After the third title in the Assassin’s Creed franchise, Ubisoft promised one new game in the franchise per year and “Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag” is the newest game and the first one to launch the series into the new promise and direction.
For Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Wii U and Microsoft Windows
Retails at 59.99
“Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag” (AC4BF) steps away from the convoluted wars of the Assassins and the Templars and instead focuses on the pirate life of one Edward Kenway, grandfather of Assassin’s Creed III’s protagonist.
Desmond Miles is also gone, the modern day link to the previous protagonists of the franchise and replaced by a nameless new character for the player to possess.
The storyline that links the present and past is lighter in tone, as your character is a new hire at Abstergo Entertainment, a company that wants to franchise from the animus used in previous games. The player character goes from normal animus and pirate based research to conspiracies and corporate espionage as the story progresses.
The story of Kenway is much more lighthearted than previous stories, as it steps away from the assassins fight to Kenway’s life as a pirate searching for the ultimate score and sailing the open seas. Though Kenway does become an assassin and involved with their plight, it is never his priority.
The story also progresses quicker, throwing you into the action and opening the world up to you as soon as possible. Sailing the seas and engaging in ship battles is a lot more fun and entertaining than before.
The rest of the gameplay is refined from previous entries, including the recruitment of new shipmates, though they cannot help out with assassinations this time around. With all the improvements, it’s a shame that repetitious and tedious missions are still in place. You still have to follow an NPC for minutes listening to pointless chatter and you still have to find high points for synchronization.
Even with all the improvements, this is still the Assassin’s Creed franchise from years before. What is good from the franchise remains and few improvements fix some problems as well. Though the improvements do make the bad a little more glaring, this is still a fun and worthwhile addition to the franchise.
