This game not only managed to start one of the most, often controversial, and definitely qualitatively speaking, never consistent (to this day) well known IP around, but this is also the game that more than any other proved how we really were fascinated by literal keys jangling in front of our faces back when the 7th Gen of Consoles was just kicking off.

There's not much to say here, at least for us non nostalgia-drivern shills, as the gameplay loop in this is beyond simple and perpetually stuck in a very easy mode you cannot change, no matter what. When the novelty of the climbing system wears off (in about 15 or so minutes) you'll be left with a really easy and below average combat system, even for the time, that is vast as a puddle and shallow as a glass of water and a "find random stuff around the map with no indicators" waste of time which was never fun to begin with, not just here, but in any single Open World Game it's been featured in.

Don't think I've ever died in any of the AC games, if not by accident, while trying to fiddle around with the controls during the climbing sections, which are sometimes really clunky the moment you find yourself in corners or parts with more than one snap point during a jump. The enemies pose no challenge whatsoever, thus rendering any of the stealth mechanics in this pretty useless. I guess only the narrative saved it, more or less, as the downtimes during the modern day sections were quite annoying. Personally I stopped at AC Brotherhood as that's when I realized I was completely and utterly burned out on this Open World formula provided by UbiSoft. The sequel isn't much better either.

Decided to re-play this again recently just to experience the additional content and I have to say, this game still holds up. There are probably better Metroidvanias around but I bet in none of those you can stop time, go around the enemies and "nothign personnel, kid" them with a bunch of knives until they explode. So yeah... it's peak!

My only gripe is that the RPG component of this is very basic, could've used more item management (yes, unironically) and the game itself is quite short for a metroidvania standard. Also, did the devs forgot to add Cirno to the Boss Rush mode? Kinda lame.