC was an integral part of pop culture discussions. I don’t think fans coming into the series now will ever be able to comprehend just how big Assassin’s Creed used to be, and I’m not talking about sales- we know these titles continue to rake in large amounts of profit (as of the posting of this review, Valhalla remains the most lucrative entry). What I’m speaking of instead are community discourses you have with your peers, either in-person or via online forums. From ACII to Black Flag, the franchise was the talk of the town. You couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting someone who had played the games; together, the two of you would eagerly look forward to the next upcoming release, no doubt hoping it would be an early Christmas present.

Alas, all good things must come to an end, and while it’s easy to blame Unity’s bugged launch as the reason for this fall from grace, the truth is ACIII was the start of it. There had always been mixed attitudes towards the modern day, but even critics can acknowledge it served a purpose of channeling the games towards something tangible. We weren’t playing a historical anthology series loosely-connected ala Final Fantasy - everyone had some vested interest in where the present was going, and ACIII’s inability to deliver on that promise soured public opinion.

I know I’m getting ahead of myself in ridiculing the MD, but I can’t help thinking back to those months that preceded the game’s release, the joy such recollections bring, and the ultimate pain I feel seeing my beloved series lose mainstream interest amidst other AAA releases and hypocritical anti-Ubisoft attitudes. I will always cherish sharing a collective conscience with thousands of gamers, a conscience full of anticipation about the new features, what would happen with Desmond, Connor’s story, and freakin tree climbing! So went the spring, summer, and autumn of 2012.

ACIII’s plot matched its real-time release, taking inspiration from apocalyptic misinterpretations of an ancient Mayan Calendar that, back in 2012, led doomsayers to genuinely believe the world was going to end. For better and for worse, this was adopted by the series, giving it must-buy gravitas at the expense of a rushed production (one that produced problems we’ll be going into).

Things didn’t start off on a good note as we are privy to an exposition dump from William Miles not only recapping the past games, but also briefly explaining the series lore as a whole. While every AC since II has done this, 3’s was a bit more egregious due to it dragging on longer than its predecessors’. And to those who claim “well Red, that’s cause it had to go-over Brotherhood and Revelations,” I respond that it doesn’t even mention them outside of showing a model of an older Ezio.

On top of this, the gang is awfully quiet during the car ride and excursion to the precursor temple….like eerily quiet. One of my favorite aspects of ACII and Brotherhood was the banter you got within the group, yet here they’re all basically silent until Desmond succumbs to the Bleeding Effect. I get that things are serious with the fate of the Earth in the balance, but could Corey May really not have thrown in a couple of sentences?

Desmond falls because he needs another key to open the Isu door in addition to the Apple, and lo and behold, that key can be discerned in the memories of his colonial ancestor…Haytham Kenway?

Yes, Haytham was, without a doubt, the biggest surprise to hit those of us who launched ACIII. He had been hidden from the marketing whilst Connor was promoted, and while he would go on to become a beloved character in his own right, his initial appearance was more confusing than anything, a facet not helped by his mission context and objectives being deliberately vague, making most of his sections (at least for me) a bit frustrating- they felt more like filler than the genuine prelude/build-up they were intended to be. For example, we open up in an opera where Haytham has arrived to assassinate a guy named Miko- we’re not told who Miko is, why he’s here, why he needs to die, or even who Haytham is.

The next part sees Haytham traveling by ship to the New World as part of an assignment to locate an Isu site there (the same one Desmond and co. are in). He’s told by the Captain about a feared mutiny and asked to help investigate; we don’t know how the Captain knows or why he believes one would even occur, and digging deeper brings about more questions than answers, culminating in a showdown with a single deckhand named Mills. Why is the mutiny the work of this one man? Why is he specifically targeting Haytham? Who is on the hostile ship that he has been leading to them? What was the point in revealing himself if his goal was to lure said ship to board Haytham’s boat?

Of course, it’s disclosed down-the-line that Haytham is in actuality a Templar, thereby making it a reasonable assumption that Miko and Mills were members of the Assassin Brotherhood. However, this posthumous disclosure is revealed way too past retconned events, preventing it from converting the frustration of these purposefully-obscured sequences into genuine amazement. You guys have to understand that video game stories are literally hours upon hours of content (the equivalent of an entire movie or several episodes of TV), and so plot twists meant to illuminate prior happenings need to be freshly-served, not reheated in the microwave after dessert was already apportioned.

Once in the Colonies, Haytham meets aspiring Templar Charles Lee, and together the two embark on a recruitment drive for a list of men provided to Haytham by the (presumably) British Grandmaster. Besides half the men looking too old to be participating in showdowns, I honestly have no real complaint about any of these missions as they are concurrently diverse in construction and explanatory in backstory; that is they feel fresh gameplay-wise and set-up details about the story naturalistically, most importantly the disclosure that the Kanienʼkehá꞉ka know where the ancient temple is as a result of William Johnson’s diplomacy. And thanks to Benjamin Church’s conflicts with slaver Silas Thatcher, Haytham has a way of securing their favor: freeing tribal members who’ve been subjugated by Thatcher.

All the men also come with their own optional dialogues that you are welcome to listen to pre and post-mission. These invoices divulge tidbits about the Templars that range from interesting to amusing, providing more background/personality that supplement their database files (they also beg the question of why Corey May could scribe them but not have more lines for Desmond’s side?).

The only big issue I had with this section was the circumstances of Pitcairn’s enlistment- he’s under the watch of the cruel British general Edward Braddock, a man who has a personal history with Haytham you can learn through one of those aforementioned optional convos. To get Pitcairn free, Edward has Lee (also a junior officer under Pitcairn’s regiment) humiliate himself as a decoy and lure Braddock to a lonely alley where the team hacks up most of his men. It struck me as nonsensical- for starters, why kill a bunch of soldiers who had no part in Braddock’s possessiveness? Even if you were fine with needless bloodshed, surely annihilating that many troops in a non-battle situation would leave you open to notoriety. Secondly, exposing Charles Lee, thereby sabotaging his burgeoning military career, instead of hiring some drunk streethand was just insipid. It’s only through some unconvincing offhand remarks about Lee scapegoating Haytham that we find out it conveniently had no effect on his relationship with Braddock.

Oh well, during the rescue of the captured Mohawks, Haytham is introduced to Kaniehtí:io, or Ziio, a woman he ascertains to have high value among the Native group. Tracking her with Lee weeks later leads to them getting acquainted and agreeing on a deal: Haytham will kill Braddock in exchange for Ziio showing him the cave with the Isu door. This part of Haytham’s journey is evidently intended to develop the relationship between Connor’s parents, and I can’t say Corey May and his team were successful. You only have three missions with the duo: one involves them gathering intel from a bar, the other intel from a fort, and the third the assassination of Braddock. The bar is the only place where they have anything resembling extensive dialogue, and it unfortunately gives off an anachronistic vibe in its depiction of Ziio as this strong woman who willingly enters a colonist tavern, doesn’t draw attention, and withdraws from it scot-free. Not to mention the fight that breaks out between Haytham and the attendees is so dang random (especially since he was blending!).

The fort is nothing but an isolated infiltration quest for Haytham, while the Braddock Expedition occurs weeks later (begging the question of whether the Templars would actually be partial towards waiting so long for vital info) and is purely action-based (during which time Ziio questionably decides to spare George Washington). I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy any of them- what I’m saying is, with regards to the larger purpose of setting up this romantic blossom point that sprouts Connor, it stumbled significantly. To be honest, the only way to effectively complete such an endeavor would’ve been to concoct another sequence or two for Haytham: something that, I know, would’ve been unfeasible and disparaged by fans. But that is the reality one must contend with when conceiving a generational framework- it’s got to be longer.

Haytham’s section ends with Ziio finally directing him to the Cave, him discovering his key is incorrect, and him opting instead to build-up a new Templar Order faction in the Colonies.

Overall, I can’t say I fully enjoyed Haytham’s introductory segment. It was certainly an experimental decision, to open up a major title with a completely new protagonist, and Ubisoft deserves props for it. However, this decision came with a number of downsides, the biggest one being the aforementioned shroud of bewilderment brought about by the need to hide Haytham’s true allegiance from the player. I remember my befuddlement back in 2012, and it remains a point of contention that numerous pieces of supplementary material are needed to understand a good 15-20% of the main story.

The missions were, as I said, thankfully diverse in conception, and the motivation behind such design schemes had a lot to do with the fact that Haytham was basically used as a glorified tutorial for the game’s main changes. So what were this?

As you guys know by now, Assassin’s Creed has been earmarked by three pillars: parkour, action, and stealth. Parkour has been mostly redone here- gone are Ezio and Altair’s movements in favor of brand new ones for Haytham and Connor (and later Aveline, Edward, Adewale, and Shay). In prior titles, the run and climb buttons were separated; they’ve now been merged, automating the process for better and for worse. On the plus side, the climb leap is now a default animation; you can finally step down from heightened elevations without needing to lunge, and you’re almost unable to commit one of those glorious Assassin’s Creed errors of missing a step and falling to your demise. On the negative side, though, there are a lot more mobility restrictions with removing manual input, the biggest being that you can no longer easily deviate from predefined parkour paths. In the Ezio games, if you saw a ledge or window shutter to your side, you could dislodge, bound, and reattach yourself effortlessly. You can’t really do that in ACIII due to the presence of a tractor beam effect that pulls Connor towards the nearest parkourable piece of environment. And yes, I know the original system had this as well (if it didn’t, the main character would’ve been hopping around ragdoll-style, unable to attach to anything), however, the difference is it was much smaller in scope, restricted to objects near you AND had to be directed to with the joystick/mouse. The range here has been expanded and is no longer dependent on directional output: you’ll grip things whether you want to or not. For all intents and purposes, the jump key has been reduced to purely allowing players to glide over objects or saltate from a rooftop without restriction.

As I mentioned before, another huge addition to the parkour is the inclusion of nature environs. Before, the most you had were cheaply cutout steps in mountainsides: now, Connor (not Haytham) is able to dart among trees and scale rocks as though they were manmade structures. To be honest with you guys, as cool as it was to see initially, this aspect is ultimately more linear than it should have been. The vast majority of tree genuses cannot be clambered up, you instead having to find that conveniently fallen down or spiked one to begin your traceur. Cliffs fare a lot better due to their greater mass, but I can’t deny being a little disappointed with the lack of freedom.

Next up is combat, which has taken Brotherhood’s/Revelations’s version and boosted it. Connor can attack, break defenses, dodge, or block, blocking opening new avenues for counterkilling or throwing. Successfully slaying an enemy initiates a killstreak option, enabling you to move between goons and hack them down with ease.

You may be thinking, “well Red, that sounds exactly the same as before,” which it is, save for enemy switching being smoother and a few key variations intended to make fighting harder. One, enemy types actually matter: not everyone can be instantly counterkilled, chain-killed, or even attacked, requiring you to first break their defense; two, the window of opportunity for a counter is much shorter; three, multiple guards attack you at once now (in addition to the one guy standing at a distance and shooting), though both these have caveats in place to protect players (double counter kills and human shield grabbing); four, no more insta-heal medicine while engaged in a brawl.

Overall, combat is definitely harder, but once you memorize the prompts and which enemy types are which, it does become easy- a quick search on YouTube pulls up tons of videos of Connor surrounded by corpses! Still, credit where credit is due- Ubisoft tried, and ultimately made something fun.

Stealth is where the most upgrades have been made. Those of you who perused my ACII review know that it was very flawed in this department; you couldn’t manipulate guards, you couldn’t breach hostile zones without hiring a faction to blend with, and (most infamously) you couldn’t crouch behind smaller objects to break enemy vision cones. Brotherhood alleviated things via adding three long range weapons (the crossbow, poison darts, and recruits) whilst Revelations’s incorporation of cherry bombs finally gave a misdirection tool. Still, things couldn’t help feeling lackluster for a series that claimed to embrace covert gameplay- standard stealth facets like shadow/light reliance, propping, squatting, and cloaking were outright nonexistent, and areas in general were constructed to goad players into following a single route to success.

The first thing you’ll notice in ACIII is an auto-lean function around frames, finally allowing you to do corner takedowns/assassinations. Coupling this is whistling, which has replaced the cherry bombs as your a maneuverer for enemies in the way. The greatest change-up, however, is the addition of stalking grass- you’ll catch patches of these throughout the world, and entering their vicinity prompts your character to FINALLY hunch over ala Quasimodo. They’re such a welcome sight it’s kind of surprising we didn’t get them before, their only downside being the inability to use ranged weapons while concealed. Other new stealth-related facets include unarmed takedowns, knockout darts, two-person blending, kinetic assassinations, and Shao Jun’s shéng biāo for hanging cretins.

Sadly, for all its improvements, ACIII’s stealth is a pristine case of 2 steps forward, 1.5 steps back as the gameplay here, outside of story scenes, is frustratingly broken. The problems can be congested into four distinct strata, beginning with the classic problem of a hive mindset- alert one goon and suddenly the bulk of his compadres are on the hunt. In addition, enemies have eyes on the back of their heads- snipe someone standing a few feet away and their partner will hone in on your location regardless of if they were looking or not. Third, soldiers have some psychological radar allowing them to hone in on your location unless you’re hidden: crawl in a patch of green and they run away, but leave it for even one second while still on high alert and they’ll suddenly swarm back to you like bees to honey. Fourth, and arguably worst of all, hostile areas are designed with no method of infiltration. Troops and sharpshooters are the biological equivalent of those cameras from BioShock, preventing you from infiltrating without some John Doe catching wind of you, and unlike prior releases, which gave you a few seconds leetime, getting caught in these scarlet zones triggers an insta-alert. The Ezio games, for all their flaws and as stated before, at least carved some linear pathway to follow, and notwithstanding that, if you wanted to go against the grain, you had an option via the courtesan/thief/merc hiring system. That’s gone in ACIII, leaving you with two choices if you’re adamant on not entering guns-ablazing: either stand at a distance and stupidly whistle to pry guardsmen away from their posts one at a time, or use the standard Brotherhood/Revelations trick of sending in your recruits (more on that later, though this is less suitable here given that you only have six total). It’s a shame considering ACIII is the first title to incorporate the franchise alum of clearable forts (not to mention 90% of chests this time around are in enemy abodes), but you just won’t have any fun trying to be silent.

Back to the story. The shock over Haytham’s true allegiance spurs Desmond out of the Animus. His reluctance to immediately lie back down (which, side-note, looks deeply uncomfortable as it’s now just been propped up on rocks!) prompts a heated discussion with his unsympathetic father, prompting the latter to suckerpunch him when Desmond compares him to Abstergo. Before returning to Colonial America, you’re welcome to engage in optional convos with the rest of the gang, though they come with flaws: one, save a follow-up with William, they’re not expansive the way the ones with Haytham’s buddies were (nor do they make-up for the preceding silence); two, they expose bugs in the game (lip syncing, Rebecca sound, Desmond clipping, more on that below), and three, unlike ACII, they’re not cutscenes but in-game dialogues that lock you into this awkward camera pose unless the lines are fully read.

Sequence 4 opens up with what will remain a severe recurring problem with ACIII, that being its rampant employment of timeskips. As I’ve ranted a lot about this narrative technique in miscellaneous reviews, I’ll quickly sum my dislike of them under the umbrella of them generally being lazy endeavors solely prescribed for the sake of skimping over vital character development because the writers didn’t know how to, well, develop. Interestingly enough, the problem with ACIII’s ellipses isn’t that they subvert character arcs, but that they jump between story junctures without explaining sh*t, making the confusion from Haytham’s scenes appear clear-cut by comparison.

There’s no better example than the opening narration, wherein Ziio explains how she got pregnant from Haytham, but decided to leave him because of the darkness she saw in his eyes…what? Wtf does that even mean? By all accounts Haytham was nothing but a solid person to her, rescuing the Mohawk and getting rid of Braddock. Where did this come from? And does Haytham even know he has a child with her?

Don’t worry, the worst is still to come- we jump forward to a young Ratonhnhaké:ton (concealing a book we never find out the title of) who goes out to play hide-and-seek with his fellow kids. While reposing, he’s found by Johnson, Hickey, and Lee, the latter of whom chokes and subjugates him to a barrage of derogatory insults (that conveniently avoid slurs despite the M rating) whilst interrogating him about some MacGuffin the Mohawks are dissembling from the Templars. Ohhhh man, does this whole charade bring up a lot of inquiries, starting with where the heck this bigoted drivel came from. When we were playing as Haytham, there was no sign that the Templars were racist; sure, they were mainly helping the Natives to isolate the location of the Isu Site, but there were no side chats nor sly remarks that alluded to a superiority complex. I get that even the most progressive Caucasian from this era would have probably held some degree of subconscious intolerance, but, as a storyteller, you still need to lay breadcrumbs alluding to these cognitive thoughts. If anything, the literal opposite happened beforehand wherein the Templars were positioned as above the fray. Johnson, especially, is explicitly stated in his biography to have fallen in love with Mohawk customs and become fluent in their language. Even if I were to make an exception to Hickey or Lee, there is no way I could do the same for him.

Besides that, what exactly are they looking for? Haytham already reported back years prior that they couldn’t get into the Temple and were shifting focus to establishing a Rite in the Colonies. And we later learn that Haytham directly told them to avoid bothering the Natives, so what exactly is going on here? Did these guys suddenly get wind of new info about a Piece of Eden and sneak away from their Grandmaster’s watch? Nothing about this dust-up makes any sense when you put a little thought into it.

Connor awakens from getting knocked out by Johnson to discover his village ablaze. Running through the inferno, he finds his mother trapped under debris, her last words telling him she loves him before he’s dragged away and the screen fades to black. Overall, this entire memory was laden with faults, mediocre voice acting for the children, and plot holes. The only silver lining is, from a gameplay perspective, it isn’t as bad as I remember it due to Connor’s running speed being decent.

Another temporal jump of nine years takes us to a young adult Connor musing about the encroaching presence of the colonizers before helping his friend Kanen'tó:kon glide through trees and hunt. One thing you’ve probably gleaned from these and Haytham’s missions is the subtle tutorial nature of them, hearkening back to May’s exceptional work in the beginning chapters of ACII. And yes, hunting is a major system, marking the first time of the AC series dabbling in it (and also the only time it was competently designed before getting dumbed down in Black Flag and beyond).

After grabbing some game, Connor is invited to speak with the Tribal Shaman, who randomly decides now of all times to show him the Piece of Eden in the Mohawk’s possession (perhaps Juno gave her a “vision” inclining as such, but again, it’s one of those narrative threads you gotta fill in the blanks for). Touching the Apple, Connor is told by Juno about the need to stop the Templars and find the Assassins; failure to do either will result in his people being wiped out. It’s an interesting take on the Isu that harks back to polytheistic stories involving deities manipulating mankind to progress some personal agenda, and the whole Eagle Quest depiction was pretty cool visually.

Connor shows the symbol to the Elder, who tells him she saw it on a man who once helped Ziio (another major plot development that is casually name-dropped despite the amount of questions it spawns- how did Ziio meet Achilles, did she do work for the Assassins, what help did Achilles provide her, did she know about the Templars when she was helping Haytham, etc….). Connor travels to the Davenport Homestead, finding Achilles to be a reclusive stubborn man who refuses to train him until he staves off marauders trying to kill them both (between this and Cristina being saved from Vieri, it seems to be the typical Assassin way of bonding).

Achilles takes Ratonhnhaké:ton under his wing, lecturing him about the Assassin/Templar history and showing him a series of portraits highlighting the main baddies in the Colonial Rite. During this cutscene, we don’t get any explanation as to why the American Brotherhood is in disarray nor, more importantly, how Connor knows about his father. Like seriously, we never saw Haytham during his childhood, and it’s seemingly implied by Ziio that she left Haytham before Connor was even born, so how is he aware of him? How does he know he’s a Templar, and why is he so nonchalant about being willing to murder him? It can’t help but come off like Achilles has indoctrinated the boy.

A 6-month (!) timeskip then happens wherein Connor is trained in the arts and knowledge of the Assassins. Corey May obviously didn’t want to rehash the pure tutorial memories from ACII, but I don’t get why we couldn’t have gotten a rapid montage akin to Horizon Zero Dawn. In its place, you have another monologue from Connor recapping events, and, as any gamer knows, cinematics leave a greater impression than boring internalized self-talks.

Following the jump, Connor accompanies Achilles to Boston to gather supplies. For all my complaints about the script, one thing I have to consistently praise is the banter between the two. It strikes a nice wavelength that touches mentor/acolyte, veteran/novice, world-weary/naive, and yes father/son. Their words are wisely-crafted, touching on multiple themes/topics without diving deep into the details. One could definitely argue that ACIII, being an M-rated game, should’ve been bolder in its depiction of societal ills like racism, and I don’t disagree, but the more subtle approach has its pros: Achilles telling Connor not to stare at Caucasian women and pass himself off as a Spaniard or Italian say a lot in few words.
The trip to the city happens to coincide with the Boston Massacre wherein a crowd of angry protesters begin to converge on an ennead of British troops. The run-up to the tragedy is excellently executed: the lamentations of the colonists over post-war taxes, the clanging of street bells, cries of anger, all covered with gorgeous orange-flared snowdrifts. The Templars are interwoven as being responsible for sparking the final fuse: Connor tracks a suspicious associate of Haytham’s to an adjacent rooftop, only for Lee himself to break the camel’s back. Haytham’s redirection of British attention to Connor (indicating the tracked assassin was intended to be a fall guy) leads to Connor becoming wanted. Cue the inauguration of the game’s notoriety system, as conveyed by future-Founding Father Samuel Adams. The good news is it hasn’t been radically changed from the Ezio Trilogy….the bad news is, it hasn’t been radically changed from the Ezio Trilogy. Besides replacing corrupt overseers with suborning printing presses, you’ll still do the same tasks of ripping down posters and bribing heralds. The one thing I will praise is, unlike ACII’s more lethargic introduction of the notoriety system (i.e., it leaned into it being a gameplay facet over a narrative facet), ACIII takes the opposite approach, with Adams’s convos with the herald and publisher being taut and sharp, providing insight into his personality whilst giving those minor NPCs decent characterizations alongside their brief appearances.

Adams is also used to briefly familiarize players with ACIII’s tunnels, which were intended to serve as a replacement to the Tombs from the Ezio games (apparently sprawling necropoleis were too unrealistic for old America but not old Europe). I’ll speak more on them when I go over the side activities, but their general function is to unlock fast travel points. After successfully quelling Connor’s stigma, the two part ways. The sequence of events is overall a highlight, though it gives yet another major info drop that isn’t fleshed out- how Adams and Achilles know each other and how strong their bond apparently was to warrant Adams risking his life to ensure Connor’s safety.

Back at the manor, Connor chastises Achilles for abandoning him after the Massacre, only for Achilles to rightfully claim it as a real-world learning experience. While Connor wishes to pursue Haytham for the incitement, Achilles insists on more training, giving him his Hidden Blades as the next step. It’s a nice moment that’s unfortunately cut short when a Scottish man knocks on the window begging for help- his brother has fallen into the river and is going to drown. This next memory initiates players with what will go on to be of ACIII’s crowning achievements: the Homestead Missions. They’re a series of story-driven sidequests wherein Connor assembles a community in the Davenport area, each individual having their own quirks, skills, and wishes. While technically optional, for this replay of ACIII I decided to complete them as though they were mandatory for a few reasons. First, they spring up as you progress from sequence to sequence; second, they contain major beats like Achilles’s death (making me wonder if some or all of them were originally intended to be compulsory); third, it serves as a nice side piece to the main plot wherein you’re creating a commune concurrent to your disassemblage of the Templar Order; fourth, and most importantly, 90% of Connor’s personality is shoved into them. Seriously, while it was always going to be a challenge for any protagonist to rise above Ezio’s shadow, Corey May and his team really didn’t do the Mohawk any favors by making him brooding and moody for his primary journey. Connor is a great character, but you wouldn’t know that if you didn’t complete the Homestead Missions.

Besides the above benefits, the Homestead Missions also serve a gameplay function of giving you more resources for crafting and peddling, which Achilles spends time teaching Connor about. Cue the trade-and-crafting system. Back in the day, this got a pretty bad rep for being convoluted, but replaying the game, I got to say it’s actually relatively simple: you purchase goods from your migrants, load them up on a caravan, and then send that convoy to a merchant for profit. There are some QOL drawbacks, like being unable to compare merchants without canceling the entire order, and having no way of knowing how much profit any product will yield until you get the final screen of the transaction, meaning it’s impossible to determine what is worth investing in until you’ve already purchased the stock. The sheer amount of commodities is also puzzling and seems to exist purely for the Homestead’s micro-crafting challenges. A final botheration is the threat to the cavalcades you send out: if they’re attacked, you’re either going to have to bark out there yourself or deploy one of your recruits, and as most reasonable people will want to do the latter, you’re going to have to invest time into doing the Liberation Missions to get those newbie Assassins (more on that later).

Achilles also takes the time out of his day to acquaint Connor with Robert Faulkner (portrayed by Pirates of the Caribbean alum Kevin McNally), who asks Connor for wood in order to rebuild his ship the Aquila. Another time skip happens that, contrary to the in-game line of “6 months” is actually three years (ironically articulated accurately by Connor’s narration), during which time the Aquila is rebuilt and Connor brought on board (literally) by Faulkner to sail. Cue the game’s naval system, a feature that would go on to become a major component of Black Flag, Rogue, and Odyssey.

Anyway, the two sail to Martha’s Vineyard to pick-up guns and crewmembers for the Aquila. As it turns out, a couple of Templars (Benjamin Church and Nicholas Biddle) happen to be dining at the same bar, prompting our very first “where is Charles Lee” quip from Connor (AC fans know exactly what I’m talking about). Jokes aside, it doesn’t make sense for Connor to inquire about Lee here given that Haytham is the Grandmaster (and orchestrator of the Boston Massacre). Faulkner diffuses tensions, and the two return home.

At the Homestead, Achilles is pissed off at Connor for leaving on this three week voyage without even saying goodbye (yet another plot development that’s left obscured), but puts those emotions aside to finally give Connor his robes and induct him into the Brotherhood. Sequence 5 fully synchronizes and we are pulled out of the Animus to play as Desmond in an…action scene?

That’s correct. ACIII marks the only time in the franchise of Desmond having dedicated missions as he is sent by the Assassin cell to retrieve the power blocks for the Temple from various locales. It definitely was cool to see Ubi adapt their parkour constructs to modern-day architecture, and Desmond having a chance to show-off his assassin skills was something we’d all been waiting three games for. However, there were evident shortcuts taken with these sections, the most obvious being the animations- they’re literally just Connor’s copy/pasted. I get the Bleeding Effect doesn’t ever stop, but wouldn’t it have made sense to program Desmond with movements more akin to Altair and Ezio’s? I’m not just describing the traceur, which would at least be understandable given that Ubisoft couldn’t possibly go back to the old system for a single person; I’m talking about EVERYTHING: the way he fights, the way he hides, even the freakin’ way he relaxes against metal beams (meant to represent Connor’s ease among trees). It’s incredibly lazy.

Nonetheless, the excursions as a whole are fun, with the first having you scale a construction site in order to parachute onto the adjacent Abstergo Industries rooftop. Inside the office, Desmond is attacked by a former Assassin-turned-Templar named Daniel Cross, who Desmond successfully evades thanks to an admittedly badass disarming. Cross was apparently a character from the comics that the writers opted to bring into the game, but thankfully you need not know that as his backstory is divulged thanks to another batch of optional convos you can engage in before restarting Desmond. These discourses are a lot better than the previous ones: you got Desmond and his dad making-up, debating a potential Assassin/Templar alliance, and actually addressing Lucy’s betrayal; Shawn and Desmond getting into it over the British causing the American Revolution; and Rebecca getting distraught over the circumstances leading to Cross’s defection.

What do I think about Ubisoft dedicating 5 Sequences to an introduction? We’re talking about maybe 5-6 hours total, which is 2-3x as much as its predecessors. Of course, gamers who’ve had experiences with JRPGs will find such a number to be miniscule, but within AC it’s certainly a new precedent. Though I appreciated the experimentality, I ultimately lean on the side of “nay”. The problem is people play open world games for the, well, open world, and holding off that facet because you want to weave a special yarn is just not a wise trade-off. There’s also the fact that you’re having players invest too much time with a character they are not going to stay as for the remainder of the game, which inherently comes across like a waste of time no matter the macro tutorial purpose.

Returning to 1773 somehow brings us an older-looking Connor, who is informed by Kanen'tó:kon about the Mohawk’s land being sold to the British. The person overseeing this procurement? None other than William Johnson. Connor heads over to Boston to chat with Sam Adams about this development, the two engaging in an interesting debate about fighting for freedom whilst who discloses that Johnson is receiving funding for the initiative from a tea smuggling operation in the Colonies. As it turns out, the Sons of Liberty rebel group Adams and co. have created is targeting the same industry for their unfair taxes on the colonists. Connor is dispatched to disrupt this pekoe sector, but not before making the acquaintance of one of the most annoying characters in the franchise, Stephane Chapheau. Yes, as my nice adjective indicates, Chapheau is irritable- a French immigrant with an inconsistent accent and constant temper. The problem isn’t his anger being unjustified, it’s the way he goes about channeling it. The first time you meet him is en route to the Sons of Liberty HQ where he starts a vicious fight with tax collectors. Okay, one could argue this was at least justified since the guards semi-assaulted him first (I say semi because he threw a pot of piss at them initially); however, later he goes on a tirade later wherein he attacks guards minding their own business whilst galvanizing a crowd of rioters. For a man focused on justice, it’s a little bizarre to see Connor simply standby and let this bloodshed happen.

Thankfully, Chapheau only has speaking lines in this sequence, his primary purpose being to introduce ACIII’s recruitment system (more on that later).

After destroying the tea, Connor is requested by Adams to aid with the coup de grâce: the Boston Tea Party, or, rather, the Boston Tea Party as directed by John Woo. While I understand AC has always dabbled in historical fiction, Corey May’s take on the famed historical event sees a mostly nonviolent circumstance turned into a skirmish on par with the worst of the Revolutionary War’s battles. 15 guards have to be killed to get on the ships, and later tens of others dispatched as you defend the rebels throwing the tea overboard. You also don’t witness any of the Sons of Liberty wearing Indian costumes as was recorded in the history books and Shawn’s database file (a missed opportunity considering I would have loved to have seen Connor’s reaction to white people wearing redface).

Connor returns to the Homestead, telling Achilles he abstained from killing Johnson as he felt there was no need with the tea destroyed (strange considering he had no problem killing the British soldiers garrisoning the ships), the Mentor glumly replying that Templars always adapt. Lo and behold ANOTHER six month time skip occurs wherein Achilles’s foreboding comes to fruition- Johnson has acquired new funds and is pressuring the Kanienʼkehá꞉ka to sell the Village Land. Connor heads out, and what follows is what I’ve always considered to be the wilderness version of the Castel Sant'Angelo infiltration from AC Brotherhood. Darting through the woods, slowly swimming through rivers, and scaling mountaintops as you avoid enemy watchers is an absolute joy, the only downside being that it’s not as long as the Castel set piece.

Eventually, you climb to a spot to assassinate Johnson, who is on the verge of violently forcing the Mohawks to sign the lease. His confession scene, however, yields a surprisingly different story. It should be stated beforehand that ACIII made active efforts to return to the moral greyness of the first Assassin’s Creed. Though the Ezio Trilogy was more ethically-ambiguous than its reputation would suggest, there’s no denying it wasn’t in the same philosophical ballpark as its predecessor. It’s kind of amusing as I think back to how much I disliked ACIII’s confessions the first time I beat the game- I hated feeling like I was turning things worse in spite of my noble intentions. A lot has changed in the 10 years (!) since then, and I now cherish games that make you question whether or not you’re doing the right thing.

We got hints of this amorality with the debtor Chapheau hacked to death, and it’s put on full display with Johnson. You understand where the Templar was coming from and how he genuinely wanted to protect the Natives from future encroachment by the Colonists. It makes for a sad scene, no matter how many ways you cut it.

The next sequence begins with Connor reading a note found on Johnson’s body, requesting Pitcairn to destroy Patriot supplies in order to cripple their resistance. You get another nice interaction between Connor and Achilles debating the good that killing Templars brings prior to a messenger arriving from Paul Revere. Connor meets with Revere and two additional couriers, who inform him about Pitcairn’s planned march on Lexington and Concord. What follows are the two dumbest memories you’ll experience in the game, the first featuring Connor playing horsey with Revere on his famed Midnight Ride, and the second having Connor command troops during Lexington and Concord. I get that diversity in quests is important to avoiding boring repetition, but it still has to seem sensible within the context of the game. Connor is meant to be an Assassin; a covert figure working behind-the-lines. Is it at all logical for him to be doing these public actions?

Even from a fun factor perspective they’re not enjoyable. Revere needs to be manually primed to shout out instructions instead of acting like a normal guide and telling you as you progress (causing the whole enterprise to come across as a weird rehash of that one Brotherhood mission where Ezio was impersonating the guard), while the battle has you running back-and-forth from one regiment to the next pressing a button and hearing repetitious war commands.

Following this, a convention is convened wherein Washington is promoted to Commander-in-Chief over Charles Lee, whom Connor somehow doesn’t notice sitting right behind him until he speaks up. Connor is acquainted with the General, and then departs to Bunker Hill.

For all my complaints of the previous machinations, the next two memories more than compensate for that dip…as long as you don’t go for the optional objectives. Yes, that’s right, ACIII continues the trend that began in Brotherhood with sub-goals for full synchronization, goals being plural for a reason- there’re often more than one now. The good news is each mini target is tied to its conjoining checkpoint, meaning you are able to reset from that point over redoing the entire level (i.e., no more Tank PTSD). The bad news is, you need to hit all of them in one go in order to permanently register them in the DNA, meaning any objectives you finish will be blank again upon a repeat. More importantly, a number of the ones for ACIII’s main campaign are flat-out ridiculous, requiring you to go out of your way to do things that wouldn’t have made sense for Connor to canonically do. Oh, and to add the cherry on top, half the time they don’t even appear on-screen, causing you to miss them (and dragooning you into seeing your failure with its dark red constancy).

There is no better illustrator of this than the Battle of Bunker Hill. Connor takes an epistle to General Israel Putnam (voiced by franchise alum Andreas Apergis), who informs him Pitcairn is being shielded by gunboats raining fire on the troops. Connor bursts through Boston and swims ashore to sink the two ships. On its own merits, this is an excellent two-parter that combines badassery with subterfuge (both vital traits of an Assassin!), but unfortunately, it’s partly sabotaged by this nonsensical ancillary objective that requires you to avoid detection on both ships AND air assassinate a grenadier, facets made hard by the poor stealth design of the boats resulting in vision cones covering every entrance. It’s simply flat-out easier to climb the vessels, kill the men, and trigger the gunpowder reserve, so why wouldn’t Connor have just done that?

Next up is the actual fighting on Breed’s Hill, wherein Connor makes his way across the battlefield to get to Pitcairn. Again, THIS is how I imagined an Assassin actually operating during a freakin’ battle- skulking across the plains to get to the vulnerable leader in his tent. Yet it’s hampered by the optional markers; avoiding fire from opposing linemen is tolerable, but frustrations amount from the final phase with Pitcairn- you gotta air strike him whilst not getting detected, and the way the field is laid out before gives you very little movement space to plot your kill.

Regardless, Pitcairn’s Confession is another excellent piece of writing, with the man revealing he wanted to convince Adams and co. to surrender so that the Templars could negotiate an end to the war. On his body lies a parchment detailing the next big Templar scheme- terminating George Washington.

Sequence 8 commences with an inane argument between Connor and Achilles, the former starting the squabble after Achilles simply tells him that his and the Colonists’ strife is one and the same. Connor berates his Mentor for not believing in his cause from the get-go, and is on the verge of challenging him to a fisticuff when a Brotherhood ally named Benjamin Tallmadge appears. Because of the choice of music, I’m under the impression this back-and-forth was intended to be humorous, though the seriousness in Connor’s tone may lead one to rationally think otherwise.

Tallmadge reports that Thomas Hickey is the plotter behind the conspiracy to murder Washington, and proposes finding his counterfeiting HQ in order to arrest him. Well, thanks to one of Hickey’s henchmen trying to scam a merchant, Connor has a tail he can stalk to that very HQ. Only, instead of reporting back to Tallmadge, he opts to…kick in the door and confront Hickey then and there. The writers evidently wanted to bestow upon Connor the traits of a hothead, perhaps to make him more relatable to the average human being; however, they mistake hotheadedness for idiocy. Connor has no idea what’s behind the door, knows that there’s a chance of compromising the investigation, yet still does such an insipid thing.

Tackling Hickey results in the police locking up both of them. What follows next is a prison segment I was never a big fan of back-in-the-day as it seemingly contributed additional plot holes to a narrative already full of them. Luckily, my new playthrough has plugged-up most of these, and I definitely appreciate it more than before. Lee and Hickey have Haytham moved to different quarters, unable to free him due to Tallmadge accusing the hedonist of treason. Before departing, Hickey discloses the existence of Connor and the Assassin Brotherhood to the leaders, Lee opting to spare him in favor of killing two birds with one stone- framing Connor for Washington’s murder. With help from Parson Weems (who, wouldn’t you know it, is in jail at the exact same time), Connor makes it to Hickey’s cell, only to discover Lee waiting for him who finally recognizes Connor as the boy he assaulted in the woods, before knocking him out. Due to the serious charges, Lee’s political sway, and this being 18th century American law, Connor’s trial is expedited to an insta-execution. En route, his Assassins (the game assumes you’ve recruited most or all of them by now) secretly station themselves amidst the square while Achilles advises Connor to call them at the appropriate time (couldn’t the newbies just use common sense upon seeing him being hanged?). Regardless, Connor is freed from the rope and rushes to end Hickey before, well, ends Washington. The consequent Confession may very well be my favorite from ACIII- Hickey defending his debauchery under the veil of it being achievable and tangible, unlike Connor’s principles and quest for justice.

Thanks to Hickey publicly trying to kill Washington and Putnam’s own rebuke, Connor’s name is cleared. Two months later, Connor is present at a Philadelphia Convention as the Founding Fathers officially sign the Declaration of Independence, ending the Sequence.

We’re pulled out of the Animus for another trip with Desmond, this time to an MMA stadium in Brazil. While there are some repetitive NPCs (I swear I saw the same bikini girl model 10x), I was impressed by the amount of Portuguese dialogue Ubisoft recorded for this section. Anyway, Cross gets ahold of the artifact first, though Desmond is able to get the upper-hand and escape. Upon returning to the cave, Shawn discovers the last cell, though William insists on getting it himself so that Desmond can prioritize Connor. William’s NPC is strangely still present in the cave, but you only have optional convos with Shawn and Rebecca: the former debating using the Founding Fathers as a basis for contemporary morality, and the latter inquiring about Lucy’s death (with Corey May retconning the tragedy by revealing Desmond deliberately killed Lucy via consciously letting in Juno’s death program).

Back in the Animus, we’re given front row seats to perhaps the worst scene in the game- Connor engaging in a childish, petty fight with Achilles. The Mohawk wants to inform Washington about the presence of the Templars, whilst the Mentor wishes to keep it a secret for the sake of maintaining the privacy of the Brotherhood. Insults are thrown at Achilles, some founded (him letting the Brotherhood crumble), the majority not (him doing little to help Connor…you know, after he just SAVED HIS LIFE life by assembling the Brotherhood at the tribulation). If this was intended to be a culmination of heat between the two, the building blocks weren’t there, and the end result makes Connor come off as ungrateful.

Connor approaches an isolated George Washington (guessing the guy is just inviting more attempts on his life), who, speaking of that, doesn’t bother addressing/apologizing for the conspiracy accusation. Connor questions if he’s heard anything more on Lee, with Washington reply that the loss of Patriot supplies to the traitor Benjamin Church has distracted him from investigating Lee. Connor takes up the matter, heading to Church’s last location, an abandoned chapel, where he is attacked by Haytham. Haytham spares him, disclosing that Church betrayed the Templars as well, and is now marked for death. Seeing as their goals align, Kenway proposes they work together. The two track down Church’s men, and during the scuffle Haytham departs, asking Connor to meet him in New York.

One month (!) later, Haytham has tracked Church to a brewery in the Big Apple. You get a nice philosophical discussion between the two about the connection between freedom and peace (or lack thereof), before they enter the factory where Connor confronts Haytham over Lee murdering his mother, to which Haytham denies the action. Their resolution is interrupted by an ambush from Church’s men who set the plant alight, but not before one of them discloses Church’s abscondment on a sloop.

Connor and Haytham give chase on the Aquila (the second and final time the ship is used as part of the story), during which you’re forced to listen to Haytham’s constant berating until he finally takes control and crashes into Church’s ship. After Haytham beats Church to a pulp, Connor stops him and ends Church’s suffering, and while we don’t get much insight into why Church did what he did, his Confession does enlighten audiences about how the Revolution lacks objective clarity depending on the perspective.

Sequence 9 is widely considered a fan favorite of the game, no doubt because of the extensive interactions between Connor and Haytham. Unfortunately, I can’t say I hold the same fervor as there were a number of prosaic qualms that were never resolved: how does Haytham know Connor is his son, how did he not know what befell Ziio, why did Church betray the Templars, what did Connor mean when he said it must be strange for Haytham to discover his existence this way, and why the bloody heck does Connor reask his dad questions about Johnson and Pitcairn’s motives when they explicitly told him in the Confessions? Did Corey May really go all out scribing those beautiful dialogues only to render them non-canon?

Those inquiries aside, I also couldn’t quite get over how…weird it was to see the two act like a cliche father/teenage boy. I can’t deny it’s humorous, nor that it’s genuinely interesting seeing a dad/son duo work together to accomplish things, but I’m 99% sure the reason people give the strange atmosphere a pass is because of the great chemistry on display between Adrian Hough and Noah Watts. They excel in the limited screentime they have together, and it’s a dang shame more scenes weren’t dedicated to the two, particularly their ideological differences.

The next sequence sees Connor become likable again by apologizing to Achilles for his outburst and proposing an alliance with the Templars. Achilles notes his positive attitude has no doubt erupted from his newfound acquaintance with his father, but cautions him against the man’s penchant for listening.

Connor returns to Haytham in New York, wherein the two track down the leaders of the Loyalists working to undermine the Revolution. Three of the heads are captured, wherein they are questioned and then executed by Haytham. That Connor is surprised at seeing this happen when it already occurred twice is silly, but that he has any grounds to critique Haytham after that nonsense he pulled with Stephane is hypocrisy. That being said, I do have to say this darker turn with Haytham is a bit out-of-place. He wasn’t a moral figure by any means when we played as him, however there’s no denying he wasn’t stabbing defenseless prisoners willy-nilly.

With intel on the British Army’s plans, the Kenways return to Washington at Valley Forge, wherein Haytham reads out Washington’s plans to exterminate Connor’s village whilst simultaneously disclosing that the future POTUS was behind the initial razing years ago. Washington defends this under the guise of reports about Native alliances with the British. Connor breaks things off with both of them, criticizing Haytham for sitting on such vital information and maintaining that Charles Lee is a monster. Using the Sullivan Expedition as the basis for Connor’s break-off from the Patriots is quite genius, but the way it’s depicted is so sanitized (a problem I’ll go into detail more later). Connor departs immediately, killing the Patriot messengers and knocking out the Mohawk warriors. Unfortunately, he’s unable to get the drop on Kanen'tó:kon, who has turned against him after Lee disclosed the Patriots’ plans to murder the Natives. Believing Connor to be seduced by the Americans (as Lee ascertained), Connor is put in a position to kill him (I abstain from saying forced because the choreography doesn’t exactly make it seem like it had to be done). I’m under the impression this death was meant to be heartbreaking, but as I ranted about in my ACII review, this series has consistently failed at establishing believable brotherly relationships, and Kanen'tó:kon and Connor is another bungled attempt.

Reflecting back, this whole resolution to the Haytham/Connor union is disappointing and reeks of rushed production resulting in hours of storyboards not seeing the light of day. More could’ve been done, more shared missions programmed, but alas this is what happens when you have a deadline to meet. How long did Haytham know the truth in advance, and how can Connor continue to accuse Lee of being a monster when the main event behind his accusation is no longer on the man’s shoulders? ACIII’s attitude towards Lee, in general, strikes me as overly-anachronistic, an attitude amplified by the final mission of Sequence 10 reenacting part of the Battle of Monmouth. While historians debate the rationale behind Lee’s conduct, the general consensus remains that he was concerned for his men; that ACIII upends this completely as part of a power-grab play is a bit too disingenuous for my tastes.

Why Connor opts to help the US Army after what transpired is beyond me unless he’s suffering from some form of colonized Stockholm Syndrome. Optional convos at Valley Forge display a mutual liking between Connor and the Marquis de Lafayette, but this isn’t enough grounds to justify actively supporting the Colonies when they blatantly want to eradicate the Natives. Not to mention operating a cannon, while funner than the troop rallying at Concord, is just not gratifying gameplay. Connor and Lafayette apprise Washington about what Lee did, with Connor stating this to be the last deed he does for the Commander.

We’re pulled out of the Animus again, Rebecca informing Desmond that William was kidnapped by Abstergo. Vidic (or Viddic as the typo subtitles spell out) uploads a ransom video: William for the Apple. If my previous justifications for the theorized premature development seemed unconvincing, let this infiltration of Abstergo serve as a better illustration: we have Desmond making the grand decision to literally enter the front door of Abstergo’s Italian HQ (earning the onslaught of all the security guards), somehow dispatch armed gunmen, use the freakin elevator, take out more armed men, get saved from Cross via a deus ex machina freakout, kill Cross, and then kill Vidic with the Apple (yeah, genius idea, confronting a guy with the most powerful weapon on Earth).

What in the world happened to Corey May? This was supposed to be the culmination of all of Desmond’s trials from ACI to present and instead we get this pathetic excuse of an ending? The first two missions weren’t masterpieces by any means, but you could at least label them solid escapades that set-up a foundation for potential. This, on the other hand, is absolutely lazy, from the Assassin strategy not making a lick of sense to Vidic’s amnesia about the Apple’s powers. It’s also a technical mishap: guards literally draw their guns with the same slo-mo animations as the Redcoats, other Abstergo employees don’t exhibit a single reaction to the chaos going on about them (compare this to Brazil where you got cries for police if you bumped into the citizenry), and on top of it all, I experienced bugs! Desmond and his father having a genuine parental moment is touching, but even in 2022 I can’t get over the disappointment of the venture- you know things are bad when both villains comment on the nonsensicalness of it all (Vidic towards the elevator, Cross towards the Hidden Blade).

The next basket of interactive conversations see Desmond and William discuss him coming home and theorizing about Abstergo’s new technological breakthroughs (hinting at the cloud network in future ACs); Shaun confesses to eating “food” that popped out of an Isu Machine (alongside providing updates on the outside world not taking the solar flare seriously); and Rebecca: inquiries about whether Clay uncovered Washington being a Templar (hinting at the Tyranny DLC), gives more backstory on Cross fragile psyche, and suggests they all go on vacation when this is over (tragic, I know).

We’re now in the endgame for Connor’s story, and the circumstances are not pretty. Connor has become a full-on freedom extremist, zealously backing the Patriot cause in spite of them blatantly not caring one way about his people. Worse yet, he’s got an unhealthy obsession with murdering Lee- the man has literally been censured, his political career halted, yet he apparently remains too big a threat to leave alive.

Still, Connor holds onto some mercy with regards to his father. The penultimate sequence opens with Connor and a dying Achilles softly quarreling over whether Haytham has to die. Connor has evidently seen Return of the Jedi, believing his dad can return to the good side so long as the negative influence (Lee) is displaced. Achilles harshly believes otherwise, and while it would have been nice to actually see a conflict of emotions play out, fate (read-Corey May) would dictate otherwise. As Lee is holed up in a military installation called Fort George, Connor decrees the best method of drawing away the security to be assaulting it with allied French ships. That’s right, Connor is willing to inadvertently kill innocent American soldiers for the sake of satiating his bloodlust.

Connor secures the French aid after helping Admiral Comte de Grasse in the Battle of the Chesapeake, and then proceeds to infiltrate the abode…only to get hit by friendly fire from one of the French ships. Inside, he finds Haytham, who anticipated Connor’s actions and sent Lee away. During the ensuing fight, Haytham has a lot of great dialogue fleshing out his POV, and Connor is unfortunately not given any decent response beyond generic “muh freedom”. Haytham gets the upper hand, but is eventually killed by Connor (in a manner that looks oddly recycled from Kanen'tó:kon’s death), his Confession being woefully short (though grimly moving).

Lee is now the Grandmaster of the Templars, and in an augustinian speech, he reiterates the need to double down the Order’s efforts to hack out the Brotherhood. Connor, in all his intelligent wisdom, opts to walk right into Lee’s lap amidst his entire flock. Luckily for him, Lee suffers from the good old-fashioned villain trope of wanting to spare the hero so that he can make him suffer first, and his oblique to Connor marks the one time where he actually feels like the monster in Connor’s head (though I can’t blame him- wouldn’t you break down after all your years of work was undone?).

As is to be expected, Connor escapes from Lee’s thugs, and takes a page out of Haytham’s book of getting info out of one prior to executing him. Lee has taken refuge in a naval prison off the coast of New York- Connor goes there and learns from an eavesdrop that Lee was set to meet some mercs at the Green Dragon Tavern. Connor plays follow the leader and interrogates a thug there, who informs him Lee has gone off to a port. Rinse and repeat and we finally confront Lee, who flees into a shipyard. Connor gives chase and the two end up collapsing to the ground, where Lee falls into another cliche of monologuing, giving Connor an opportunity to blast him point-blank with his revolver. Lee escapes to another tavern and Connor ambles slowly after him, chartering a boat to the place (why all this pointless wandering? Lee’s death is already anachronistic, just end it at the dang dock). The two share a drink, Connor finally ends the man’s life (no Confession), and takes the key around his neck.

Connor returns to his abandoned village, finding the Mohawk have left behind the Piece of Eden. Touching it brings about Juno, who commands him to bury the key in a place no one will think to look. When Connor protests that his actions failed to save the Mohawk, Juno blankly states that such a task was impossible and that he achieved a greater good. Connor chooses the grave of Achilles’s deceased son (aptly named Connor), finally giving Desmond and co. the location they’ve so desired. Desmond retrieves the key (I’m going to assume that’s red clay on his hands…) and then canonically opens the Temple Door. However, because I wanted to retain full memory of Juno’s orations, I staved off submitting the power blocks till now. In these soliloquies, Juno explains how the Isu foresaw the future solar flare through a device called the Eye, and consequently made various attempts at stopping it. Most of these concepts were pretty standard stuff (absorbers, shields), though a couple go out there and definitely branch out the Isu lore significantly (harnessing human thought to form physical manifestations, Aita’s guinea pig experiment [which would go on to become the Sages]).

Unfortunately, for all these cutscenes, not one of them actually explains how Juno came to develop the perfect solution that somehow evaded the minds of all the other Isu. That confusion is amplified when the team enters the door. There, Minerva manifests alongside Juno, revealing the two were hidden inside the machine- the latter as punishment for attempting to use the Eye to conquer mankind. Minerva discloses that the plan she and her brethren settled on was to send messages and artifacts forward in time as a way of encouraging the Assassins and Templars to prepare for the extinction event. Of course, the everlasting holy war between the two dwindled that initiative significantly, and so now she presents Desmond with a new proposal: let the world burn. While there could’ve been sound grounds behind such a calamitous proclamation, the writers stumble in providing one. Literally, Minerva’s sole justification is to prevent Juno’s escape into the 21st century as activating her machine will simultaneously do just that. Through a vision, Juno shows Desmond how letting the Earth burn would spawn an everlasting cycle of conflict via his sage words being misinterpreted.

Believing mankind has a chance at beating Juno (and, you know, not wanting a genocide), Desmond opts to turn-on the machine. Sadly, the man doesn’t get a proper send-off. He demands the rest of his party leave, informs his father he has to do this, and then zaps himself to death (oh, and the game doesn’t bother explaining why exactly Desmond had to die for Juno’s contraption to work). A newscast in the credits narrates that the flare’s damage was minimized, and Juno walks out of the Temple free.

Yeah, to tie things back to my original paragraph, Desmond’s resolution was what I genuinely hypothesize led to the franchise having diminishing returns in the mainstream consciousness post-Black Flag. The MD wasn’t universally popular, but even its most ardent critics would agree the way Ubisoft treated their long standing protagonist was absolutely disrespectful. I get wanting to wrap-up Desmond’s arc - AC was a moneymaker that needed to flourish for the foreseeable future, and it was hard to come up with excuses to throw him into the Animus (per Darby McDevitt’s own words). But what I don’t understand is why they had to make his last moments so dang anticlimactic? Why not have some grand skirmish in the Temple involving Abstergo culminating in the corporation faltering and Desmond departing scot-free? Stringing fans along with these cryptic references to Juno in subsequent titles, especially when Ubisoft evidently wanted to broaden the appeal of the brand, was always going to end badly. And that’s exactly what would happen: spoiler alert, the threat of Juno ends in a freakin’ comic book that isn’t referenced in ANY of the sequels. Henceforth, the modern-day transforms into a hodgepodge of half-baked ideas that do not go anywhere cogent until AC Valhalla, though that’s a story for another time.

One of the things that caught my ear about Desmond’s death was the lack of a unique theme: he’s instead given a remixed version of the ACIII main titles, which serves as a good transition to talk about the music overall. Lorne Balfe was given full reins after aiding Jesper Kyd with Revelations, and following up the Ezio Trilogy’s maestro was no easy feat. And yet he’s done just that, composing a sweeping score that simultaneously elicits action, drama, tragedy, and even more action (made all the more enticing when he incorporates Native American vocals into the tracks)! Without a doubt one of my favorite video game OSTs, and one that I would gladly pay extra money for a vinyl rendition.

When it comes to AAA video game SFX, I tend not to spend too much time on this facet as it's rare for incompetency to breed when you have this much money invested into a product. In the near-40 years since its founding, Ubisoft has hired thousands of talented employees to concoct technical marvels, and the sound designs produced by such artisans have consistently been good in the AC series. ACIII does kick things up a notch by adding SFX cues to the background activities of denizens- you’ll primarily hear this on the Homestead, though there is plenty of bustle in the city to conceive such noises as well. Whether it’s sawing of food, hacking of meat, flipping of dough, etc…every single action yields a corresponding note that had to have been astutely foleyed.

I do wish there had been more differentiations in the parkour dins. Nature vs manmade is irrelevant as dashing through trees resonates the same as standard architecture. In general, there’s a lot of aural copy/pasting with regards to anything specific to Connor- dirks slice identically to the tomahawk and Hidden Blade, air takedowns indistinguishable irrespective of height or type of target (man or animal), clothing jostles unvaryingly no matter the outfit, and every firearm discharges the same. I know these were concerns of prior ACs; however, for some reason they were far more noticeable in ACIII, perhaps because of the larger scale of the world or increased emphasis on the new gameplay.

I was also disappointed that ACIII removed many of the crowd reactions programmed into the Ezio Collections’ denizens. You can read my review of ACII to glimpse exactly what I mean, but to sum it up, they literally emoted to any action you did. While I’m happy Ubisoft completely recoded the movements and hustle animations, it is regrettable they give nothing more than a deer-in-the-headlight stare to Connor’s shenanigans.

With regards to the voice acting, ACIII marks the first-time of the franchise incorporating motion capture from its stars (yes, there had been some done with Revelations, but not on the scale of III’s production). The results hold-up well to this day, though with the caveat of the non-scripted scenes being very hit-or-miss. That is, it’s easy to tell the parts where the actual VAs performed the whole shebang from the ones reliant on prerendered animations, and the latter in turn ranges from competent to ACII-level uncanny (there were times I couldn’t tell the difference between Connor’s nose and cheekbones).

The historical cast aren’t the only ones to get a makeover- in the present, Ubisoft must’ve lost the rights to the previous models as the trio have seen a facelift. Shaun rises out relatively unchanged, however Rebecca has an eerie resemblance to a bird whilst Desmond could pass off as Ben Stiller’s long-lost twin.

Thankfully, the voice acting is consistently top-notch even when the faces falter. Nolan North evokes a soulful performance in his final (?) outing as Desmond, while Noah Watts more than lives up to the standard set by Roger Craig Smith as Connor. Other major and minor NPCs, from Ziio to the Homestead inhabitants, carry the same weight, and I honestly can’t recall bad moments that stood out. Any disconcertment arose purely from stilted animations or drawn-out pauses.

Part of me wonders how much of those latter issues would’ve been ironed out had the game been in the oven another year. Certainly the many hitches would be minimalized, which brings me to the topic I’ve been most looking forward to enlightening you all on- the effects of the rushed production! Let me give you guys a sample of the things I witnessed/experienced: hair and clothing clipping; floors disappearing; Achilles cloning himself in the same room; subtitles labeling the wrong speaker; characters speaking unnaturally louder/softer than the other in a conversation; mission objectives staying on screen despite being completed/failed; jittery or nonexistent lip syncing (especially for non-scripted scenes and whistling); poor draw distance; NPCs and environmental pop-in, tracks lodged on an infinite loop, lack of footprints in snow, mud, or sand; guards stuck in an in-between state of alert and passive (following you in spite of not investigating), and any vexations noted above that would not have existed had Ubisoft Montreal had additional time. ACIII was notorious for being the first bugged entry in the series (I recall experiencing a game-breaking myself), and while it has been significantly improved in the post-patch Remaster, the imperfections from the skeleton are sorrily visible.

Don’t get me wrong- ACIII’s graphics are superb for the most part. The forestry and its accompanying mist look fantastic, light bounces off glass and metal surfaces organically, texturing (particularly for brick and stone) is strong, Connor’s robe physics are on-point, and the splintering of wood during naval combat is visceral. A lot of small details have been programmed into the world, a number of which weren’t replicated in the sequels: Connor mimicking the blending animations of certain groups (and having unique kills from there!), the screams of crewmen during naval battles, the slight bending of tree limbs as you step on them, soldiers assembling to form firing lines, the radiant AI of the Homesteaders, squirmish NPC responses to having weapons drawn on them, elongated leg lunges as you plod through snow, etc…I could honestly go on for a full page and probably not scratch the surface. When it wants to be aesthetically-pleasing or immersive, ACIII succeeds; it’s just sidelined by a rough undercoat that manifests itself all too often.

I suppose I should speak on the Remaster, which is the version I replayed ACIII on. It’s been close to 10 years since I 100% the title way back on the 360, so I won’t be able to provide a minute account of what exactly has changed (and there are plenty of YouTube videos that do a phenomenal job of just that). The first thing to note is that the Remaster, even on the Xbox Series X, is capped at 30fps. Now, I’m not someone who haggles too much on framerate (if I did, I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the numerous retro games at my disposal), but it is interesting that the Ezio Collection had a 60fps boost whilst ACIII couldn’t.

Overall, I thought the game was beautiful. The higher resolution polygons are perceptible, allowing you to discern details that perhaps were too obscure in the OG release (particularly on textiles and building materials). Lighting, which many have derided as being overblown, I thought was fine; yes, a few areas are too bright (and, on the flipside, some caves too dark!), but it’s the exception, not the norm.

It’s time we wrapped up the story because there is slightly more to tell. An epilogue (which I presume takes place before Connor’s final meeting with Juno) sees the assassino burn the Templar portraits and remove the hatchet from the Davenport Manor; head to New York to celebrate Evacuation Day (whilst dishearteningly catching sight of slaves on the market), and then finally returning to his village where a lone Hunter sits. When Connor questions him as to where everyone went, he replies that Congress sold the Mohawk’s land to pay off the [bloody] war debt (in lieu of staving off the implementation of a tax system so soon after the Revolution’s end). It really is depressing, knowing that his main drive for doing all this was for nothing.

I know Connor is ragged on a lot, and I’ve definitely contributed to that ragging in this review, but it’s worth noting that this naivety is historically-accurate: a lot of Native groups got taken advantage of by wealthy white landowners, leading to their eventual near-extermination in the decades that followed American Independence. The problem comes with depicting this in a video game; people aren’t against flawed protagonists, but they’d like them to not be ignorant for an extended period of time. Connor is regularly told by those around him that the Patriot Cause is against the Mohawk’s interests, yet he persists in fighting for their rights, coming across like a battered wife. It’s clear Corey May wanted to transition his motives to a generic preservation of freedom following the truth about Washington; however it’s not well-done, and ultimately hurts Connor’s character.

And what of the Homestead Missions? Earlier, I highlighted them as avenues where the rest of Connor’s personality appears, and announced my intentions to complete them alongside the story. Yeaaaah, that ended up not happening. The thing is there are too many of them! My memory severely misremembered their quantity, and besides, the reality is they are designed to be side content: a handful correspond to events in their respective sequence, but most are standaloneish, and I don’t like forcing myself to complete side stuff if I’m not feeling it. That being said, the ones I sorted out were predominantly great- the missions themselves tend to be standard fare, but they often come with small narratorial batches that expand upon Connor’s emotional spectrum while simultaneously contributing to a mini-arc for the denizen. Not everyone is granted their own inner journey (at least as far as I saw), however the thematic essence for each person is the same- they’re rebuilding their lives in this community, and seeing Connor play a part in this endeavor is genuinely joyful to behold.

Let’s briefly go over the other side content- Frontiersman Missions are the worst. They involve Connor hearing about some tall tale (usually from Daniel Boone), and then venturing out to play detective. Such “investigations” consist of nothing more than going to X and pressing Y, and the story beat of uncovering the truth is vehemently lackluster, reduced to the common folk misinterpreting some happening in the real world (ironic to diminish American lore when the franchise's is based on its own mythos).

The Naval side of ACIII gives you 12 privateer contracts and four Templars quests, the latter adding up to a final skirmish wherein you assassinate Nicholas Biddle. The allure of any of these will depend on how much you enjoy ACIII’s ship combat, especially those of you coming into it after playing the “upgraded” versions in Black Flag, Rogue, and Odyssey. What I’ll personally say is don’t make assumptions because there is extra depth here that was simplified in the sequels. Yes, you can’t board other barques, but ammo types like chain, heat, and grapeshot are actually distinct as far as their effects on the battle are concerned.

Somewhat tied to the naval maritime side are Peg Leg’s quests. Four of these exist, endowed to you in exchange for trinkets you can find around the map (part of me wonders if they were originally intended to be something deeper than a generic collectable based on the initial dialogue between him and Connor), and they primarily comprise exploratory adventures wherein Connor will go to some curious locale to retrieve a piece of Captain Kidd’s treasure map. Assembling the quad leads you to an island with a Piece of Eden that deflects bullets. Overall, I enjoyed these four a lot.

Liberation missions involve you doing an assortment of tasks for the civilians around Boston and New York in order to free their districts from Templar influence. These are evidently intended to replace the standard Tower Destruction nodes from Brotherhood and Revelations, and while I do appreciate the writers for fashioning more than one type of chore, they do eventually get repetitive, the lone contrast being the new Assassin, which brings me to the Recruitment system. It basically operates the same as before, albeit only giving you 6 men/women total. Gone are the dedicated Master Assassin quests from Revelations, in their place standard (though thankfully finite) contracts you send them off to finish.

Lastly are the Underground tunnels which, as stated before, act as a replacement to the Tombs of Ezio’s days. They’ve got light puzzles depending on the entrance you find, but are overall pretty bland. That said, they are absolutely worth doing for the express purpose of generating new quick travel stations (shame these don’t exist in the Homestead or Frontier).

The rest of the side content is typical AC stuff: challenges, collectibles, forts, deliveries, viewpoints (why they don’t disappear after syncing is baffling), etc…They’re there to give extra treats to those wanting more bang for their buck.

Before concluding this review, I’ll go over the three main areas. ACIII signaled the official homecoming of slanted rooftops coupled with a new spider-crawl animation that made traversal as natural as the flattened hightops of old Italia. For all the yammering about ACIII’s “modern” city design hampering the old-school fun of rooftop runs, I personally had no qualms. If anything, it elicited the prior designs too closely with those annoying signposts along building perimeters that infringe your momentum and force you to waste precious seconds clambering over.

Sadly, I do think New York and Boston were not only too similarly constructed to be distinct, but ultimately not as, for lack of a better word, magical as the civilizations of the Ezio games. And no, this isn’t me ribbing them for not being “old” enough (I feel the same about Masyaf, Jerusalem, Acre, and Damascus in ACI). It’s that they don’t contain a warmness that makes you want to stay and explore them; and maybe that does subconsciously have to do with the contemporary architecture, but I like to believe it’s more-so the absence of mass crowds in the interior parts of the town. Denizens are more likely to flock to the outskirts where the markets and fisheries are, while only a batch of them trickle through the corridors where you may watch them from above.

The frontier was hyped up to be 1.5x bigger than Rome, yet that space isn’t utilized for much besides hunting and random events (which, no, are nowhere near as good as Red Dead’s). The layout of the foliage and forestry also gets monotonous, and it ultimately doesn’t evoke a strange new world the way jungle atmospheres are meant to (especially the first one in the AC series). And to top it all off, there are barely any fast travel landmarks (less than Rome!). Some may counter saying that this is meant to encourage physical movement, and while that is a fair point, the arrangement of simulacra makes the set-up a mixed bag as far as your options are concerned; there are no direct paths going all the way across the map ala a wilderness version of a highway, and the amount of fallen timbers and low hilltops prevent horse rides beyond a hundred meters.

Overall, ACIII was definitely a lot better this time around. The story is more consistent, the world beautiful, and the gameplay advances very noticeable. Unfortunately, it is held back by the highlighted defects, as well as the lackluster endings to both concurrent storylines.




Notes (or additional observations that did not fit organically in the review):
-Horses in ACIII cannot be cheesed over ledges/basins, a crime considering it’s the one pro AC equines have had over Red Dead’s.
-The inner hallway runs were awesome and I hate that they removed them in later ACs.
-I was not a fan of the shattered, triangle esthetic they went for here. It came off as cheap as thin glass.
-If viewpoints aren’t fast travel points, why do they stay visible on the map (albeit open wing) after being synchronized? Very pointless clutter.
-Why did Achilles only bother training a single Assassin? Was he really banking on just Connor succeeding on his own? What if the man died during an excursion?




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As the remastered edition includes The Benedict Arnold Missions, I’ll be reviewing that downloadable content below:

Another day, another mediocre AC DLC. Benedict Arnold takes place between Sequences 10 and 11, shortly after Connor broke off his alliance with George Washington. So of course the first thing the expansion does is have him cuck to the future President. Washington believes there are traitors who intend to murder Benedict Arnold at Westpoint, and enlists Connor’s aid in putting a stop to their machinations. Connor agrees under the guise that such an action would result in a huge morality blow to the Patriot cause, though not before telling Washington to never ask for his aid again.

Connor travels to Westpoint, kills the hitmen, and makes the acquaintance of Arnold, who has him do a series of mundane tasks before an eavesdrop discloses Arnold’s identity as a traitor himself. What follows is a grand battle with the British and Arnold fleeing to (presumably) Britain.

In a couple of ways, this DLC reminded me of a combination of the Battle of Forlí and Copernicus Conspiracy: the former because of how natural it fits into the timeline of the main game + big battle sequence, the latter because of how disappointingly it incorporates a major historical figure. Benedict Arnold is a complicated persona in American history, and that his motives aren’t even touched on is so confounding. Honestly, part of me questions why they even went the route of making it a mystery: I get that Assassin’s Creed is a global franchise, but Arnold is one of the most well-known turncoats in history; the majority of individuals surely know that much about him. Instead of resting the crux of the story on Connor discovering this, why not shift gears to him trying to prove Arnold’s guilt? It would’ve made for a nice companion piece to his similar scheme towards Lee.

There’s also the fact that the two halves don’t coalesce well. Connor initially begins by stopping an attempt on Arnold’s life by treasonists, only for Arnold to then conveniently turn into one? So was the first group actually trying to put an end to his plotting or is it a pure coincidence that he be the victim of a cabal whilst attempting to betray the country?

Westpoint, as an area, is pretty cool. I liked the log cabin aesthetic, and it was nice to see an early rendition of what would go on to become the most famous war college in the United States. Sadly, there isn’t anything extra to do here minus another set of challenges.

Overall though, Benedict Arnold is largely forgettable. Paul Hopkins solid voicework as Arnold and Connor’s dark farewell words to Washington are about the only praise I can muster. It’ll take you less than an hour to beat, and is full of the same unoptimized problems as the vanilla game.