Assassin's Creed: Mirage - Before You Buy

The one thing I loved about the very first Assassin's Creed game was the challenge to sneakily assassinate just the evil bad guy from above in each chapter and then escape with minimal carnage. The original bad guys in AC1 were legitimately evil.

The sluggish movement was something i immediately noticed in the first gameplay trailer. I think it’s his run cycle, Basim looks like he’s perpetually going on his morning jog.

The AC Unity stealth kills were honestly peak. They were well animated and FELT precise. Like Arno knew exactly the weak spots to target, as an assassin should. Definitely wish they brought back that variety of both running kills and stealth kills and different animations for each. Also you gotta be able to manually engage and retract the blade. That's just a staple of any assassins creed game imo. Combat in the older games was simple but it worked for what it was at the time. I think they nailed it in Unity if only they offered more variety in enemies and smoothed out the gameplay and animations for combat. Overall Ubisoft should have stuck with the Unity systems and built off of them to make them smoother.

I missed how they had Desmond and the story of him learning from his ancestors and how they both had a story. I loved it and they dropped the ball.

Great review Jake!

I’m glad the map is smaller Valhalla was kind of overwhelming with the size

I'm with you on AC going back to its roots. The 1st one was tedious and repetitive but I thought it was cool and interesting how they tied in historical events and figures into the game, especially so in the AC2 games. I tried playing the newer open world one and they were just a bit overwhelming for me. The exploration is interesting but can be burdensome. This is definitely a welcome change to AC fans like us.

If you are having problems with Basims momentum while running. One great tip to solve this is to go into your control settings and tinker with them. By default the sprint on controller is binded to the left analogue stick and is set to toggle to sprint but you can change this very easily. It has the option to hold to sprint instead of toggle this way you always know that when you are holding the button down you are sprinting. For me as well I binded sprint to the right trigger which made the whole experience of running through the city feel far more satisfying. There are lots of settings you can change to make things feel more like the older games. Plus one bonus fact which I have appreciated is the amount of animations both combat finishers and assassination animations that are taken directly from AC unity since most people forget that these games are made using the Anvil Engine. Overall loved this game I agree it is a middle ground between the different genres of games in the series

It's wild to think they haven't innovated on environmental gameplay. The crowd options in AC2 made you feel so stealthy and they just forgot how to try on the stealth options. Last time they tried was Unity with more interiors to navigate and the disguise option. Even AC1 had the prayer hands. Imagine if they'd thrown all those stealth options into this game, with some environmental discretion options to interact with the world which causes a distraction or obfuscates or gives you access to something else.

Anyone that has played AC from the beginning fell in love with this series because it was different. I love how they weave their story into history that we know or can lookup. I don't mind the newer games there are parts that are great. But a mix between the old and new game styles would be a welcome sight I think

I'm torn between the newer and older AC games. I like both of them in different ways. I absolutely love the overarching story of AC games, since the RPG trilogy were longer there was more of that, rather than the ~15 hours Mirage lasted for me. I hope they continue to make both RPG and old school versions.

I played all assassins creed from the start, but I like both sorts, so I think a mix of them is perfect. Can't wait to play this game and see if it turns out to be how I expect it, a mix!

Totally agree about the hidden blade kills. Half the time, Basim does the stupid “swipe” animation where they phase their whole hand through an enemy, and there’s still the age-old problem of guards seemingly stopping in their tracks just to get stabbed. And you’d think sliding before assassinating someone would trigger a slide-stab animation (something that they’ve animated and can just recycle), but nope, Basim just snaps into the regular standing stab animation. Ubisoft games feel AA

TIP: Changing the control scheme to the classic one is a major step in the right direction in terms of making it feel like the old games. There's a tutorial on YT for it as we speak. If you watch it, Be sure to change the attack (press) and heavy (hold) attacks to X or square, and you're set.

I actually agree with you Jake, I loved the combat of AC and ACII. Glad to see they returned to it. I'll definitely be picking up this game as soon as I can :)

The first time I saw Damascus in the first Assassin's Creed is forever burned into my memory. One of my core gaming memories. I would love to see the series go back to its roots.

9:40 I think it's mainly because most of the time Basim goes for the stomach or chest while assassinating someone and after that he throws them to the ground as everyone looks while Ezio mostly went for the neck with a quick stab and by the time the target slowly fell to the ground, Ezio could go into hiding in the crowd again. It's obvious what's more satisfying here and who's the best Assassini of all time.

I loved the older Assassin's Creed games. AC2 was so well done and simple. Ezio is still the most memorable character in any of them to me. I still have to look up the character names of all the "modern" AC games and I've completed all of them.

I always watch your videos before I buy my games lol it really helps me out

I've been a fan of Assassin's Creed since the first game. It was a huge part of my childhood and I've played every single main line game. Mirage brought back memories of those first games, so that's a plus. It has a nice setting and historical ambience. I hope Ubisoft finds a way to either: combine old and rpg Assassin's creed to satisfy both sides or that they can alternate between them.