Assassin’s Creed: The Ezio Collection

Its been almost 10 years since a seemingly innocent little game known as Assassin’s Creed made its debut on the scene before taking the world by storm. Since then there has been a steady flow of games in the Assassin’s franchise, but all of them feature the same base principal; games are set in a fictional history based off of real world events while the story itself follows the centuries-old struggle between the Assassins and the Templars. You yourself the player are in fact  playing as a modern-day man, in the case of Assassins Creed and up to Revelations this man’s name is Desmond Miles. Through the use of a machine called the “Animus,” Desmond is able to go into view and control the genetic memories of his ancestors.

While the first game may have been the start of the story and what drew a lot of fans to the franchise at first, its hard to deny the fact that Assassin’s Creed II and the tales of Ezio Auditore are what really began the future of Assassin Creed and showcased where the franchise was capable of going.

If you’ve never played it before, Assassin’s Creed II is considered to be one of the best games of the franchise, so it seems like a perfect fit for Ubisoft to start a remastered Assassin’s collection with it. The Ezio Collection features an updated coat of pain on the visuals which sees the three games get a bump to 1080p resolution, which you can definitely see while playing. Making them feel more at home on modern consoles, I also think this helps give a 7 year old game a fresher feel. While the graphical upgrades somewhat hide the ageing, these are still the same games from a few years ago, so don’t expect miracles. (The degree of improvement can be viewed in this comparison video here) Not without its flaws and shining moments that are both particularly obvious in the character’s themselves, they are however the same character models used in the original games so it’s understandable. I think Assassins Creed has held up a lot better than most franchises and I’d like to see more developers give their much loved games this kind of treatment.

Unlike the previous release The Ezio Trilogy, Assassin’s Creed: The Ezio Collection offers players the bonus of all DLC for the original games as well as the addition of two short films with Assassin’s Creed: Lineage and Assassin’s Creed: Embers, which add more to the legacy of Ezio. The only complaint I have about this is that you can’t fast forward or rewind either of these movies, with the press of most any button exiting you. This leaves you with an all or nothing approach to the movies and no room for accidental button tapping.