This is my second time playing Assassin's Creed, as I had played the 2009 release originally. Obviously I'm going to play with nostalgia glasses, but the game itself does hold up exceptionally well in my opinion. This felt like such a step-up and refresh from the original AC1 release (which I had loved at the time), with some re-scheming of the controls and a lot of quality of life improvements. Compared to some of the modern releases, the graphics aren't exactly holding up against AAA budgets, but it was largely serviceable. It's not a game that I'd say was "aesthetically stunning" beside the moments of cinema like the Viewpoints and "The Truth" sequence. The sound design was pretty on-point too and captured a Renaissance Italy vibe! With that said, I can say that it was hampered by a few big things. The collect-a-thon aspect with treasures/feathers were a bit overkill, killing pace and just acting as a time-filler. Cutting both to half the amount would have made it a little more enjoyable. Sequences 11 to 12 (originally DLCs) were BRUTAL to play as they functioned as a hard stop in between what is meant to be the climax to the conclusion. The final mission also felt a little silly as a raid on the Vatican. I would have preferred a more secret-silent assassin ending, possibly even spread over 3 or 4 missions. Still, the story as a whole was perfect (otherwise I wouldn't have been as enraptured as a child and into my adulthood) in the way it interweaved historical fiction and science fiction. The gameplay was great, besides those end-game pacing issues and the fact that I have been exposed to improvements on parkour fairly recently, like Brotherhood and Ghost of Tsushima and Sekiro. I give AC2 some extra grace for being an older game straddling technological improvements at the time, and for being as fun a game as I remember (most of the time). As a side note, I ended the game with 966k florins (retconned to 50k in Brotherhood), a fully complete 100% sync, and 1200+ enemy deaths.

2 pts for Story - 2
2 pts for Graphics - 1
2 pts for Sound/Music - 1
4 pts for Gameplay - 3
Bonus Points:
1 pt for my Nostalgia
.5 pt for Improving over AC1
Final Score = 8.5 (Leaned 8/10 over 9/10)