By Harris Allgeier
Staff Columnist
The “Assassin’s Creed” series has experienced a lot of ups and downs in its lifetime. The first game, while decidedly interesting, was more of an experiment in form than a great game, full of unrealized potential on which its successor “Assassin’s Creed II” would fully capitalize. Since then, the series has gone through a number of incarnations, the most recent being the pirate-centric “Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag.” Published by Ubisoft Montreal, “Black Flag” marks a departure from series trends in a number of ways. For starters, longtime series protagonist (and erstwhile Adam Sandler impersonator) Desmond Miles, through whom players relived the memories of various assassin ancestors, is no more, having kicked the bucket at the end on the disappointingly linear “Assassin’s Creed III.”
“Black Flag” sees players take control of a nameless employee of the video-game division of Abstergo industries (the front organization for the series’ ongoing villains: the Templars) who is tasked with reliving the memories of 18th century buccaneer Edward Kenway. The meta-narrative involving the gaming studio is a step up from previous ones, and the story is at least interesting, if not particularly conclusive, serving more as a teaser of things to come than anything substantive. Fortunately, the player isn’t required to spend a large amount of time in the “real world” and can invest the vast majority of their efforts in exploring the world of the swashbuckling Caribbean and master pirate Edward Kenway. Kenway’s story revolves around his desire to secure a personal fortune by beating the Templars in discovering the location of “The Observatory,” a fabled artifact that will allow the user to spy on anyone in the world.
The story, for all its pretensions, serves largely as an excuse to provide impetus for high-seas adventure and to allow Edward to cross paths with famous historical pirates, such as Blackbeard and Captain Kidd.
As for the gameplay itself, “Black Flag” plays like a dream. The world has been opened up considerably from its highly linear predecessor, allowing players free reign to explore the cities of Havana, Kingston, and Nassau as well as many other smaller locales. For the most part, on-foot controls remain the same as they have in previous iterations. The combat is still satisfying and fun, despite being a tad on the easy side (most fights can still be won via generous use of the counter button) and Kenway comes equipped with enough gadgets to keep things interesting, along with a wider variety of foes that require different methods to defeat.
The visuals are inspiring as well, with beautiful lighting and water effects (especially in the PC version, if you’ve got hardware to support it) that bring the storybook world of pirates and adventure to life with gorgeous effects, textures, and filters.
In keeping with its open and freer world, “Black Flag” also offers the most generous stealth opportunities the series has presented to date. Every environment is filled with at least several intersecting paths to sneak through, and it’s utterly up to the player on how to plan to infiltrate that pirate fortress or tail the governor’s lieutenant to his secret treasure stash. However, as with previous games, the wonky on-foot controls are still an issue and while running seamlessly across rooftops functions sublimely, the vagueness of the controls makes any kind of precision maneuvering incredibly difficult and awkward.
The biggest addition to the series comes in the form of The Jackdaw, Edward’s highly customizable and upgradeable ship that allows you to freely traverse the open seas, engage in exciting naval battles and assault daunting fortresses. The ship controls are smooth, and the naval battles play out in tense games of cat and mouse, with players trying to avoid coming into the range of enemy cannons while blasting them with their own. Once a ship has been weakened, Edward may choose to send it down to Davy Jones’ locker or to initiate a boarding to seize supplies and additional crewmembers. There’s something about casting your line onto a burning enemy ship and swinging onto it Errol Flynn style, cutlass raised, that never loses its appeal.
“Black Flag” really shines in the little things as well. Be it the collectible sea shanties Edward can teach his crew to sing, the roars of welcome that the crew shout whenever Edward returns to his ship, or the utter seamlessness in transitioning from on foot, to ship, to the open sea, “Black Flag” is a highly polished game at every turn and sets an impressive bar for wherever the series goes to next.