Assassin’s Creed 2 Final Preview

Assassin’s Creed 2 is just a few days away from us, before we finally get some real hands down on the game.  So just before we review the game we thought we should shed some light on Ubisoft’s highly anticipated game: Assassin’s Creed 2. Behold! There might be spoilers ahead.

In the sequel the protagonist remains the same, but Desmond will be playing  the role of Ezio, a nobleman who is a descendant of Altair. The game takes place during the Italian Renaissance in the 15th century. Now Ezio is not a trained assassin like Altair in the first game. He has to learn from the very start in order to become a master assassin. Ubisoft have been pretty silent about the story elements and that’s actually a good thing since gamers should always be in a surprise as long as that surprise lives to the expectations. Now lets talk about the gameplay in Assassins Creed 2.

The scale is breathtaking!

Assassins Creed 1 one had about five to six mission types. Although much of them was repetitive, developers this time around have increased that number to about fourteen to sixteen. In the first game the assassin had to first investigate about the target and than after that the location is revealed to Altair. This time the world is open and Ezio can choose whatever mission he wants to take up next. Creative Director Patrice Desilets says: “With 14 to 16 mission types, we can construct bigger mission, cause we can start with an escort mission which may turn in to a chase mission and finally in to an assassination one.” Now this is pretty cool since in the original the mission structure was a bit bland even though the overall game was great. There will be over 200 missions , a hundred for the single players one and over hundred side missions. Now this will also mean that single player will be almost double the length of the original with the developers saying it will about 20 hours in length.

Assassins Creed 1 had a bit of social element where you can save people from the Templars and those will in turn help you out. Assassins Creed 2 takes it more than a step further. Since you are not a trained assassin in the game you will need people around you who will make you one. Leonardo da Vinci is shown to be as Ezio’s best friend in the game. He will be supplying Ezio with tons of gadgets and weaponry. The following is a short list:

• Hidden Blade
• Double Hidden Blade
• Poison Blade.
• Hidden Gun
• Flying machine

Make friends if you want to become a Master Assassin!

The trademark sky dive returns along with a ton of new gameplay elements. New to the franchise is the economic system. Player can earn money by helping people, looting or stealing. They can now approach shops and buy various types of armors, weapons and other things like poison. There are lot of secondary missions available as I mentioned earlier. These missions can be accessed by finding a pigeon cube. In one of the walk through’s, a secondary mission was demoed by the production manager. In that mission Ezio would have to assassinate a target. The catch here is that Ezio needs to eliminate his target without being seen. With the eagle eye he finally finds his target and pins the guard with the poison blade. The guard starts to react like he has gone bonkers and kills the target by himself. That also means that its possible to kill targets without actually getting Ezio’s hands dirty. New to the franchise are the secret locations. These locations will test out your stealth abilities and your acrobatics as well. This is really a cool new development since it has the potential of adding hours and hours to the gameplay. The enemies and the guards in the sequel are no cake walk. They will make moves, set up traps, bring down bridges to stop you, so you have to be really quick with your controllers. Developers have promised there will be various secret locations in each of the areas. Completing them will unlock awards and more insight in to the story. There will be new locations. Here is the list:

• Tuscan
• San Gimignano
• Forlì
• Venice
• Florence
• Rome

Also unlike the first one there will be tons of new weapons, here is the short list of them:

• Hammer
• Mace
• Spear
• 2 different types of sword
• Spear axe

Other than using flying machine to fly around, Ezio can use rafts to ship himself across various places using the the historic canals. A number of historic characters are also set to appear in the game. Some of them are:

• Leonardo da Vinci,
• Niccolò Machiavelli
• Caterina Sforza
• Lorenzo de’ Medic

For 80$, 2 extra maps and extra goodies! Not bad at all.

As is the norm these days, limited editions of the game will be available. Ubisoft will be releasing a couple of them. The Masters edition will come for 80$ and will include a 8.5 inch tall statue of Ezio, art book, bonus disc and two extra maps.The two maps are Palazzo Medici and Santa Maria Dei Frari. I guess for 80$ and for so much extra stuff its a good buy. Assassins Creed 2 looks like its way ahead of the the first one. With tons of new gameplay elements promised we can bet it will be better the original. The game comes out on November 17th, 2009. Keep an eye out for this game and stay tuned with us.