Video Game Review: Assassin's Creed Brotherhood

"Not as good as the last Assassin's Creed game, but Assassin's Creed Brotherhood serves to be a great sequel that deserved to be really looked at"

    Assassin’s Creed 2 was a game that I would describe as legendary. It’s combat, it’s open world exploration, it’s presentation and it’s revenge driven story where all very powerful and motivational for the player to finish the game. It’s very rare to have a game like that, and it’s rarer to have a sequel to a game like Assassin’s Creed 2, but let’s see if Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood can pull it off, given that it’s a fully direct sequel to Assassin’s Creed 2.

   Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood went through the same formula as the first two games, which is the inside-outside Animus storyline, only on brotherhood, the outside Animus storyline actually was much more interesting and something that was really well played. The outside Animus circled around Desmond going inside the Animus to get to Ezio’s memories so he, Lucy, Rebecca and Shawn can find an apple of edin hoping that it would tell them where the other temples  to the pieces of Edin are.

    On Ezio’s side of the story the game doesn’t quite live up to Desmond’s side or the storyline of Assassin’s Creed II. It was about Ezio going to Rome and trying to get back the apple of Edin which was stolen by the Borgia, and to do so Ezio must weaken there forces, that all means Ezio gets new assassination targets, new allies and a new enemy: Chesare Borgia.

   As I mentioned, Ezio’s side the story on Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood really didn’t live up to the story of the last Assassin’s Creed game. Ezio’s story in this game felt flawed, and here is why: While there was a small number of new characters and a different location, there was really no question answering in the game, there were no new real new features, and there was only just more questions piled up and added to the questions that the second game had, I’m not saying that the story wasn’t good, Ezio’s story in this game was great, but just flawed, therefore disappointing.

     Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood continued on the excellent presentation that Assassin’s Creed II had, but this time it did have some very minor issues. The game was presented in an excellent way, in both sides, but especially with Desmond, but it’s ending on Ezio’s side felt really rushed and unexplained, I hope that this error was actually something worth asking and not a presenting error or a plot hole, but until then I’ll say it’s a plot hole, also the game disappointed a bit when it came to presenting new characters, while there where some new interesting Assassination targets, I don’t think they really had as much of a cause as they did in II, and as for Ezio’s allies, it’s such a coincidence that all of them somehow ended up in Rome, don’t you think? But otherwise the game still was very strong when it came to presentation. There was really no other negative comments I could say about it other than those two, and even with those problems, Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood was still presented in a more or less excellent way.

     Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood’s gameplay felt very similar to the gameplay in Assassin’s Creed II. The game took place in Rome, which was a bigger city than all the cities in Assassin’s Creed II combined, so there was a lot to explore and a lot to do in such a big place, however, while Rome was a fun and a really exportable city, there was one minor issue with it though, it felt too much like Assassin’s Creed II and there was more country than city. The city is one of the things that make an open world game, and this game felt too familiar to Assassin’s Creed II, which gave the game a needlessly familiar feel, and it felt less like a city since there was less to climb, it didn’t feel quite like the right city for Ezio to explore.  

     Combat was fun here and more flexible than the last game, the controls became more enhanced and the general fighting just felt more organic and realistic, however the AI was the problem here. Combat was too easy in this game, mainly because the AI in this game was a little bit too dumbed down, at some points I would just finish fights without being touched, which was fun, but it didn’t feel like a challenge, at all, don’t get me wrong, the combat on this game was still fun and something I felt like I could spend hours doing.

     The economic system which was in Assassin’s Creed II was fully enhanced in Brotherhood. Stores can be purchased, places like thief guilds and courtesan homes can be renovated, and historical buildings can be bought. Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood had an economic system that was fully enhanced in every way, and as a result made Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood a fun and more realistic game when it comes to the economy.

    As for new gameplay features, Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood felt lacking where the new gameplay additions either felt too contrived and unrelated to the story or just didn’t make a big difference. Ezio can now recruit Assassins, which is fun, but the number of Assassins recruited has no effect on the story, and gameplay was far too easy to even ask for recruitments. Other than that players can explore the lairs of Romulus, which gave some great platforming moments. The player can ride horses through the city, which I found pointless because Rome was filled with Tunnels, and the player now needs to kill a Borgia leader to free a district, which was the only real great addition to the game, because when playing like that the player feels like they earned the stores and places in that aria.

     Desmond had a big side this time in gameplay, and I think that made a huge differences and helped me looked passed a lot of the errors on Ezio’s side of the story, why? Because Desmond’s side was a lot of fun, there was a lot of exploration and platforming involved, plus his side of the story made it feel a whole lot stronger and his side gave a lot more details about Desmond’s character, which was something I really loved from this game.

     There was also a new online feature in this game, and honestly it was a big disappointment, mainly because the servers took a very long time to load, it lacked having a decent amount of players, and it lacked player freedom, I mean, i get that this was the first time Assassin's Creed had online gameplay but it was still poor and it had some really clear space for some really big improvements.

    Every Assassin’s Creed game was a step up graphically, Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood was a big step up, while things did look a bit too animated at some point, a lot of the graphics here where big improvements over the last two games, the lighting was a lot better, the characters looked excellent, the landscapes and Rome looked very organic and realistic, and the animations looked excellent, there are a bit pop-ups here and there and sometimes things looked a bit too animated, but those where very small complaints compared to the great graphics in this game.

     Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood was pretty much exactly like Assassin’s Creed II when it came to sound, Ezio’s voice kept improving, the characters sounded great, the city sounded reactive and alive, the sound effects where great and the music was excellent, however, some voices and some music on the album sounded somewhat needless or a bit stereotypical, which wasn’t really a big issue at all, in fact, they barely effected, especially comparing to the great effort on this game when it comes to sound.

      Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood had its ups, and it had it’s downs. It wasn’t nearly as special as the last Assassin’s Creed game was, but it still did the job of being a great game with a decent story. It did have it’s down such as the really easy gameplay, some story-related errors and the annoyingly familiar feeling, but the gameplay was still very fun, combat was still fresh, the story was still decent, and the familiar feeling was actually a bit helpful at some cases. Overall Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood wasn’t the best Assassin’s Creed game, but it did have some of the series’ best moments and it was still a game worth buying and playing through.

Gameplay: 8/10
-Ezio's side of the gameplay was great, but more or less the same, with some new stuffed in elements and easier gameplay, Desmond had a major side in this game, and that's where the game shined-

Story: 8/10
-While it was still strong, the story didn't really present something new on Ezio's side, it was great but if felt like it was 'just there', but Desmond had some real breathtaking moments that wowed me throughout the game-

Presentation: 8.5/10

-There where a lot of plot holes, some repetitive elements here and there, but otherwise the presentation was almost as good as the presentation in Assassin's Creed II-


Appeal: 8.5/10

-Given that II was a much better game and that Rome felt very familiar, after finishing the story i think the player won't last nearly as long as he or she did in the last game, but would still give a sustainable amount of time for this game-


Graphics: 9.5/10

-The game looked less gloomy, it was much brighter, so Rome looked more beautiful then it could have looked and character designs had so much more detail this time-


Sound: 8.5/10
-The soundtrack was strong, but not as captivating as the last game's soundtrack, and the voice acting was also strong, but it felt a bit emotionless and stereotypical though-

Average Rating: 8.5/10

Overall Rating: 8/10