Why Assassin’s Creed: Revelations?
Over the last decade, Assassin’s Creed grew into a colossal series. What used to be a structured narrative experience that let you live the fantasy of an assassin has slowly turned into massive worlds, RPG mechanics, and maps overflowing with side content. Yet somewhere along the way, I found myself gravitating away from the franchise. After trying yet another modern entry that didn’t quite sit with me, I returned to Revelations to see if the older games really do hold up through a modern lens. I was surprised to find that Revelations reminded me of when I genuinely had fun with the series, and that’s a good thing.
The Good
Assassin’s Creed: Revelations is the final game in the Ezio trilogy, following an older Ezio Auditore as he asks some final questions near the conclusion of his story. The game wastes no time getting started, sending Ezio to Masyaf, the Assassins’ stronghold from the very first game. It immediately evokes a sense of familiarity and intrigue, especially since it’s been so long since we’ve returned there.
You’re thrown into combat almost instantly, and it feels better than ever as Ezio cuts through dozens of Templars in the opening moments of the game. By this point, he’s a seasoned Assassin, and the animations reflect that experience. Every swing of the sword feels deliberate, with Ezio moving through enemies with a fluid, almost dance like precision that showcases some of the series’ best animation work.
Sadly, though, it isn’t long before you’re pushed away from Masyaf and find yourself in Constantinople, where most of the game focuses on leading you back to where things began. Ezio needs five keys to unlock a secret chamber that may or may not hold the answers he’s searching for. Fortunately, all of them are located around Constantinople. With the help of the local Assassins, you’ll set out to track them down one by one.
When you do find a Masyaf key, you’ll get to relive a memory from none other than Altair, the protagonist from the first game. The memories pick up right after the ending of the first game and follow Altair through some of the most important moments of his life, all the way to his natural conclusion. It’s a reflective journey through the life of a man who shaped the entire Creed, leading into a final moment that ties directly into Ezio’s story in one of the most powerful payoffs in gaming history.
Constantinople is a sprawling and beautiful city, not as colorful as some of the later games, but it still effectively serves its purpose in the context of the game. It never gets old to traverse either, with rooftops plentiful across the city, even more so with the newly added Hook Blade. This new tool pretty much lets you leap to ledges slightly farther away, and it also helps you reach ziplines scattered throughout the city. In combat, it can be used in tandem with the Hidden Blade for quick, efficient takedowns. It’s a simple tool, but one that changes how you move through the world.
This is packed into a tightly narrated experience. The gameplay further reinforces the plot by limiting choices. You are Ezio, and you have to play his story the way he lived it. The narrative hits hard all the way through the game, something I feel the series has lost over time. Revelations rivals those titles by lasting long enough for you to care, but not so long that you feel bored. And yes, I feel Revelations is one of the more story-heavy games in the series, but for good reason. It’s Ezio’s send off, my boy went through a lot and deserved a proper one, and that’s exactly what we got.
I don’t want to spoil anything, but the ending doesn’t just land, it stays with you. It lingers. The kind of finale you don’t really forget, even years later.
The Bad
Assassin’s Creed: Revelations came out in 2011, making it a whopping fifteen years old, and by modern standards, some things don’t hold up as they did when the game released. Namely, the parkour is a little stiff — a symptom of the older games for sure. As you’re traversing Constantinople, you’ll sometimes find yourself coming out of the parkour flow, nose-diving into the streets below, or getting stuck to a ledge or wall like Spider Man. This is something that plagues most of the older Assassin’s Creed titles. It’s been addressed in newer entries, and Ubisoft tried to mitigate it with the aforementioned Hook Blade and ziplines, but it doesn’t quite solve the issue enough to avoid pulling you out of the flow state occasionally.
Unfortunately, if you were looking for some cutting edge combat, Revelations follows suit with the previous games, only changing how sword strikes feel and the animations behind them. The typical combat encounter in these early Assassin’s Creed games, outside of stealth, is drawing your weapon, blocking, and countering. As you can imagine, this can get repetitive. To mix things up a little, Ubisoft added various bombs you can use in combat, but to be honest, using them felt a bit awkward, so I didn’t really try them outside the initial tutorial.
I don’t feel like any of this really dampens the experience. With a little patience and persistence, you’ll end up playing one of the best narrative stealth action games there is, even if you have to fight the controls every now and then.
Final Thoughts
I started playing Assassin’s Creed: Revelations as a way to revisit one of my favorite games. It left me wondering where that version of Assassin’s Creed went. After a decade of gigantic worlds and endless side content that often feels the same, modern entries never really hit me the same way. Revelations felt like meeting an old friend I’d lost contact with, only to be greeted with the same jovial familiarity. Revelations solidified why I became a fan of the series to begin with, and for that, I can do nothing but recommend it.
