By many, sixth installment of the main series (irritatingly called Assassin's Creed 4) is one of the best, if not the best Assassin's Creed. Which is funny, because it's also the first game were we're not really playing an Assassin (at all?).
We start this game shipwrecked as Edward Kenway - father of the Templar Haytham and grandfather of Ratonhnhaké:ton. The setting is the Caribbean sea: while colonizing America, the nations Britain, France, the Netherlands and Spain allowed so called Buccaneers and Privateers to raid the ships of the other nations; they where given Ships and allowed to keep the spoils, and soon in the West Indies a community that from 1630 established this as their culture. Until - starting from 1690 - it was forbidden by more and more of the participating countries. Hence forth these people where labeled Pirates and their way of living outlawed. Different to the European and American society, Pirates lived in societies free of class and sexual, national or racial injustices as a egalitarian multinational society, base-democratic and anarchistic. Which in turn drew more and more people of lower class and status to them. This let to the "Golden Age of Piracy" who's peak many scientists see starting in 1715 - the year Edward strands on an island at the West Indies. But he is not alone - Duncan Walpole; an Assassin, who Edward manages to kill - in his belongings, Edward finds strange items and a letter from a Spanish Governor, that promises a high reward for these items, so Edward decides to take all his belongings and clothes and assumes Walpoles identity. But at the exchange he gets found out, and is sold into slavery. Luckyly the slave ship is getting into an hurricane, and he and another slave - Adéwalé - manage to help themselves and escape. They capture a ship, the Jackdawn, whom Edward calls himself Captain of, and makes Adéwalé his quartermaster, and thus their adventures as pirates begin.
Assassin's Creed IV - Black Flag is an epic Pirate adventure game, and it is the best Pirate adventure game out - this comes even more obvious as just this year Ubisoft released another Pirate game, "Skull and Bones", which is supposed to be a successor to Black Flag, but its release made people long for Black Flag again instead, making it the most played older AC title in the beginning of this year, which is probably the reason why Ubisoft is now rumored to work on a remastered version of Black Flag.
However, I am playing the series for the story of the Assassin's - and regarding those, Assassin's Creed IV feels like the first (but definitely not last) "odd one out": Edward does meet the Assassin's, but is not really taken with them. He helps them when it meets his goals, and ignores them otherwise. Which is getting more and more difficult as friends and fellow pirates of his join their cause and leave the pirates. Edwards however follows the dream of an Pirate State, so you never get to play him as an Assassin. Still it turns out that there is a lot of the typical philosophical questions that Assassin's and Templars fight over also present in a pirates live - the question of control and freedom, order and chaos, etc. And Edwards story and his final choices make sense and feel organic, given all his background and what he experiences in the story.
The game-play can be best described as a combination of AC II and AC III. In AC II we had dense cities with great possibilities to parkour, and different stealth possibilities; in AC III we got a lot of open spaces, hunting and naval games, but less stealth and parkour. AC IV as a Pirate game takes place mostly on the ocean, and you can explore a lot of small islands that don't have much on them but allow you to find and collect items, go hunting, etc. But then there are the three big cities; Havana, Nassau and Kingston. But the biggest component is of course the ship. Naval missions are not a small bonus on some optional objectives as in AC III, but a major part of the game, even though most of it is not part of the main mission (which takes place mostly on land). Ocean makes up 80% of the map and all collectibles, all side quests, all special enemies are only accessible via the ocean, so the ship becomes a major part of the game.
AC 4 gives us a ship that comes with 6 different ways to shoot your enemies (fire barrels, chain gun, swivel gun, mortars, broadside and heavy shots), gives as three different speeds that however change our maneuverability, and that are highly depended on the wind direction (which you always need to take a look out for), while throwing at us different sea obstacles, like really heavy enemy ships (man-o-wars), tornadoes or tidal waves, that we need to keep in mind. This is where the fun of the game lies, the ship feels realistic and to even further immerse you, your crew will sing shanties while your your ship is rocked by the waves. Even though Ubisoft says that the split is 40/60 for sea to land game-play, if you are a completionist you'd probably switch those numbers around and play far more on sea than on land - and if only to plunder the resources you need to upgrade your ship to the fullest. There is also a lot of personalization possibilities, both for the ship as well as the character, and this adds to the immersion.
For the modern day story, Ubisoft picks up the idea they strarted with Liberation: the modern-day main character is you, the player. You are a researcher at Abstergo industires, and you are to explore the DNA of Desmond Miles for one of the many Entertainment products that the subsidiary "Abstergo Entertainment" wants to market to the customers. During your time at Abstergo, you get contacted by different hackers - one of them is an actual Isu trapped as a program on the computer network that tries to get free - the other two are Shaun and Rebecca who want to win you over for their course. The modern-day story was actually fun to explore, but in my humble opinion not as good as the one in AC III; and the story with the Isu and the back story of Abstergo and the Assassins becomes more and more complicated to follow as a whole. But I did enjoy this part non-the-less.
What is sad is that the game feels much buggier again - especially climbing. E.g. I dreaded ships where you needed to climb the mast to cut down a flag, cause ever so often, Edward wouldn't climb but suddenly just jump of the mast and die, which looses you the bounty you nearly had. There was a lot of frustration of this kind, however the really brilliant story and the - for the first time - open world totally makes up for it. It's the first Assassin's Creed game that does not make you play an Assassin, however it still feels totally like an Assassin's Creed game - and it maybe has one of my most favorite endings of all Assassin's Creed games. It also has one of the most recognizable soundtracks after AC II, and just hearing the main title again gives me a the feeling of the really good time I had with the game.
If it weren't for all the bugs and problems with the game play that came with it (especially for certain missions) I might have rated it higher.
This review does not include the DLC "Freedom Cry" which I totally forgot about (got it mixed up with Liberation, so I thought I played it already) and unfortunately played much later.
We start this game shipwrecked as Edward Kenway - father of the Templar Haytham and grandfather of Ratonhnhaké:ton. The setting is the Caribbean sea: while colonizing America, the nations Britain, France, the Netherlands and Spain allowed so called Buccaneers and Privateers to raid the ships of the other nations; they where given Ships and allowed to keep the spoils, and soon in the West Indies a community that from 1630 established this as their culture. Until - starting from 1690 - it was forbidden by more and more of the participating countries. Hence forth these people where labeled Pirates and their way of living outlawed. Different to the European and American society, Pirates lived in societies free of class and sexual, national or racial injustices as a egalitarian multinational society, base-democratic and anarchistic. Which in turn drew more and more people of lower class and status to them. This let to the "Golden Age of Piracy" who's peak many scientists see starting in 1715 - the year Edward strands on an island at the West Indies. But he is not alone - Duncan Walpole; an Assassin, who Edward manages to kill - in his belongings, Edward finds strange items and a letter from a Spanish Governor, that promises a high reward for these items, so Edward decides to take all his belongings and clothes and assumes Walpoles identity. But at the exchange he gets found out, and is sold into slavery. Luckyly the slave ship is getting into an hurricane, and he and another slave - Adéwalé - manage to help themselves and escape. They capture a ship, the Jackdawn, whom Edward calls himself Captain of, and makes Adéwalé his quartermaster, and thus their adventures as pirates begin.
Assassin's Creed IV - Black Flag is an epic Pirate adventure game, and it is the best Pirate adventure game out - this comes even more obvious as just this year Ubisoft released another Pirate game, "Skull and Bones", which is supposed to be a successor to Black Flag, but its release made people long for Black Flag again instead, making it the most played older AC title in the beginning of this year, which is probably the reason why Ubisoft is now rumored to work on a remastered version of Black Flag.
However, I am playing the series for the story of the Assassin's - and regarding those, Assassin's Creed IV feels like the first (but definitely not last) "odd one out": Edward does meet the Assassin's, but is not really taken with them. He helps them when it meets his goals, and ignores them otherwise. Which is getting more and more difficult as friends and fellow pirates of his join their cause and leave the pirates. Edwards however follows the dream of an Pirate State, so you never get to play him as an Assassin. Still it turns out that there is a lot of the typical philosophical questions that Assassin's and Templars fight over also present in a pirates live - the question of control and freedom, order and chaos, etc. And Edwards story and his final choices make sense and feel organic, given all his background and what he experiences in the story.
The game-play can be best described as a combination of AC II and AC III. In AC II we had dense cities with great possibilities to parkour, and different stealth possibilities; in AC III we got a lot of open spaces, hunting and naval games, but less stealth and parkour. AC IV as a Pirate game takes place mostly on the ocean, and you can explore a lot of small islands that don't have much on them but allow you to find and collect items, go hunting, etc. But then there are the three big cities; Havana, Nassau and Kingston. But the biggest component is of course the ship. Naval missions are not a small bonus on some optional objectives as in AC III, but a major part of the game, even though most of it is not part of the main mission (which takes place mostly on land). Ocean makes up 80% of the map and all collectibles, all side quests, all special enemies are only accessible via the ocean, so the ship becomes a major part of the game.
AC 4 gives us a ship that comes with 6 different ways to shoot your enemies (fire barrels, chain gun, swivel gun, mortars, broadside and heavy shots), gives as three different speeds that however change our maneuverability, and that are highly depended on the wind direction (which you always need to take a look out for), while throwing at us different sea obstacles, like really heavy enemy ships (man-o-wars), tornadoes or tidal waves, that we need to keep in mind. This is where the fun of the game lies, the ship feels realistic and to even further immerse you, your crew will sing shanties while your your ship is rocked by the waves. Even though Ubisoft says that the split is 40/60 for sea to land game-play, if you are a completionist you'd probably switch those numbers around and play far more on sea than on land - and if only to plunder the resources you need to upgrade your ship to the fullest. There is also a lot of personalization possibilities, both for the ship as well as the character, and this adds to the immersion.
For the modern day story, Ubisoft picks up the idea they strarted with Liberation: the modern-day main character is you, the player. You are a researcher at Abstergo industires, and you are to explore the DNA of Desmond Miles for one of the many Entertainment products that the subsidiary "Abstergo Entertainment" wants to market to the customers. During your time at Abstergo, you get contacted by different hackers - one of them is an actual Isu trapped as a program on the computer network that tries to get free - the other two are Shaun and Rebecca who want to win you over for their course. The modern-day story was actually fun to explore, but in my humble opinion not as good as the one in AC III; and the story with the Isu and the back story of Abstergo and the Assassins becomes more and more complicated to follow as a whole. But I did enjoy this part non-the-less.
What is sad is that the game feels much buggier again - especially climbing. E.g. I dreaded ships where you needed to climb the mast to cut down a flag, cause ever so often, Edward wouldn't climb but suddenly just jump of the mast and die, which looses you the bounty you nearly had. There was a lot of frustration of this kind, however the really brilliant story and the - for the first time - open world totally makes up for it. It's the first Assassin's Creed game that does not make you play an Assassin, however it still feels totally like an Assassin's Creed game - and it maybe has one of my most favorite endings of all Assassin's Creed games. It also has one of the most recognizable soundtracks after AC II, and just hearing the main title again gives me a the feeling of the really good time I had with the game.
If it weren't for all the bugs and problems with the game play that came with it (especially for certain missions) I might have rated it higher.
This review does not include the DLC "Freedom Cry" which I totally forgot about (got it mixed up with Liberation, so I thought I played it already) and unfortunately played much later.