The 6th game in the Ubisoft franchise sees you still playing with the memories of Desmond Miles, this time, following on from AC 3 as Edward Kenway, who is Connors Grandson. Set in 1715 at the golden age of piracy, you find yourself living the double life as part pirate, part assassin.
You start out with a basic outlook on ship driving and combat and after defeating enemies, you soon end up on dry land when you are given the controls for your basics and if you have played any Assassins Creed game, these controls should feel very familiar to you. You find a rogue assassin and take his identity, with only his eye on gold, Edward has no idea what he gets himself into.
The standing combat controls are also very familiar and with the use of tall grass and other plantation a place you can become invisible and use this to your advantage or sneak around areas and tactically take out the enemy one by one, of course if this is not your style, there is always the 'come and get me' approach, which sadly still leads you waiting for enemies to attack and you just countering, there were points when enemies let their defence down a little, giving you seconds to catch them off guard but countering is your best friend in this situation.
You arrive in one of the main cities of the game, Havana and set to work on the sandbox missions ahead of you but as with other Assassin Creed games, missions are not the only thing on offer, true to the series, there are various viewpoints and chest to seek to get access to the radar and also some nice weapons/ammo/money and other loot. Added into this game though is the hunt for buried treasure (no, really), finding sea shanties and bureau side quests like hunt down a courier, along with this, there is also hunting, either on land or in the sea and statue puzzles, which no doubt lead to something special.
As noted earlier, Havana is one of the main cities, there are 2 others, which are Kingston in Jamaica and Nassau in the Bahamas and while the 3 cities may leave you with the same style of missions and other activities to do, they are look very good and very well done. The detail in all 3 cities is superb and this carries over into the sea and among the ships, all ridiculously good looking and this is only the current gen version, so the next gen version is going to look amazing.
The 3 cities have a huge bit of ocean inbetween them and you get to explore this with your own ship that you come across during the game, it is called the Jackdaw. Sailing around the seven seas, well one in this case, is more entertaining than you would think, you are able to stop at Islands and go hunting for skin off Ocelots or Iguanas or if you spot one, stop your ship and hunt shark with a harpoon, as well as this, you can loot other ships, identify what a ship has via the spyglass and see if there is any materials you need or just consider if it's worth looting or not. Once the enemy ship has caught fire, you can board it and fulfil the objectives to take full control of the ship and then you are free to loot away, also you can use the spare wood from that ship to repair the Jackdaw, if however you sink the ship, then you will still get loot but only half, this floats on the water for you to sail by and pick up, seems to be random loot floating around as well so keep an eye out. Looting too many ships can cause you to get a wanted level, it does not suddenly turn into a GTA game though, depending on your level seems to depends how many ships are sent out to take you down, can either run and hide, fight back against the ship and loot it or bribe the local officer, the choice is yours. You can also just have a lovely cruise along the sea, listening to your crew sing along to various songs which will get stuck in your head for a good few hours or more.
The naval combat in this is superbly done, it's pretty simple and easy to pick up control wise but it is quite the tactical fight on the sea, it feels like chess, on water, with 2 huge ships. You find yourself thinking ahead, trying to out manoeuvre or catch out the other ship, making sure you have enough sail out to get the right speed or slowing the ship right down to make the all important turn to get in the right position, another challenge is that you are steering while shooting, so you need to figure out when is best to stop steering and get the cannons ready to fire, knowing when to brace for impact is also a huge bonus, reduces your damage taken by at least half if not more. You can attack from the front of the ship, right cannons, left cannons and barrels at the back, plus you have swivel guns, which target the weak points on a ship when they appear, which help in your battle, also if all else fails, you can just ram them, you take damage but dish out more. Every battle I have had so far has been great fun, and that is amped up when you accidentally hit 2 ships and then you are battling against both ships on the water, harder but so much fun.
As with previous Assassins Creed though, the whole game is not set in the past, there is also a modern day story and that trend follows in Black Flag, this story however has been shortened down and the missions are not as long. You play as the nameless analyst who is assigned the sample 17 project, to begin with, it starts out as you going through the memories just to gain footage for a pirate themed film but as you get further into it, you realise it is more than that. Still partnered up with Shaun and Rebecca from the previous games, you stick with it and uncover bits of the story which you can then take into the Animus with you and relay that to Edward and the same from the past to present.
Multiplayer is chaotic as always, either you play alone or in a team, it is full of paranoid anarchy and the most extreme game of hide and seek ever. The game modes remain the same from Assassins Creed 3, with the free for all modes being wanted, deathmatch and assassinate, the team games being artifact assault, manhunt and domination and also wolf pack returns from the last game but with the added extra of defending chests as well as attacking enemies. Would like to point out that once you peak at level 10, if you have not got a Uplay passport, will not be able to unlock anything else after level 10 but Ubisoft have made it free for Black Flag due to some problems and look to get rid of the passport for future games.
There is not much wrong with this game apart from the missions, they are what you would expect from the franchise, there is only so many times where trying to sneak past 20 enemies gets a tad repetitive and the modern day story kills the flow of the game, all good getting into the story about how Edward is getting his plan together or there is a twist in the story and you want to see how it continues but you suddenly get transported into the modern day and sort some problem out caused by John the IT guy, yeah it is apart of the story in a whole but position it better.
This game overall is awesome, Ubisoft have re-found their form after the last Assassins Creed, I'd highly recommend getting this either on current gen or next gen, made me rekindle my love for the franchise once again and the fact you can interact with famous pirates like Blackbird and James Kidd to name a few is that cherry on top for the game and I have to say, after playing Assassins Creed Black Flag, it's the pirates life for me!
Assassins Creed IV: Black Flag - Xbox One
One of the few games that appear on both the Xbox 360 and the Xbox One is Assassins Creed Black Flag, and to begin with, it seems Ubisoft have played it safe, but the loading times are already quicker! Which is a huge positive from before as you would find yourself lost in loading screens that really do not need to be seen, well that many anyways.
Jumping into the game, graphically, it is just beautiful, no other word to describe it, everything from the waves crashing into the ships, to parts of the ship flying off, even to how good Edwards beard looks, Ubisoft really have used the new graphics potential to its full capacity. This really is one of the games on the Xbox One that really are using the new graphics engine in the Xbox One and in my opinion, just about equal to Forzas level of graphics, yes they are that good.
However, once you have been amazed by the graphics and how pretty everything looks, the gameplay is, well exactly the same, the buttons are the same, animations are smoother yes, but are pretty much the same, yeah gameplay wise, maybe Ubisoft could not of changed anything but just a few tweaks here and there just to make it feel a but different would of been nice, instead of it just looking different. The story and the missions involved also are the same, you'd expect to see some kind of changes to make it feel different gameplay wise.
Ubisoft have also used the controller feedback well, especially in naval combat, you can really feel it when a ship crashes into you, or you are hit with cannon fire and the same when you fire at ships, can feel the trigger rumble as you let loose cannons at the enemy.
Multiplayer is also a lot quicker, Ubisoft have used the new features that the Xbox One very well, allowing for matches to be searched for and made a lot quicker than the 360 version, also, there was no signs of lag or anything going wrong while playing the Xbox One version, noticed looking at the two, there was a few glitches and searching for games seems like it took an age comparing the two.
Overall, if you have the 360 version of Assassins Creed, there is not much reason to get the Xbox One version unless you really like graphics and want to see everything in a much better quality, but if you are yet to get Assassins Creed, then I would recommend this game and if you were waiting to get this on the Xbox One, it will be worth the wait.