Enemies deal more damage if they successfully land a hit, and certain foes are completely immune to specific tactics. Thankfully, Ubisoft has scaled up the combat’s overall difficulty. It is easy for Edward to slip into the water, climb aboard another vessel, and stealthily kill its crew, leaving it ripe for the plundering.īasic combat remains largely the same, and it still relies heavily on countering and maintaining kill-streaks. Conversely, open combat can be skipped altogether. Transitioning between weapons is as simple as rotating the camera angle, and the degree of customization available for the Jackdaw-Edward’s brig and the player’s key to exploration-allows the vessel to be finely tailored to the player’s preference. These battles are remarkably fast, brutal, and streamlined. Naval combat, as the game’s action-packed opening emphasizes, is the best illustration of such borrowing and refinement. Though many of the mechanics from Assassin’s Creed III have carried over into Black Flag, they are integrated in a more smooth and polished fashion.
The question indirectly gestures to what Ubisoft already knows (and what new players will soon discover): Black Flag is good. With a laugh, Edward gamely asked his companion a question which could have just as easily been directed at me: “Was it good for you as well?” A man from the opposing ship also made it to shore. Once the game’s early cannon fodder was soundly defeated, an explosion flung Edward overboard, forcing him to swim to a nearby beach in order to survive. My first encounter with Edward Kenway, a former privateer and budding pirate, called for me to literally take the wheel to pilot a ship under siege. The opening act of the game exhibits a degree of self-awareness as readily as it introduces players to the world of piracy. Most missions offer equal opportunities for both combat-oriented and stealthy players alike, and features like enemy tagging ensure that the stealth mechanics are at their finest. The more horizontal motions of city freerunning have seamlessly converged with the tree climbing, frontier-style gameplay of Assassin’s Creed III.
As a result of this gamble, Black Flag comes with a greater sense of balance and cohesion than other recent entries in the franchise. It immerses players in the golden age of piracy-the early eighteenth century-and so combines the seemingly disparate worlds of pirates and assassins.
The sixth major release in their series marks a conceptual leap of faith. With the release of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, it seems as though Ubisoft has, at last, learned from the example of their assassins. They perch atop towering buildings to get the lay of the land before diving off in a leap of faith. The titular assassins balance precariously on wooden beams, rooftops, and ledges as they pursue their latest target. Assassin’s Creed has always been a series about balance.