Assassin's Creed is a series that gets so much hate for what it became... but imo it wasn't always like this.... the series WAS good at one point.

I don't get why some people hate the older ones... in my personal opinion, the Ezio saga was great and hands down the best part of Assassin's Creed games.

It was all downhill from there... and while we still got Black Flag and perhaps Origins is decent.... I still think the series is down in quality from what it used to be. At least from a story standpoint...

I mean.... remember the end of Assassin's Creed 2???

I was so hyped for what was to come... I was so ready for this series to evolve and to show us what it could be and what it was going to do. Where the story and gameplay would take us.... but NOPE.... they just rehash practically the same thing almost every year... even Origins is nothing compared to what I was expecting.

So... tell me your thoughts? Am I wrong? Did Assassin's Creed stay good after the Ezio stuff? Or were the older games never that good to begin with??

Guess you could say 3. They redeemed themselves with Black Flag, then it slowly went down hill. Rogue (which was very much a recycled version of IV) followed by the abomination which was Unity, then a less than average game with Syndicate. For an RPG game Origins did work, although not so much as an Assassins creed game. Got no idea what they're doing with Odyssey, given that the protagonists aren't even Assassins. They just took an ancient Greek game and slapped an Assassins creed title on it.

Black Flag is the only AssCreed I have remotely fond memories of. So I say it always sucked.

After Black Flag.

After assassin creed III. The Desmond storyline ended there. It should have ended even the game releases.

as of now i'm enjoying origins,but to answer your question i found 3 to be mediocre and black flag to be awesome.

Only Assassin Creed game I truly enjoyed and didn't treat like GTA [running around, exploring and going on random killing sprees] was Black Flag. Hated every single Desmond story line I was forced into, I, literally, felt myself dying inside every time I had to play as Desmond, and Black Flag's modern story line was so dumb it hurt me. It physically hurt me.

"Oh, hey, I'm being a total jerk and arsehat to you, but I want you to do me a favor...."

"Yeah, no, go to hell. You're not my boss and you've been a total arsehat the five minutes I've known you and you are asking me to do something that is obviously not cool. I don't even work in the same department as you, so yeah, go to hell, do not pass go."

"........ Oh.. :("

And then, it forces you, of course, to do it and he blackmails you! What do you know! The arsehole was an arsehole! Who woulda thought!? What a twist! And it gets even better, "The company you work for is.. EBIL! Trust me."

"Of course I trust you Mr. Blackmail! Let me follow your instructions explicitly because you're obviously the good guy!"

Why people hate Unity is beyond me. The story and character development is great. Easily the best parkour in the series, the combat isn't too easy or too hard. And it promotes stealth more than any other AC game.

Went downhill with 3. Syndicate was pretty good though.

The first Assassin's Creed was not a good game so you could start there. Ass Creed 2 was an improvement, but Brotherhood was worse.

I am no Assassins Creed expert, I haven't played all the games, I own three of them (AC II, AC III and AC IV), but only played AC II, I'll probably eventually get AC Origins and AC Odyssey as well. From my understanding, the game has a certain negative reputation, not because a lot of them were extremely low quality, just that they released a whole lot of them, in a relatively small window of time. Not counting portable titles, but look at below games released in chronological order.

Assassin's Creed, Assassin's Creed II, Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Assassin's Creed III, Assassin's Creed III: Liberation, Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, Assassin's Creed Rogue, Assassin's Creed Unity, Assassin's Creed Chronicles, Assassin's Creed Syndicate, Assassin's Creed Origins, and Assassin's Creed Odyssey in a few months. From Assassins Creed 2 to Assassins Creed Syndicate, Assassin Creeds console/PC games were being released every year. Thats not counting some parts of Chronicles, which I am kind of fuzzy over. Thats a lot of video games over just a few years!

Perhaps the above approach is potentially good for sales, but its also going to create a lot of apathy from general consumers. Its also going to be harder to create anticipation and excitement for newer releases. People get jaded and cynical, especially if the games don't evolve or offer new stimuli. From my own personal experiences with friends and the news cycle, Assassins Creed II is almost universally adored, AC III was alright. Some of the non titled AC's had high points and or some were bad, but then AC IV Black Flag was credited with "revitalizing the series" and it had ship battles or something... then I remembered hearing one non numbered AC being pretty good and one being really buggy on release. Then I heard Origins "revitalized" the franchise again and how it had been over a year since a main AC game.

So maybe Assassins Creed never really stopped being good, rather it introduced a lot of mediocrity and repetition in a relatively short amount of time. Franchise sort of exploits its own popularity, a lot of people love having a yearly installment of a game series, but a lot of people also prefer a longer development cycle and bigger improvements in game series. As someone with a general interest, I don't even know which of the AC games to catch up on... just because of time limitations. Maybe just the numbered titles, plus Origins and Odyssey? Perspective from someone who hasn't played most of the games, but semi cares about the franchise.

TL;DR it gluttoned itself towards mediocrity.

After Black Flag.

@sc: Hey thanks so much for the amazing post you had some great insight!! :D

So if you want my opinion... in terms of story Assassin's Creed is at it's best with the Ezio saga... trust me when I say don't skip Brotherhood and Revelations. Everyone hates on them and gives them so much crap and says they should've just been dlc for Assassin's Creed 2 but imo Ezio is one of the coolest video game characters of all time and I love the journey he goes on. Think about most characters who get multiple games, Mario, Laura Croft, Ryu, etc..... none of these characters really age too much.... but with Ezio we see his entire life and we play as him through his whole journey from when he started out as a punk kid, to a manly adult, to an aged legend.

In my personal opinion.... Ezio is without a doubt the true face of the Assassin's Creed franchise. The true poster boy if you will... and the first 4 games (including the first one with Altair, because Revelations heavily calls back to it) are definitely worth the quick play through just to experience that story! ^^ so if you're bored one day and got nothing else to do then don't be afraid to give the old AC games a shot to check out the story of Ezio!! :D

It hasn't for me.

It hasn't. The fanbase can only agree that they like the ezio games and black flag which was just an excuse for Ubi to make a pirate game everything else is just personal preference

It actually started getting good when I was allowed to hunt for animals.

AC3 was the beginning of the end, my least favourite in terms of gameplay but at least we still had Desmond, at its release AC3 was just a bad game in a good series, but after killing Desmond it all went to shit. It's quite clear Ubisoft had no idea where they were going with the Isu/modern day stuff and now they're totally lost, they should've waited another year before AC3, improving the story and planning. I still think it's a good series, but not what it was before AC3, they rushed it and now they're lost.

After Ezio.

@piratekingoda: Thank you for the recommendations and breakdown! I'll put Brotherhood and Revelations on my to buy list. Cheers!

@richard96 said:

Half way through the first game

Did anyone even play or remember the original assassins creed? That's where the series started, as a mediocre game.

It seems to me people here and other places ignore it and start judging the series from ass creed 2 and onward

As far as I can work out, AssCreed is kinda like a modern Sonic without the nostalgia. Started off bad, got better, went bad again for a spell, did good again (Black Flags) and back down again and has pretty much remained there since. So, it's just generally bad, but with brief glimpses of excellence.