By Ernest Medina,
Video Game Correspondent

At first, I sought revenge for the murder of my father and brothers. I have now discovered something bigger than I. I do not know where this new path will take me, but I do know this: nothing is true, everything is permitted.

I am Ezio Auditore Da Firenze. I am an Assassin.

Sound: Voice actors: great. Background music: ok. Sounds of the city: lame. When you step into a city, what features most prominently are the town criers. These guys have five, six lines at the most. The guards seem like their vocabulary is limited to “He’s over there! Get him!” This is the weakest part of the game.

Graphics: The cities look impressive, but character models are lacking. Ezio and Leonardo look the best among the main characters; the rest of the cast is done very well.

Gameplay: If you’ve played the first game, it basically plays the same. The free-running is smooth and works well, which is critical for this game.  A lot of new gameplay elements have been added for AC 2. First off, remember when, in the first game, you had to leave your home base, ride all the way to the next city, talk to someone who told you to do a series of side-missions before you could do the main assassination? And, you did the same three or four side-missions throughout the entire game? Well, that is gone. While you do have a home base of sorts, you don’t need to return there every time you complete a mission. Second, there is a fast travel system now, which will take you to any city for a small fee. And while there are side-missions (assassinations, beat up, and courier), they are not required for the main storyline. There is also a new wanted system. If you kill a lot of guards or pickpocket people, you become more notorious. Once a meter is filled guards will attack you faster and without provocation. The problem with this is that they don’t attack on sight and they give you plenty of time to hide before they attack.

Positives of the game: This is one of the best stories I’ve ever heard of in a video game. And this doesn’t stem from the main storyline itself. While playing the game, you will discover glowing symbols. Interacting with those symbols will activate a mini-game in the form of puzzles. For example, for one of the puzzles, you will have eight pictures and sentence that reads, “Those with great powers often leaned on others.” The word “leaned” will be in red. From there, you need to pick five pictures (all real pieces of Renaissance art) that match the clue. If you look carefully, you’ll notice that five of the pictures have people with staffs. There is also identification, code breaker and reassemble puzzles. Now while these puzzles get IMMENSELY difficult by the end, the story you will uncover is mind-blowing. I won’t spoil anything here, but the people at Ubisoft have worked very hard to intertwine real historical figures and conspiracy theories into the Assassins Creed cannon.

Next is the dual hidden blades and new modes of assassination. You can now grab targets when you are hiding, pull targets off the edges of rooftops while hanging and jump from the roofs onto a target on street level with one button push. And nothing is more satisfying than the first time you jump from a building and take out two guards at the same time with dual blades. Once you get a taste, you’ll wonder how you ever did without. In the first game, you could only hide among the monks that were walking around. Now, you can blend in with any group of people on the street, a great benefit if there are no other hiding spots around. Lastly, the speeches after killing an important target have been cut. What used to be  five minutes has been cut to about 20-30 seconds. Now I know a lot of people will like this, but I miss it somewhat. The monologues in the first game are some of the best written and most thought provoking scenes in video games. But I’m also the guy who likes the 20 minute long cut scenes in the Metal Gear Solid Series, so to each his own.

Some Negatives: Targeting is somewhat of an issue in this game. This is especially true when trying to execute hanging assassinations. The game almost refuses to target someone unless you are on the same level or higher than the person you’re trying to target. Double assassinations depend on proximity to people other than you picking targets. Most of the time this is fine, but from time to time, when killing a guard, you may accidentally kill a civilian without meaning to (fortunately, you’re allowed to kill three civilian in a row before you become desynchronized). I would also like to be able to control the camera when targeting. Sometimes, when chasing a target, the camera will zoom in to close and makes jumping from roofs hard to do. While the dual hidden blades are a welcomed addition, most of the rest of the weapons are useless and you won’t never need to use. The knife, throwing knifes, poison, smoke bombs, and the gun (yes, you do get a gun in this game) are fairly worthless and you could go the whole game without ever using them. Certain weapons also get a charged attack, like being able to throw multiple knives. Problem is, when charging, you are exposed and the enemy will ALWAYS attack just before you’re ready. And yet, when you’re guarding normally, the AI decides to dance around you, taking their sweet time before attacking. Finally, what I remember from the last game was that, unless you messed up and were seen, every kill could be done silently. In AC 2, a good number of missions have you chasing a target because he knows you’re there, for whatever reason. There a very few that require you to wait and watch till your target is most vulnerable.

While there are a few hiccups (targeting and an unnecessary monetary system) Assassins Creed II is everything a sequel needs to be. Ubisoft listened to their fans when making this one. This is a must play for everyone and a great experience overall

Final Score: 9/10