Since Assassin’s Creed: Rogue released on the same day as Assassin’s Creed: Unity, a lot of the attention for Rogue went lost. That’s a shame to be honest. Although Rogue isn’t an innovating game in the franchise, it’s the closing chapter to the marvelous book set in the American history. Rogue forms the bridge between Assassin’s Creed III and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag. It lacks innovation but remains a very enjoyable conclusion to an era.
Who’s this hooded man?
A new Assassin’s Creed game, means a new assassin. This time we live the life of Shay Cormac, an Irish gentleman, including all clichés. Shay is a rather young assassin that joined the organization years ago, accompanied by his friend. Shay’s story is based around the east coast of America and the North Atlantic Since Shay is rather young, he does everything to prove he’s a worthy asset to the brotherhood. By Infiltrating and assassinating key targets, he proved himself worthy of the brotherhood rather fast.
All of this changed when one specific mission ended in a bloodbath. This mission made Shay turn Rogue, betraying the men he once called brothers. Shay leaves the brotherhood and joins the Templars to help them defeat the assassin’s once and for all. Shay returns to the scene as on older, wiser and more skilled Templar. His goal is clear, kill each and everyone that stands in his way.
How does a Templar move?
So playing as a Templar is by far the biggest change in an Assassin’s Creed game yet. Ubisoft describes Rogue as their darkest yet but that’s not entirely true. Since Shay was trained as an assassin, playing like a Templar isn’t that different at all. You’ll still do most of the things you did before, and that’s a bit of a disappointment.
Rogue can be considered as a direct sequel of Black Flag. And to be honest, most things you do, were also able in Blag Flag. Half of your time is spend on land with assassinations, infiltrations, climbing and recruiting more crewmembers. The other half of your time is spend on your ship, the Morrigan, to set sail to new locations, attack other ships or harpoon some of the wildlife. The gameplay itself doesn’t really offer a lot of new stuff, but the Templars will affect the way you’ll play.
An enjoyable ending to an era.
Hunter or hunted?
The way you feel while scouting your environment changes since you’re now a Templar. While playing as an Assassin, you felt like you were on top of the food chain and nothing could hurt you. Being a Templar feels different. Some of the missions will force you to attack the assassins right on, while others will make you feel like you’re the hunted. Those missions offer the best experience. In those, you’ll also be switching on your Eagle Vision to spot enemies or use some of your new toys to district them. Being the hunted has a completely different vibe, too bad there aren’t a lot of missions that make you feel this way.
Your new toys.
As said before, main part of being a Templar means you’ll get access to some new toys. The new silent air rifle is without a doubt the best new weapon in the game. It makes you able to put enemies to sleep or let them go insane with one single dart, without any sound. It’s the perfect weapon to sneak around and will become your new best friend soon after you acquire it. Later on you’ll even be able to transform this into a grenade launcher and yes, it’s as great as it sounds. The other weapons are tweaked a little so they all feel very natural and easy to use.
Aside of your guns and blades, your ship also gets some important improvements. New weapons such as burning oil, machine guns, mortars and an ice-breaking ram, are key to survive on the Atlantic. It’s sad to say that most of the innovation stops there.
A recycled Creed.
Everything about Assassin’s Creed: Rogue feels like it’s recycled from Black Flag and that’s a shame. Even key locations like New York are recycled from Assassin’s Creed III. Rogue takes place near the Atlantic, which means there’s a lot of ice and snow, but if you look a little closer, you’ll notice that a lot of the environments and islands you discover look a lot like those found in Black Flag. It’s a shame the budget of Rogue wasn’t bigger. The developers had to make hard decisions to invest their budget in the best possible way, recycling old assets is part of the process.
This recycling process also means that a lot of the well-known bugs are just transferred to Rogue. You still won’t be able to remain hidden in tall grass, you’ll eventually run on top of a building you wouldn’t want to end up to and the enemies still attack one by one. It’s a shame that those well-know problems weren’t handled once and for good.
Is it a good game?
The most important question however is: ,Is this a good game?’. The short answer is yes but you need to take some things into consideration. This isn’t the best Assassin’s Creed game ever created but thanks to the interesting story, it’s definitely fun to play. Too bad you need to play a rather long time before the pace really picks itself up. The first hours of the game really are boring compared to the action-packed Templar action later on. The balance isn’t that great in other words.
Variation on the other hand is key. You’ll never stay at one place for too long. With the help of your ship, you’ll set food on a wide variety of landscapes and that’s without a doubt a positive note. If you had your share of Assassin’s Creed games however, this isn’t the game that will be the game changer for you. If you enjoyed Black Flag, than Rogue has something to offer.
Conclusion:
All in all we can say that Rogue is a worthy ending to a thrilling trilogy. It’s the last game to release exclusively on the old-gen and that’s without a doubt worth mentioning. We understand that the developers wanted to deliver a fun ending without a lot of innovation but that’s truly a shame. Assassin’s Creed: Rogue isn’t a perfect game because of the bugs and recycling, but it still is a game fans need to try out. The story of Shay is an interesting one, a story worth the struggle!
7.5/10
Tested on Xbox 360
