Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood

There’s a lot that’s new in this year’s entry into the Assassin’s Creed franchise. So much so that it makes the highly applauded Assassin’s Creed 2 seem like old hat in ways more than one.

First up is a multiplayer mode. Sure it’s a first for the series, but not a first in video games as a whole, with a little known game called The Ship doing it before the fine folk at Ubisoft deemed it fit for Assassin’s Creed. The premise is simple, kill your target without being spotted and at the same time look out for your own assassin. While The Ship sank, a host of RPG-like add-ons with skills, perks and levels to cross, along with a variety of modes would make Brotherhood‘s multiplayer infinitely popular. It’s fun, addictive and works well.

The combat system has been significantly improved getting rid of its predecessor’s clunky, almost tank-like feel. The agile-as-bricks controls have been replaced with a more free-flowing, acrobatic combat that actually makes you feel like you are an instrument of death rather than a 20-tonne anvil. And this extends to the single player campaign as well.The single-player campaign takes place in Rome, which is thrice as big as Assassin’s Creed II‘s Florence making for a meaty campaign.  You can recruit natives and groom them into assassins, which becomes a meta-game in itself.

You can use your minions to help you complete missions easily. With just the press of a button they’ll make short work of their victims, provided you’re good at training them. Oh and the city management feature from the previous game makes a welcome return. You can gain some killer equipment by capturing key positions and repairing them all, while also gaining the blessings of the populace.

But Brotherhood isn’t without its share of issues. For instance, the story expects you to have played Assassin’s Creed II, making it inaccessible to newcomers, which is a bit of a letdown given how easy it was to get into earlier games. In fact, it takes place right after the ending of Assassin’s Creed II making for a very vague and ill-explained game riddled with plot holes for newbies.

However story-telling woes aside, this is perhaps the best entry into the series yet in terms of gameplay and sheer content packed in. And it may not look as good as some of the titles out last year but it’s got enough to keep you going till the stealthy, brutal end.