Top 5 overrated video games of all time – Part 5

By: Jason McCarthy

  |   September 13th, 2012   |  

Uncategorized

1. Assassin’s Creed

It is becoming increasingly common to find this game sitting high in various lists of overrated games and that too for a good reason.

Before the game was to be launched, Ubisoft created a lot of hype about a new engine that the company was working on, Anvil. This new technology was to be used to introduce a new genre of gaming, stealth-action-adventure, though some sci-fi element was also difficult to ignore.

The trailers that came out prior to the release of Assassin’s Creed were indeed mind-blowing, creating a strong desire to get one’s hand on the beautiful game as soon as it arrived in the market. I actually know quite a lot of people who were driven towards the purchase of an Xbox 360 of PlayStation 3 solely because of the game, while many PC gamers got latest hardware installed in their systems to ensure that the game ran smoothly.

Once Assassin’s Creed arrived in the market, it turned out to be a big disappointment. People searching for visual pleasure had plenty of love about Ubisoft’s effort because the characters, the textures and the details were simply mind-blowing.

However, core gamers found themselves staring at a game that had very little to offer in terms of gameplay.

Despite a compelling storyline, the game failed to come off as an entertaining package. For countless hours, players are expected to travel back and forth between the four cities. Unless you really go into the details of the architecture, the four cities come off as pretty similar, save for one which had a ship harbour.

There gameplay is hurt even more by the bland missions, which are extremely repetitive and have little to no drop of innovation.

From the moment you put your Assassin’s Creed disc in the console to the moment you beat the game, all you will be required to do is travel to a city, meet up with a guy to discuss your target, climb to the top of the tallest structure or structures in the city, investigate a few people by either pick-pocketing a piece of paper from them by a simple press of a circle on the Playstation 3 controller or a B on the Xbox 360 controller, interrogate a guy by punching him until he agrees to give you the information and then stab him in the end, sit on a bench and eavesdrop a couple of people and then reporting back to the a creed member you talked to upon entering the city, who gives you the permission to pursue your target and kill him.

No effort seems to have been made to give more depth to the targets and killing them feels hardly any different than killing a normal guard.

The combat is even worse than the monotonous missions. One button combat system, two if you consider a pretty useless throw feature, is hardly the sort of thing that can be expected to come off as entertaining.

Yes Ubisoft has done well with the overall presentation of the game, but the gameplay is lacking depth and leaves a lot to be desired. The game can be hailed as a visual piece of art, but should not be confused for an outstanding game, which ends up forcing people like me to cry out loud that the game is seriously overrated.

Disclaimer: the views and opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the editorial policy of Wishfree.com.