Gorgeous game, game-breaking controls and AI.

First off- every British soldier in this game is a master marksman with XRAY vision and the reaction speed of a fighter pilot. Jump from one building to another, you just alerted a guard who was standing below you who takes aim- shoots you in mid air (1.5 seconds airborne from one building to the next) and using his IPHONE notified every single British in Boston to your EXACT location- Every British soldier converges on your location and using their extensive PARKOUR training they all leap from building to building to kill you. All while moving around the base of the building underneath you constantly tracking your location with their XRAY vision.

This coupled with the fact I have 1600 pounds and cannot buy a new outfit so I'm not the ONLY NATIVE IN BOSTON. While every soldier is on the lookout for... a native.… Expand

My Score: 3.0/10 Pros: -Cinematics -Graphics are **** amazing (IF you have a PC with good hardware) Cons: -Combat is too simplistic and not fluid. -Glitches and bugs throughout EVERY aspect of the game -Terrible AI -Boring gameplay and almost entirely automatic Bethesda's Dishonored makes Ubisoft and their team look like fools. Assassin's Creed III is one of the more disappointing games to be released this year. Don't fool yourself by reading the review by IGN, BECAUSE Ubisoft paid for that review. I'm sure over the next couple of weeks I will have to listen to all the simple minded **** who bought the game and are too afraid to admit how stagnant the series has become. The game emphasizes cinematics with a cutscene for every 5 gameplay minutes, which seems to serve as Ubisoft's effort to distract the player from the slow, simple, and glitchy gameplay. Marketing will fool the majority of the tools, hopefully not you, but this game is a failure. If you want to play it then pirate it so you can save your money for bourbon.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. This game is probably best compared to going into a restuarant, purchasing the best steak available and finding that it is burnt on the outside and raw on the inside. My first review composed of a lot of swearing, but I have decided to refine it...
I love Assasins Creed. The story, the characters, the open-world and free-running freedom and the choice to go at your own pace. The series seemed to go from strength-to-strength (with the exception of Revelations), however when I played this game, I couldn't believe at how arrogant the game is. The first 4 hours of the game, you are dictated what to do non-stop. The cut-scenes happen far too often and rather than allowing you to skip conversations during a cut-scene to speed it up, the only options you have are to watching the entire scene - which are usually incredibly drawn out and slow paced - or to skip the scene entirely. I don't like being left in the dark, but Assasins Creed 3 seems to like to test the gamer's patience with the abundantly pedantic amount of cut-scenes. It feels as if every time you are getting momentum, suddenly, a wild lengthy cut-scene appears! Also, ignore every review that addresses amazing new free-running. It's not amazing it's actually disasterous and completely unneccesary. The game has now taken away your choice as to when you want to climb/jump and when you only want to run. Now, when you run, you automatically will climb/jump. This sounds great, except for some reason, the developers decided to slow your character down when jumping/climbing to the point where I'd rather just run away from enemies instead of performing the seamless parkour that was evident in the earlier titles. Most of the time, my character tries to climb or jump onto a nearby barell/box during a chase that I wasn't even aiming towards. Next up, combat. Combat is always fun right? The developers decided to find a way to mess that up too. Your counter-attacks can now be countered as well, which is kind of ridiculous when surrounded by strong enemies who take away your health each time they counter your counter-attack. So there's no way around that but to discourage combat, which nobody wants to do. The leap-back move has been taken out, because the game would rather you time your blocks, even if it means the enemy can counter your blocks which you cannot stop. You can no longer grab enemies. The menu to select weapons has now been taken from a nice, seamless, in-game experience to a full blown menu which covers your whole screen. Which you still need to hold the button in for. Instead of an easy inventory-wheel seen in previous titles, the weapon-select menu shows the weapons in a column view, which is rather annoying and doesn't allow a "snap-select", you now have to scroll through each and every weapon to get to the one you want. Did I mention there are only 4 quick buttons? So we are now forced to use this unpleasant menu more frequently. Horses are completely useless when not being used on roads and trails because although they have no problem jumping up hills, they seem to have a problem jumping down again. It's little, irritating things like this that make me really not care about the game. It's just irritating and not a joy to play. Even the amazing visuals and life in the busy streets of 1700's New York isn't enough to distract the disgustingly obvious flaws. There are no bugs in this game, the entire game is even more flawed and unfinished than Dragon Age 2 ever was. It seems that the developers were so excited about finishing the game, they decided to distribute it before they could discover on how to make it better.

There's just too much wrong with this game. Play it for yourself and see.… Expand

Initially this game felt very solid to me, it felt like a good addition to the franchise.. that is until I got to the second sequence. This game is absolute trash, a complete waste of money and I couldn't even be bothered to start it again despite paying $50 for it. Even if you get this game for free as a gift or some other form, save yourself the headache and either return it or remove it from your computer.

This shouldn't even be called AC3, they took everything that made it Assassin's Creed out. It's not like the old Splinter Cell games that the first Assassin's Creed was modeled after. The only similarity between the first one and this one is the less than perfect movement. There is a linear path in this game, no creativity at all, the only path you can choose is the order in which you complete the now mandatory Synchronizations. You have to do missions a certain way or you fail, you don't get to try new things unless it's convenient for the game.… Expand

I don't know how many times I have failed a mission because I didn't know what to do and only found out after failing that mission! The lock picking "mini game" simply does not work, check YouTube to see what others are saying about that! Way too many cut scenes! Combat is horribly simple and repetitive! This is a lot like the first Assassins Creed but prettier and easier for the most part, when it works!… Expand

This game ruined everything I used to love in the Assassin's Creed -franchise.
(1) The characters were not exciting.
(2) Story was not exciting.
(3) Assassin's Creed used to be about assassinations, not charging enemies with your sword out. This game encouraged to brawling, many missions even started with enemies attacking you.
(4) Parkour is missing. Lack of heights, building too wide apart. Even the greatly advertised tree jumping is more linear than all CoD -games combined.
(5) Sum of previous 4: The game is just not that fun to play. Once I completed it, I felt no desire to go back and complete all mini missions and try for 100% game completion. Maybe if Ubisoft fixed all the hundreds of bugs, I might feel intrigued again...… Expand

I've never uninstalled any open-world game before without finishing it first. AC3 will be the first. I decided I'd rather watch the ending on YouTube than suffer through the insanity of game design. My monumental disappointment stems from the realization that such an incredible game series has fallen so very far since the first and second games, including their variants. Despite being a "stealth" game, accomplishing objectives with stealth is either impossible or unrewarding. Lockpicking is a hair-pulling affair, the enemy AI is laughable, and travel (despite being reworked in a more advantageous way) is even more of an annoyance. Heaven forbid you run into the rock wall of a cliff above you and need to choose left or right. If you choose wrong, you're running ALL the way back. There's no way to climb up, the trees nearby don't go high enough, and you can't Fast Travel to a closer location to start again because Fast Travel is turned off during a quest. The only thing I love about this game is the music. An incredible score keeps up the exciting tempo. Such a waste, though. God damnit.… Expand

Fail and disappointment f the year :( That's very sad because I'm big fan of AC series and was waiting hardly this part to come out. First, this is NOT AC game at all. Everything good from AC2, ACB and ACR is gone. Controls are totally changed and practically unplayable. For first 30 minutes be sure to make popcorns because there is 30 minutes unskipable boring animated sequences series. Overall, unplayable game which have nothing in common with good old AC games. Everything except nice graphics is bad in this game.… Expand

This game has turned into call of duty and their just churning out new ones each year, wait till this goes on sale for $20 or something, I do not know what I was thinking when I bought this....

First thing to hit you about this game is how badly optimised it is. The opening scene, which is set in a fores, makes your frames per second plummet. All this is but a taste to what is to come. Once you enter the city of Boston, the game becomes unplayable even in the lowest detail setting with frames dropping to as low as 20 fps. This is on a rig that plays Hitman Absolution and BF3 with no issues.

I guess this was expected since it is a Ubisoft game after all. Their console to PC ports are some of the worst in the business.

Gameplay wise, it's standard assassin's creed fare. Jump some buildings, kill some guards and hide in some things. Perhaps the gameplay would've been better without the infuriating performance issues.… Expand

**** console port. Ubisoft delayed the game three weeks behind consoles for what? The optimisation is horrible. There are barely any changable graphical options in single-player. The low FPS being experienced by many is the straw that broke the camels back. And on top of that, Ubisoft forum moderators state that there is no patch 'forthcoming' to fix issues. This is the last Ubisoft product I'll purchase.… Expand

I simply do not understand why people are so enthusiastic about this game. I hate games that take you by the hand and don't offer anything else besides the scripted linear path. The summary of my experience with this game comes to: "Hold E to skip cinematic" and "Follow the yellow dot to finish your goal". Extremely boring... moving on.

While this is the best looking Assassin's Creed so far, everything else is the worst and disappointing. The story missions are dull and uninspiring. The game also feels disorganized, there are side-missions that are already on the map when I haven't even meet the character associated with it. I found myself doing things I don't even know what for because I haven't been briefed. And most of the side-missions doesn't even bother to give you a reason. Just targets popping out in mini-map. 3 years to develop this? More like 3 years spent on the graphic engine and 3 weeks of rushing overworked coders on the actual game.… Expand

This game is awful... I seriously want to write a long review but even then thinking about all of the bad just enrages me. Story was so predictable that I got to the part where you first get to sail your boat and gave up. That's it. I was done. I knew exactly what was going to happen. Wasn't worth my time playing if I knew the story already. What awful story telling Combat is boring more counter fun. Graphics are no big improvement but the visuals are great. The characters I don't even remember... seriously who was in this game? Never touched multiplayer as this game disgusted me to no end. It was... just... awful. There is no more Assassinating in Assassin's Creed too... I noticed as I watched my friend Livestream it he just tomahawked all his victims... there was no stealthy approach or anything... 2/10 because of visual... love of God gaming industry you're just failing.… Expand

After good AC1, much better AC2 and best AC: Brotherhood, we have here revelations and AC3. Sadly it seems that Revelations and AC3 were made with different dev team that made AC1-2. AC3 is probably the worst. Dumbed down to it knees, fight mechanic, free runing... everything. No options for player, everything is scripted. You cannot control when and where to jump. Just press ASDW and everything is done for you. Occasionally (or more often) you just press E and another script will do everything for you. Cut scenes on every move, "press E" on every corner.. Overall for completing the game you just need 5 buttons- ASDW and E. I was looking forward to this game, but it seems that i will skip this release and will just look at the end cutscene on youtube and im done.... Im very sad that developers slapdash last two releases and ruined my whole AC enthusiasm :(… Expand

they ruined ac series with this abomination. Cities are boring, street after street looks the same. amount of guards on the streets/ roofs( ??) is ridiculous . Even in the middle of forest there are 9 men patrols walking in circle guarding snow. No idea why they made soo many of them, since you can kill them without slightest problems. Fighting never been so easy, still its ridiculous how many times you have to stab opponent to actually kill him. Main character is just some random dude, not even close to being so charismatic as Ezio. Missions are uninteresting, most of people I'm helping out i would rather leave to death. This game is much worse then Revelations and thats kinda a achievement.… Expand

I had high hopes for this game and was really looking forward to it after AC2 and the add-ons. Unfortunately, it does not live up to any of the hype as the storyline is completely haphazard and does not explain itself. To add to that the game play is nowhere near as good as AC2 and the scenes and sequences are cut short without explaining the story well enough. I am 40% of the way through the story and I'm still not sure about how a lot of things came to happen. It doesn't explain itself like AC2 did. The story doesn't flow, it's all over the place. And could someone tell me how an old black man (not being racist here, just factual), could own a mansion in America at that time? He would have been a slave, not a home owner and even if he was freed I'm sure the population at that time would have driven him out of the area.
There is a problem with riding horse along wilderness tracks. The horse keeps getting stuck by running into invisible walls. They also get stuck if you try to cross a river at the wrong place. They can't be backed up or turned around so you have to dismount and call the horse out.

Apart from the terrible story line, I'd like to know why Desmond has transformed into a silver back Gorilla? It was bad enough that he completely changed for a good looking Italian guy into an uglier older guy in Revelations but he now looks like something from several thousand years ago. Why couldn't the character models from AC2 be used in AC3? Have the characters suddenly been mutated by radiation or something?

On the whole, the graphics are acceptable but there are too many errors in game play. The sound effects are pretty good but a lot of the time they are misplaced in relation to the character/object and are too loud/soft in many instances.

This game is a big let down after the brilliant AC2 and unfortunately, there are too many things to "patch out." I don't know what Ubi soft were thinking with this version but they have definitely lost direction in game development between AC2 and AC3. Very disappointed.… Expand

This game should not have been made. The amount of bugs that exist as well as the bland storyline do not create an atmosphere that is worth seeing or playing. For players who have never played any of the previous games it will leave an empty feeling in your stomach for even attempting such a project. Another reason to never try this game is the fact that anything advertised such as the massive battles that took place during the Revolutionary War do not exist in the game. The player will only see 2 or 3 of the main battles and they mainly have you going from side to side avoiding fire or telling colonial soldiers to shoot at incoming targets. There is only one assassination during a battle, and for the most part it is the same rinse and repeat style that exist throughout the entire game. As far as graphics are concerned the game is beautiful compared to its console brethren. However, graphics alone does not make a good game. The sad part about the entire thing is the story. It makes players want to see what happens next but about half way through there is a feeling of a job. The game becomes tedious and not worth seeing after sequence 9 which is a huge shame.… Expand

This game is not bad, but I'm already tired of the same cities in the game. Graphics of the game is even worse than in the second part. I think that this game is ported from the PS Vita.

Good: Pretty good story line, not a common scenario that you would see in other games. Graphics are good. Cities look realistic, definitely captures the feel of the era. Weapons are pretty cool. Fast travel has been added in more places than just the tunnels. The money systems have been revised, it takes a little more effort to make cash now. Haytham is a very well done character and really good voice acting. The naval battles are awesome, easily the most enjoyable part of the game for me.

Bad: Very linear, yet jumpy story. There isn't a lot of creativity involved in what you do. Combat is great if you love cinematic kill shots, not so much if you enjoy honing your skills to get better. It's basically block when the warning thing pops up and mash the mouse button. It's often hard to pick up dropped weapons while in combat. There are some higher level AI that you fight that seem to just headbutt you and reverse your blocks making you just want to shoot them to end the hand to hand combat. Crafting seems very scattered and doesn't make much sense, why am I crafting barrels again? You will probably get stuck in the crafting menu until they get it patched. Lock picking... wtf. Doesn't make any sense at all. Your horse will likely get stuck inside of things frequently, but no big deal you can just call another. Better make sure you setup your shortcut key to the horse whistle though because your equipped weapons change by themselves. You may try to call a horse and wind up shooting a patrolling redcoat in the face. You can't just blindly jump from a viewpoint because it doesn't automatically line you up with the soft haystack at the bottom, this becomes annoying when you do the tree viewpoints and can't see the ground. Remember all those amazing underground puzzles in the past AC's? Yeah, none of that here. The main character isn't very likable. He's kind of an arrogant dick head to everyone. Achilles's story doesn't really end with a bang. Seems like they just ran out of time and forgot about that part. The story outside of the Animus is just out of control. It's not immersive and mostly leaves you with more questions than answers. The thing that frustrated me the most I'd say was the movement. The cities are designed to look more realistic, but unfortunately that means that rooftops are harder to traverse. Everything is very spread out, and it's hard to stay in the air for very long. The climbing seems to have been dumbed down a bit, when you want to climb it works nicely. If you're just trying to run away on the ground you will probably end up trying to climb the food cart or tree that's vaguely close to you, causing you to be surrounded. Graphics look nice, but aren't quite optimized. I have a decent rig, but there are lots of stutters especially when entering the big cities. At the end of the game, I'm very disappointed. I'd consider this the worst game in the series. So much potential, but not properly utilized.… Expand

biggest disappointment in 2012 is definitive AC3, at least for people which played the full AC line, The. player controls are a full downgrade from ACB / ACR to AC3, the whole story lacks of transitions, sometimes you jump into somewhere where you dont have the slightest clue what happened before, AC3 is more or less a 60 $ Cut scene video clips, lots of hours of gameplay is watching the video clips, so that you might, or might not get the story, lots of things make no sense after all. However one of the really bad things i figured is that its literally a bug release, i am sure they wanted to role out before xmas thou, however the stockingpiling menu f.e. is totally broken, some buttons dont work and you cant quit, there, CTD the game and restart doesnt help cause you jump to the broken menue right away, i finally found some forum posts on how to fix it, but still unbelivable to me how they can release so many bugs in a quite expensive retail version. the 85 metascore is unfort. a total fake, i guess they are forced to put it so that they dont loose ubi as advertiser, still sad to see, that games which are really bad, are recommend here!… Expand

If you are a PC gamer avoid this consolitus like the plague. Ported straight over to the PC without ANY adustments made for a mouse/keyboard setup [The indisputably superior controls over that neanderthal thumb wiggling device]

To the Assassin Creed 3 moron dev who said "PC gamers should use a controller when playing our game." You know where you can stick your console thumb wiggling device?

Save your money and buy dishonored on the PC instead of this dumb downed console game that is nowhere NEAR as good as the previous assassin creed games, Dishonored actually showed love for the PC control setup.… Expand

Honestly, I could almost copy my Far Cry 3 review over here since this game suffers from the same issues. AC3 as well is a prime example of mass produced casual garbage. It also suffers from a complete lack of creativity and vision, not to mention the same dreadful casualisation that aims to take all challenge out of the game and make everything so simple that even a monkey who fell as baby from a tree and badly hit it's head could do it. Why I'm giving it a higher rating than Far Cry 3 (Rating 1)? It's because the world is a little more immersive and you at least don't see blinking weapon and ammunition vendor machines in this game.… Expand

It's only **** port of the console game [ps3/xbox360] , poor graphic options, poor keyboard controls, no aspect ratio 4.3 for resolution. Its good game on console's but **** game on PC.

Great story and setting, very well told, but it contains quite a lot of bugs, and the controls can drive you really crazy at times, which is especially annoying in long missions, where you die at the end and are then placed at the start of the mission. Most missions do have checkpoints though, so it's only a few (really annoying) missions who suffer that problem.

Ok so, good stuff first. The singleplayer - awesome. I'm only on mission 3 and already drawn in - story, characters, graphics, music are top-notch. Combat controls will take a little getting used to, but not like it matters - just mash all the buttons, you'll win. Faces are butt-ugly though, not sure what happened there. I hear they pulled a mass effect with the ending, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.
No, the reason this gets a 0 is the multiplayer. Now, mechanics-wise, it's way better. Having kill and stun on the same button is fantastic. Everyone having a ranged ability is also great, I'm seeing much less roofing. Recycled kill animations are pretty lame, as is smoke bomb still being in the game, but whatever.
That is, when I can play at all. In Brotherhood, matchmaking was **** terrible, but hey, it was their first experience with that kind of multiplayer, excusable. Plus, they fixed it in Revelations and it was actually pretty efficient. Now it got worse over time, but I put that down to a dwindling player base. Here though, it's back, full retard. I got into a few games initially, which, by the way, had more lag than I've ever experienced in any video game ever, then the matchmaking just failed. Next day, tried for TWO HOURS without finding a single game, gave up, came back a third day, an hour later, still no luck. Now I've gotten into games, so it's not that there aren't enough people, it's just that it's not even trying! It'll say something like "trying to connect to session (1/7)" or (1/21) or whatever. After 3 tries, it puts me in my own session and never puts anyone else in there. If you leave and try again, it puts you in your own session right away. Do that a few times and it will say Ubisoft's servers are unavailable. Sometimes it'll just go to a blank screen (i.e. the background only, no text, music still going) and you have to alt-f4.
God damn Ubisoft. I know you don't give a **** about the pc community, but you don't have to make it **** WORSE THAN IT ALREADY WAS!… Expand

What a complete waste of time. I actually could't play this game for more than two hours at a time, fearing my heart would give in from my frustration:-) Every aspect of this game i worse than even AC1. Let aside the battles at sea whitch was new and great. The buttons, the story, gameplay, grafics, caracters, conversations, cutcenes, I could go on and on, they all suck! Do not buy this game, and spare yourselves from a lot of pain. Alex Hutchinson name is now burned in to my brain, and i will forever shun from anything he puts his name on… Expand

Terrible. After 3 hours I can't stand to play anymore, and from the very beginning I realized this was a game to be dismissed. I've played all the others in the series, but the pacing and mission design is absolutely painful to go through. I consider myself patient, but after nothing but cutscenes and missions that say "hide in a bush, or spring up to this thing and press E" only to enjoy another 10 minutes of cutscenes is very frustrating. And also, after completing tediously boring sections of a mission that include mind-numbingly mundane eavesdropping, some bum spots you a half second before you kill him, and BAM you are a failure and must restart the entire mission.

Boston is bland and uninspiring. Freerunning has become something of the past, the building design doesnt support fluent running and movement. This game is basically about pressing the E button when prompted.

And WTF is with the stupid lockpicking? Broken as hell. Extremely disappointed with this game, I have no desire to continue playing only after 3 short hours of gameplay (chalk it up to about 8 hours playtime due to boring cutscenes and dumb mission design failures.)… Expand

Well... before I start, I wanted to tell that I just had to register to write this review. Let it be a warning for anyone who reads the comments here. Assassin's Creed was a great franchise, I loved both episodes and expansions before this. They had their problems, but all in all were great games with a magnificent story, which is not usual these days.

So to this game. It has some annoying bugs, yes, which game does not? Ok, maybe a little too much bugs, but a few patches can solve most of these problems. If you want a game with action, where you can kill enemies by the dozens in a fight and love jumping on trees and houses, this is your game. But, if you like the story too (like me), then just don't bother with this. Cherish the memories of the previous games and pretend like this does not even exists. The start of this game is aweseom, as you expect it, but it is all downhills from here. There will be some plot holes through the story, but the real **** comes at the end. The last few hours of gameplay is like a bad dream come true. The story and all events towards the end are so nonsensical, that it drove me mad. I was like "WTF?" at everything I saw. It literally rapes the story in my eyes and i'm ashamed in place of the creaters for what they have done.

All in all, if you think Mass Effect 3 had a ****ty ending, then you can not even fathom what waits you here. If you are a fan of the Assassin's Creed games then avoid this like the plaque.

I only gave 2 points for the great 2 previous episodes, this deserves a 0 as a standalone game.… Expand

The bloated decaying corpse of a once great franchise. I have been a fan from the beginning, but this final installment was easily the worst of them all, by a wide margin. All three of the points I have given the game come from the in game graphics, specifically the forest environment. As for the rest of the game, all I can say is awful game design, poor animation and bad writing. One of the strangest things about AC3 is that much of the fun, 'assassin' gameplay of previous titles has been replaced by military themed mini-games. That is where they would actually allow you to play the game - AC3 is easily over 50% lengthy cutscenes, featuring characters which were ultimately dull and aroused no empathy from the viewer. Worse still, I often found the final blow to an enemy was delivered not by me, but in a cutscene. I found myself longing for even the most minor of interaction to feel like I was actually playing a game I had spent £30 on. I would not recommend this game to anyone, it is simply not fun.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. SPOILER WARNING - This game was "RUSHED". I have absolutely loved every AC game prior to this (with some exception to ACR), and the buginess of the PC version can attest to that even though the PC version was released weeks after the console versions. Questions...why is Valley Forge in the middle of Massachusetts (Go to VF in the frontier then look at your world map)? Why is George Washington portrayed as some weak imbecile? Why did they lead us to believe this would be the last game in the series when they clearly set it up for another trilogy? Ubisoft really dropped the ball on their flagship series. I wouldn't mind waiting until after 12/21/2012 for a better game. Dear AC fans, we are now officially being milked... -___-;… Expand

**** Assassin's creed title yet. There is a lot to do, but absolutely nothing is fun. Combat is just silly and once you watch an hour of combat you have seen it all. Sidequests don't feel important. Stealth no longer feels important or fun for that matter. Connor is a dipsh*t. The story doesn't make sense.

AC3 is an exercise in frustration. I know that I am in the minority here, but I hate this game. Which is shocking, considering that I love the all of the other AC games (yes, I even liked Revelations despite its flaws). I feel that the Ubisoft Montreal has been trying to pack more and more activities into each iteration and this has taken focus away from the core mechanics put into place in AC1 and refined to perfection in AC2. Not that I minded the extras built into each chapter, I just found that Brotherhood and Revelations were veering into territory that moved away from what made AC2 great.

AC3 has obviously been designed with the 'more is better' school of thought in mind and I for one am getting tired of the focus on quantity over quality. In this case, less would have been more. The characters are worthless (including Connor and Desmond), the story felt hacked together like the writers had no idea where to take the series after Ezio, and the missions are rubbish (despite what reviewers are saying). I can only think of one or two that were actually entertaining. Oh, all of the praise that is being heaped on the 'naval' missions - it is essentially Sid Meier's Pirates but more modern. Not one thing in this game is revolutionary and despite all of the raving going on about how it is an achievement for the series, I actually found that AC3 is more linear and less entertaining than the first AC game, just more awkward and confusing. Combat is rubbish, pathfinding is rubbish, running around the forest is NOT fun after the first ten minutes, the cities are bland and not very fun, there is no room for your character to grow, items in game are super expensive (seriously, 24 bullets costed 2000 pounds? Really?). The list goes on...

Why are people raving over a game that really should have taken a critical lambasting for being lazy and rushed?… Expand

COTSCENE kill 5.... COTSCENE walk 5 meters... COTSCENE press one button... COTSCENCE. 3 for the facial animations and the blood... fap fap fap +1 for the ship fights. the rest mehhhh. I am curious what's next on ASSASSins LOST!? Who's responsible ****

The game has become a soap film, you go and listen dialogues, sometimes you ride a horse, commanding fire, you can control the ship a minimum of action. No stealth and plot battle with 15 people. Conor listens some left people, carry out their orders, instead of himself all to understand and come up with a plan. Gameplay is very boring, all for the sake of the plot, sometimes very stupid.

Score of 0. Very poorly done and very poorly ported to PC. Horrible controls. Mouse accel is only acceptable on extremes for SP(10) and MP(1). Nothing like any previous games. Stealth is gone. Assassinations are gone. AC is gone. Turning into a COD clone with guns now. UBI robbed us of funds

I love this series. I'm actually kinda heart broken. They tried to do a lot and couldn't finish it - Everything feels incomplete. Maybe im just an old fart gamer and this is my final, cynical nail - but I highly doubt it. I saw so much potential, patiently waited through the reviews on the consoles and got this baby into my hands.. but then I was hand held for well hours- The optional objectives are unrealistic, confusing. The story while full of merit, and follows the previous template of the other stories - has been over done and feels outlandish. The character portrays native americans as if they were quiet simpletons most of the time - until he makes up his mind on something, and even then, you might find yourself intentionally walking into the enemy, killing someone you wouldn't of thought you would, or losing the ability to communicate like a normal human being and left finally to once again be stuck with hand holding through minor plot points.

Another reason I'm so annoyed is the UI is awful, and they knew it when they released it. The assassin system is merely an ode to what was made from a super power system - and half the time they don't even work, buggy terrain or just watching on from fences - a near constant immersion breaker. The guild missions are horrible and horribly done with no obvious or explained pro's - and the trade system is pretty much the same, and time consuming for -nothing- Even the Boat missions which are actually rewarding - DON'T EVEN GIVE YOU THE DAMN COSTUME YOU'VE BEEN WEARING THE ENTIRE TIME ON THE BOAT- THEY GIVE YOU SOME OTHER GUYS AND MAKE YOU LOOK LIKE YOU'VE GOT A POTTY ON YOUR HEAD.

I always thought people hated the assassins creed series because it was a bit lengthy and complex. And for some reason some gamers seem to hate that?!? -This at first seems to play on that.. But then you find yourself struggling to climb trees- buildings with obvious climb points - being rendered unclimbable until you run away and come back. Extremely annoying in some of the missions when your character suddenly decides - he can't climb, has no acrobatic skill - or wants to SUICIDE ON THE SIDE OF A FRIGGIN HAY CART. *Breath* The Developers in this story, take on the role of the templars. They hold all the ideals of a good game but, it's hollow, because all they are interested in now is the money the franchise can generate - not the happiness it could bring those who enjoy it's freedoms. See what I mother f--king did there? Yeah. THATS HOW BAD YOUR WRITING WAS.

The original three act story has now been fragmented so much everything of relevelence, unique or powerful is near common place. You know modern day security agents only fire one single shot? JUST LIKE THEY ARE USING FLINT LOCKS? It just makes me mouth vomit. But out of respect for where this franchise started I wanted to see the end. No spoilers just the credits. Every other assassins game you could speed through the credits. This one, after a very hollow ending which im not even going to get started on - I was forced to sit through multiple countries and regions credits, like they were PROUD I wasted 70 hours into it - You know what? 8 of those hours I can legitimately put down to the fact that I fell asleep waiting for the credits to roll by, to make sure the game saved and so I could try and finish the assassins missions (which are horrible)

It's sad that the rest of that time I felt like I was being forced to run or ride around long winding terrain, even to find the fast travel points you have to spend ages dealing with a concept that's extremely unrealistic and that gives very little reward for a lot of time spent. The devs spent a lot of time focusing on the forest - to do it again, to the level where they couldn't even see the trees. I don't want a game of nod too's and references too good games (di vinci's flying machine) - I want substance, details - not quick mash cutscenes - not cutscenes with 'fake' quick mash cutscenes to show me 'how quick' other characters are.

I think it's just sad. This whole 'lets try and be interactive cinematic' attitude game developers have at the moment is a level of self delusion worth commiting for - You're game designers. Make games. If I wanted a 6 hour movie - I'd call Peter Jackson, If i wanted I hybrid, I'd buy a prius - I come to you for games. Make games. Don't try remodeling the wheel when you don't know crap about the industry you're trying to recreate in a GAME.

This was written to completion using individual keys instead of just holding the one like you have to through the entire game of assassins creed thanks to the new movement system.

I was going to give it a 5 - but the Ubisoft 'launcher' (read steam clone which steam launchs so you can play the game) annoyed me so much I had to take off three points (it also accounts for about 30 hours of my 'in game time' on my steam)

waste of time for all involved.… Expand

Might be one of the biggest face plants in game design history. I would guess that roughly 60% of the game is pointless filler. Gameplay is sometimes entertaining. Mostly maddening. Ending felt like it was written by a fourteen-year-old. As a tree climbing simulator I would give this game a 10. The harbor chase near the end...wtf Ubi. Wtf. That's the climactic finish? Punish **** us repeatedly by having to perfectly run a gauntlet 50 times? High fives all around, right guys? Amazing! I hope everyone involved with the making of this game was fired.… Expand

I am a fan of the assassin's creed series but I hated this one. First of all the new character has the personality of a cardboard box, unlike Ezio, Connor is overly serious all the time. Also the combat feels just like it did before, parry, counter, kill. I also found the story boring, the one sided American revolutionary plot is so biased it made me cringe. The first 4 hours give you freedom, the game never really recovers. The free running is bad, there are so many glitches. Assassin's creed 3 had so much potential but something went very wrong in making this game.… Expand

This game doesn't work with 3D Vision at all, even though it should since it is advertised as working. For me, it's a definite goner. The thing with 3D Vision is, once you played games in S3D, you can't go back... sorry

Expected much more than I got. It really is unfortunate that they'd incorporate such a bad ending in an attempt to milk the series in the future. Don't expect anything groundbreaking.

Ubisoft sells this product "as is," i.e., without any kind of useful warranty whatsoever. When a merchant does this, it is a tell-tale sign that they have no faith in their product and that you can expect shoddy workmanship. Assassin's Creed 3 lives up to the non-guarantee Ubisoft promises. It is an embarrassing, bug-riddled mess. As numerous players have reported, the game crashes frequently and without warning, sometimes forcing a system reboot. If this happens, you had better hope the game isn't saving your progress, or you will lose your entire savegame data, like I did. Moreover, despite Ubisoft touting that the game was being optimized for PC, and that it was necessary to delay it longer than its console counterparts, the game runs terribly on the PC. Expect to see frequent FPS drops despite very little actual GPU usage. For some reason, the game makes use of only a single core of the CPU and that is causing massive bottlenecks. Don't expect Ubisoft tech support to help you either: they will blame it on your drivers even if they are up to date. When I asked them for help getting a refund they told me to shove off.… Expand

First of all, I never finished brotherhood, so I had to go back and play it again. Then I had to Play Revelations because I had never played it, just finished that one 2 days ago. First of all, let's start comparing Assassin's Creed III to Brotherhood. In Brotherhood, you were practically thrown into the city of Rome, with no armor, limited weapons, and no money. But, you had the opportunity to go around exploring and climbing viewpoints. The viewpoints revealed Borgia Towers, which after liberated, would reveal new shops to renew, thus you would make more money. By contrast Assassin's Creed III is set in Boston, and although there are viewpoints to climb, there is no reason to climb them, because there is nothing to do. All the viewpoints do is reveal the map and that is it. Don't expect the familiar areas to liberate, shops to renew, weapons and armor to buy, assassins to recruit type of deal. All I have been doing so far in this game is finishing one main mission, watching a cut scene, then going to another main mission and watching another cut scene, then once again going to another main mission with a huge cut scene. There are only two side missions: collecting almanac pages and courier missions. The courier missions give you money, but it is useless, because there is nothing to buy and no shops to buy anything from. All you have is a pistol, your assassin's blade and a sword, which you buy at the begging and that is it, that's pretty much all you get. For the past few cut scenes, the story line is centers on Conway liberating other dudes, although he says he's going to explain why, he still hasn't...hopefully I will find that out after I watch a little bit more cut scenes. If you are planning to buy this game, I warn you, it's mostly just an interactive cut scene as far as I can tell. The element's that make Assassin's Creed are missing thus far ( I am still in the Haytham Conway part of the game) there's nothing to do on the map, except walk to the next main mission.… Expand

The 3rd work that destroyed wonderful series. From very troublesome craft systems, poor subordinates, and anything, stealth is used well and it has not become an invigorating game. There are a stealth game of the company and a big difference.

This game is OK! Its nothing special or awesome. Its also not very bad. In my opinion this game is a bit too long. (I didnt read the story after 20% of the game, quiet boring this stuff). In the end the cutscenes are too often and too long and the worst you CANT skip them. Thats not what i wrong from a good game you still need a skip button. I dont want to see the credits, iam not intrested in them but you cant skip them. (fail) The game has good graphics but the hair from characters are just terrible, even GTA IV had better hair. Also the controls are not very good. In some missions you need to sprint but sprint is also the climb button so sometimes you climb stuff up that you didnt even want. There are also no marks in missions. (I often failed because of that). Iam happy that i didnt buy that game. I got it with my new PC. Thats not a great game. It have some positiv some like the openworld, graphics in some ways, also minigames etc. etc. Never played AC1/2 and i wont play AC4 its not that good.… Expand

Along with Revelations the worst AC games ever. Revelations had bad gameplay and story. This one has a little better gameplay and an AWFUL story. If the player actually gave a damn about any of characters by the end of the game the ending would be considered as bad as Mass Effect 3. Truly it's that bad. The fact is that none of the characters are the same as they were in AC II (by far the best game in the series and one of the best games ever), they have been redesigned, ripped out of any true content and are just there to say the occasional capitalist propaganda. Actually, this game is a propaganda in and on itself, sexual innuendos all over the place (sequence 7 is a disgrace for the American history), Templars are made to look good, Connor actually is a wimp when it comes to his father (guess the creators have a really big problem with their sons or the new generation as a whole we' re gonna get you anyway :P) and generally it's just an effort after effort to make you doubt the Assassin ideals and turn over to money, for without money and insanity they can't rule the world. In any case, if there was a negative rating on Metacritic this game should have had it as it is the biggest disgrace to a once great series, that after Desilets left has just gone SO MUCH downhill. Serves good as a reminder though of how this system is starting to fall apart and tries any way it can to not lose the supreme control it once had. All these people serving the system are afraid and thank you for showing it so clearly every day. The times have already changed. Good luck with your downfall. :D… Expand

When you make a game in 3D on consoles and then don't even bother to on PC there is undoubtedly something wrong with that picture. The game had been advertised as being 3D Vision Ready and yet it's an absolute mess in 3D on the PC version. It's an utter shame, when all the prior Assassin's Creeds worked so well in 3D Vision, to see such a work of art butchered in 3D for the PC version. Many current 3D gamers cut their teeth on 3D on consoles and have since moved on to 3D gaming on PC where it's more readily available and by far superior to console 3D. Yet, here we have the latest installment of the series that, because of devs laziness, isn't in 3D where it's far better suited. The average 3D gamer just doesn't want to play in 2D anymore, both of our eyes have been opened to the possibilities and we just don't want to go back.… Expand

NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....NO 3D Vision support....

WORST game i ever played!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One of the most poorly optimized games I've ever played. Running the game in the lowest settings possible yields no change whatsoever. Despite everything, I managed to slog through about 2/3rds of it. If you're expecting me to say that the game somehow makes the technical shortcomings all the worthwhile, prepare to be disappointed. The story is disjointed, and the gameplay; sluggish. Assassin's Creed was a complete chore to play. I held out as long as I can, but I ended up uninstalling it from my library prematurely and moved on. I suggest that you do the same as well.… Expand

Try as I might, I really can not enjoy this game. I don't know if it is the setting (not American, so don't care for the setting); the combat; Connors brilliant sack-of-bricks charisma and personality; or what. I just can not, for the life of me, enjoy the game. I've tried multiple times to play it, and enjoy it... but it is the dullest of the AC games so far. I wish I had bought it on xbox, so at least I could have traded it in and replaced it with something enjoyable.… Expand

Yet another disappointing installment in what was once an amazing series. It is very strange to say, but this game is extremely well-done in almost every way you could imagine. The graphics are exquisite. The story is reasonably compelling. The characters are interesting. The voice-acting is decent. It is a clever tapestry of fiction and history woven together well enough that you might have trouble separating the two (uhm...that could also be considered bad, I guess). The naval side-missions are so much fun that they deserve to be their own game. And yet, I had trouble even getting through 40% of the game. The reason? The uninspired, painfully simplified gameplay mechanics. This game has a ridiculous amount of gloss … Expand

full synchronization rubbish makes this game so frustrating. playing a sequence over and over again is enraging.
storyline is of desmond is rubbish and written by a 3 year old.
i hope the designers of this game die and lose all their family members.

The introduction takes ages only to reveal something "shocking" which is totally not worth it. The city is dull, generic and the npc's say the same thing. The music is gone, you just run around a generic block town with identlical npc's in silence. This is the game: Run from A to B, cutscene, rince and repeat. When a game is trying so hard to establish a story by making the player sitting endlessly watching cutscenes, it's trying too damn hard. This is the first time I've uninstalled an AC game before finishing it, and it is sadly the last time I'll ever buy another. Maybe I'll play the old ones again, they still have value.… Expand

This review is based having not got very far in the game at all, I've given up and uninstalled it - something I hardly ever do after spending significant cash on a AAA game. The most frustratingly annoying section a few hours into the game gives you a mission where you have to free some captives from three locations, two around a fort and one group on a ship. Now, it doesn't matter how many times I tried to do this, always I would get detected at the last minute, for reasons completely unknown to me, you then desyncronise and have to go through the same process again, and again and again. The enemy AI is not consistent at all. One time I was able to kill a guard at the same spot and no one noticed, the next time the AI guards decide to turn round at that exact moment. I've played I don't know how many stealth games, such as Deus Ex: HR and Dishonored, so I know what stealth-action is all about. However, AC3 does not allow for even one small deviation from what I've seen. The first few hours were ok as an introduction, but still a lot of cutscenes and glitchy combat. Sorry, I know my review score might well be better had I played more, but I think I got through 4-5 hours and then decided that was enough. Pff, disappointing!… Expand

Ridiculously buggy to the point of not even being playable. As always, the storyline and voice acting are superb, but the majority of the game is action based and nothing ever, ever works properly. AC3 spits on the legacy of the franchise and should be ignored.

Disasterous.

Its a copy paste AC game... There is absolutely nothing knew to this AC game besides the story. The gameplay is exactly the same as the others. If you want a good AC game take up brotherhood, where you have options on how to play along with an amazing story. Even the main character outside of the levels goes, "oh this again?" Whenever he begins a sequence.

This is one of my least favorite games so far within the franchise for a few reasons. Firstly the environment in comparison to the previous games is extremely bland, in comparison to the characters in the past their is no investment or reason to care about Connor and his story due to lack of personality and character growth. The start-up of the game is extremely slow. past the point of any story pacing and seems like a huge few hour delay before the game actually begins. The big staple of the series mechanics in the past were to use rooftop access to escape pursuers, but in this game you are penalized for it extremely as in within moments you'll have dozens of guards hone in on your position, while that is annoying enough when your at a distance their rifles magically and tremendously increase their firing rate. The campaign is broken in comparison o the other games in the series and can be buggy when climbing trees, ala Connor grabbing a hole in the tree on the third try doing the exact same thing ive been doing. The only upsides is the games combat is more fluid due to change of controls with different button mapping for the controller users. Multiplayer sees some ups and downs in this entry also with the inclusion of a more robust customization system. But once again that suffers from a environmental downgrade.… Collapse

You spend more of your time traveling between places and doing other boring stuff than actually assassinating people and doing other assassin-y stuff. I am almost at the end and never bought anything from a store because they are not visible on the map, also only way to make money is through a tedious process. Plus the confusing battle controls, etc. I liked the previous games, but am disappointed with AC3.… Expand

This game is a real dud of a game. The only two interesting game features in the game are the ship battles and the decent combat. All story and side missions suck and the game is full of bugs, waiting around and meaningless drivel. I am fan of AC2 and Revelations but this installment is completely skippable and uninteresting.

All the other negative user reviews have pointed out all the flaws and bugs etc., so I'll just point out something else which is bad in the series. By they way, the critic reviews are paid off, no doubt.
I completed the main story not making side missions (a few, max) and I explored just a little. Most of the time I just fast traveled everywhere or just rode straight from point A to point B. The game completion says "20 hours" in Steam, and my synchronization-% is 38. The main story is 38% of the game, maybe a little less. Rest of the game consists of vague side missions that simply aren't interesting to play. I don't feel like wasting 35 hours doing some deliveries etc.
Also the accounting system is horrible. I didn't do anything related to the manor economy, and had more than enough money to spend. Who the wants to spend time sending some wagons to export some material to don't-know-where to get 20 bucks? It was absolutely horrible, didn't even try to understand use that... thing. Totally unneccessary. In AC:B the Monteriggioni repairs and stuff at least made sense and you felt like "I need to do this, it's my home town." or something.
Too much time is spent to travelling. Way too much.
Another things:
1.) I have no idea what the Almanac Pages were for. Didn't give a ***t so didn't collect them.
2.) I didn't buy anything from the stores. I didn't even find any stores in the cities every now and then when I tried. All the weapons I used were hidden blades, tomahawk and sword. I didn't even feel that I had a need for other weapons. I also don't have a clue if you could get better armor or so... Connor was pretty much immortal anyway: 10 sword hits and still standing.

I'm also a huge AC-fan, but in this game all I wanted to do was to get the main plot through as fast as possible, and ignore the uninteresting side missions.

About the "real world", outside the animus:
1.) The plot was totally f****d in AC:R with the god-sh*t and ridiculous 2012-apocalypse-sh*t.
2.) In AC3 the plot has gotten very, very lame, and there will be trouble ending it all in a way that makes sense and isn't stupid.
I hope the series end in AC4. It should've ended in revelations, no doubt. It has gotten mainstream like Tomb Raider and has nothing new to offer. It all just smells like moneymaking and Ubisoft being unable to let go of something that's their number 1 profit while they should.

The best possible plot in AC-series would've been that after AC:B Ubisoft would've made an AC game that's located in real world in the present, and the Assassin's would've fought against the Abstergo company and defeated them for good. No paranormal/supernatural rubbish involved. There would've been 4 games in the series, and that's it. No more.

It's hard to write a solid review, because so much things pop up in my mind that needs to be said, and this text box is so damn small.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. This game didn't quite grasp the full extent of the Assassin's Creed series. In my opinion AC Revelations & Brotherhood are the best in the series. This game however didn't live up to my expectations. There's no final boss battle! You will just kill the final Templar & then the credits rolls up.There are no character developments either. If you didn't read the Animus database, you wouldn't even know who really is Achilles & how the Colonial Brotherhood was disbanded. The story is great but the narration sucks. Ubisoft became lazy after Ezio's success on his past three titles. The naval combat also doesn't really make a difference. I also would prefer Jesper Kyd's music over Lorne Balfe's. AC3's music didn't really impacted to me unlike the past titles. There are very few synchronization points & very few maps.… Expand

Boring interminable unskippable cutscenes. One of the weakest stealth engines ever made (look me in the eyes and tell me the stealth aspects compare to Thief, Dishonored, Metal Gear, etc.). Combat is ok, but really it's just a less-fun ripoff of the Arkham City/Asyum melee engine.
But here's the real problem: NO JUMP BUTTON. How do you make a platform game without a jump button? From the hype, I was hoping for a third-person Mirror's Edge, but all you do is hold down "run" and point the analog stick and the game plays itself. It's like a barely interactive cutscene. Imagine if you were playing an FPS where you just held down a "safety off" button and the guns all fired automatically whenever an enemy wandered into the crosshairs. Doesn't sound fun, does it? Neither is this.… Expand

Simply put, this game is amazing. It's visually stunning, and a lot of fun to play, most of the time. All the glitches are what drags it down to a 3/10 for me. When you spend 4-5 hours doing the same mission over and over again due to a glitch that they won't patch. They don't deserve your money.

So far it's good, not great though. the graphics have improved over Revelations and the gameplay is a lot simpler (for the better) BUT in pretty much half the missions you have absolutely no idea what to do and after failing a few times you figure out how to progress, plus the actual design of the different levels you get thrown into during missions is herendous, it's almost impossible to get 100% synchronization in most levels, I still have no idea what the developers were smoking when they designed these areas and it is extremely infuriating. The story is alright for an AC game and some of the characters interesting, but most are pretty one-dimensional and boring as heck. Overall it's leaving me a bit disappointed, it's like Ubisoft added some really interesting mechanics to the game but at the same time COMPLETELY butchered what made previous games great, and forgot how to design levels in the process, AND completely threw away any form of guidance to help you figure out what the hell you're doing half the time. This is supposed to be a great starting point for new players to the series but if an AC veteran that has played every single game in the series gets totally confused and frustrated half the time how the heck is someone new to the series supposed to get through the entire campaign?? All in all AC 3 is basically a mess, a shiny mess, yes. But still a mess… Expand

i would like to give this game a 6-7 but the climbing tree part of this game is downright broken and that's a big part of the game! it feels untested! so just because i can 0/10

Amazing graphics and cinematics... but that's about it. Ubisoft no longer pays any attention to PC gamers, who prefer to play with mouse and keyboard. Game is completely reliant on a controller and if you don't have one or don't like playing with one, you cannot play this game because the controls are impossible. This is a big one to me, as I've always been a big fan of the AC series, even back when it didn't reach that much publicity. Now I am forced to use a controller, something I do not enjoy in the slightest, to play one of my favorite franchises. The combat and gameplay is completely lineair, blocking off any creativity from the player. If you're looking for a good assassin game, I'd recommend Dishonored as I have had way more fun playing that than AC III, despite it's superior graphics. Assassin's Creed III is no asset to the franchise, instead it looks like it's going down the same road as the ever-criticized Call of Duty. Save yourself the frustration and the money, unless you're a die-hard fan of the AC lore, don't buy AC III.… Expand

as for the boring beginning the firtts gameplay is great really great,
nice combat moves and graphics buts thats about it as for you progress you se that youre enemys wil counter you counters and you have no way to kill them before the others schoot you like a dummy
as for the missions yea read others critics there pretty much the same on that
i loved the game until i got further and so its become a dissapointment and fails at its core for what it is entertaiment as i begain to play the against enthusiasm and removed from my pc a waste … Expand

I'm about 15 or 20% through now. It plays like this - Walk 10 yards, cutscene, cutscene, walk 5 yards, cutscene cutscene cutscene etc. Then later you run a couple of hundred yards for more cutscene after cutscene. It's really gettig on my nerves.

Buggiest AC game EVER!!!
Lacks the minor missions the previous AC's had.
What I hate most about the game it is buggy -_- just WTF Ubisoft...
Funny thing is another Ubisoft game is buggy aswell Heroes Might and Magic VI.

It may be good on a console but on a PC it is a complete rip-off. This is yet another bad port from UBIsoft (you'd think by now that I'd start to know better) to the point where I find the positive reviews suspect. The fact that the game is heavy isn't the point. The fact that even the most basic controls are barely functional is. The screen will say push "E" to pick up a musket and you can push that key until the cows come home and that musket will remain on the ground. The missions are kinda boring to be honest and the lack of save/load functionality means you will have to replay long boring sections of the game if you have any kind of life outside games and can't dedicate hours at a time to gameplay. Avoid this game on PC.… Expand

This game came included with my order of a GTX 660 Ti and I must say it was simply a dog turd included in the box. The downloading process was painful. The DRM is total bull****. The framerate was craaaaap! Everything went to **** after the boat arrived in the town, city or whatever. 20 fps on high settings! Wtf! Why include a game with my graphic card that doesn't even run on it? How was Ubisoft allowed to sell this broken pile of hippopotamus dung? If a game is unplayable, it's just not worth playing. Ubisoft, you're blacklisted to me.… Expand

BORING. That ´s how you define this game in 1 word. The game history and "open world" gameplay keep the pace so slow that i almost don´t see how can they have done the assassins creed 2 trilogy.

This... Is a very bad game.

The AC franchise has been losing much of its challenge since the second game. Now, in the series' fifth game, everything is so easy it feels like a joke. Enemies can be instantly killed by counter attacks which may be followed by single-hit kills on almost all nearby enemies; to make it even worse, now a big red icon flashes over an enemy when he's about to attack, allowing for perfect counters and thus making combat mostly a quick time event.

Moving around has been made easier, too now running is under a "safe mode", in which the playable character will automatically run and leap through the available path, avoiding jumps that would make him fall. Platforming sequences are, thus, a joke just hold the running key and forward, and the character will automatically progress to the next area.

I understand this change it's a way to deal with the lack of precise controls which has always plagued the franchise. It's the wrong way to deal with it, too instead of giving better controls, removing the need for them is basically throwing the baby with the water. Somewhat ironically, controls for everything else were actually made worse. The intriguing interface mirroring each key to a specific body part has been completely removed, and replaced by having two keys doing most actions, often overlapping them. Dual assassinations are even less precise now, and jumping, in the few moments it's needed, is the clumsiest it has ever been.

Even the basics of the AC franchise have been made worse. Viewing points don't reveal the entire map around them anymore, and many of them are exactly the same. Navigating above the ground has been made worse by having trees following very specific paths, so they are of very limited utility, and having buildings far from each other so jumping through them is often not doable. Side missions have been reduced to literally fedex quests or just killing a random, unnamed enemy standing around no story, no special circumstance to each killing, nothing. Even voice acting, which had always been brilliant in the franchise, takes a hit as the main character speaks with a monotone voice that remains as the voice of a teenager while he grows older in the game.

The setting is also lacking in comparison to the other games. The first Assassin's Creed was somewhat revolutionary by, despite having the September 11 attacks still fresh in memory, portraying the protagonist as a follower of Islam fighting against a mostly Western organization, and doing so with respect. While Ubisoft avoided the trap of denigrating a different culture, in Assassin's Creed 3 they fall for the opposite sin, by overstating the virtues of the American culture. Having one of the first interactive conversations in the game being a very long dialogue about how Benjamin Franklin was a very successful womanizer was only the first sign of the hubris America is portrayed with.

To make things worse, while graphic quality is huge the sea in the first sequences was incredibly beautiful, perfectly realistic the world is actually ugly. Boston is dominated by the same pastel colors everywhere, in a sharp contrast to Veneza in AC2. The Frontier looks the same in all its areas. NPCs and enemies have no variation.

Compounding the issue, the user interface on the PC is horrible, clearly a bad console port. The map requires the use of two different cursors, instead of simply allowing us to click on map markers, and more than once simply got stuck. Menus are horrible: they have been split on a "tab" menu and a "esc" menu for no reason, often do not respond to mouse clicks, sometimes fail to work with the mouse wheel, are a pain to close, and so on. Some of the interfaces are so bad, and so badly optimized for the PC, that not only they sometimes bug but also ruin entire additions to the game, such as the crafting system.

This is a recurrent issue within the game: there have been many new additions to gameplay... And nearly all of them are bad. Most consist of doing menial activities over and over, like hunting or selling goods through convoys; those things feel like shores, notsomething fun. The only fun addition are the naval missions, but even those become repetitive very soon. And despite new systems, there are very few tutorials explaining how they work in game. So my wagon is under attack and I need to go defend it? Sure, but where is it? Why doesn’t the game explain that those convoys are only visible within one map?

Simply said, there is nothing fun in this game. Stealth is completely meaningless, while it should have been the focus of the franchise. Combat and movement have been made so easy they are jokes now. Side missions have been replaced by empty grind. The setting is ugly, as well as bland. The user interface is horrible. I honestly could not make myself to play this game beyond sequence 7... And watching the end, it's a disappointment. Like everything else.… Expand

We should decide how we want to play, what we want to do... the game should only give directions, should not impose on what we have to do!!! This game could have 3d-vision support like it's predecessors, but it doesn't Disappointed!

Aside from the naval battle, everything else in this game is complete crap. Aside from the naval battle, everything else in this game is complete crap. Aside from the naval battle, everything else in this game is complete crap. Aside from the naval battle, everything else in this game is complete crap.

This is by far the worst, or rather said, the only bad AC game. Not only is it set in a boring time, with boring citys, storys, people, weapons and armors, but the citys are so small that there is almost no climbing at all. I cannot believe this is an AC game. They need to go back to the roots, keep the new graohics but go back in more interesting time zones.

Getting to the forest as Haytham Kenway and not being able to run in the trees made me laugh because of how racist it seemed. Anywho, the game is pretty riddled with glitches at some points and I'm not one for wanting to redo the same level twice in a row for something I have no control over. I wouldn't play it again personally, but Assassin's Creed has always been interesting before this installment.… Expand

There it is, assassins creed 3.. First of all, i thought the developers have learned from previous mistakes but it seems like the problems just further cemented.. When i arrived in boston i honestly thought there is something wrong with my pc.. Simply put i was stuttering my way through this game with a i5 2500k 16gb ram and a HD 6950 Seriously zero optimizations have been done, making this game a raw gem and yet the developers have done sh** to fix this problem yet it seems like they completely ignore it.. i would like to enjoy my product wich i have paid 50 bucks on on my pc wich i paid aprox 900 bucks for!!!! And now they keep on cra**ing out dlc´s and even announced AC4 Sorry, if they cant get this fixed first and keep ignoring the problem i pass on future titles from ubi...… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I don't care much for graphics as it's game play and story I'm after, so I won't make much if a point of the game looking nice. Haven't had enough time to get into this game properly but I'm already bored. After about an hour of 'game play' I've been forced to watch close to 16 cut scenes (which I can skip if I like...so I'll miss the story). I've only actually moved my character for about 10-15 minutes. "Perhaps this will improve" I thought. I closed it after trying my first sword fight not allowed to stab with my sword oh no. You must throw your first foe repeatedly into barrels, even when disarmed and on the floor. Perhaps an in-game training exercise? I also thought the first climbing scene in the theatre was a bit daft hanging from balconies in a tiny room in clear view of everyone. Very stealthy....… Expand

Well, still the same like Part1. Nothing special. A cool setting, indeed, but that´s all. No improvements in Gameplay, the stroy isn´t lame but also not great.

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Starting at the top, this game's story completely destroys all of the fantastic work that the previous four games worked so hard to tell. Even if this game had no other flaws, and it most certainly does, the completely nonchalant way the entire main story is just thrown away like so much tiresome refuse is unforgivable and justifies the 0 rating. I'll stop short of spoilers here, but if you enjoyed Desmond's story save yourself the time and just avoid this game.

Beyond that, Connor has to be the least likeable protagonist in any game I have ever played. His bipolar personality swings wildly between angry, whiny, and aloof. He's completely self absorbed and only one point in the game does he give any indication of empathy and self reflection. He makes no attempt to appreciate or honor the creed, the history of the order, or the man that taught him the skills. And he just generally doesn't seem to "get" the assassins.

For instance, Altair and Ezio both practiced quick kills. Kills that are both efficient, which one needs when fighting multiple enemies, and humane. And while Ezio does add more flare, and hits, to his combos, they both respect the life they are taking, even if they don't respect actions of those they are killing. Connor does not. His combos are brutal barrages of strikes, roughly 10-15 total and nearly each one fatal all on its own, that are not only a tremendous waste of time but a disrespectful display of power and cruelty. Is it rewarding as a player? Sure, until you realize it runs completely counter to what the assassins are all about.

And even all of that is just the tip of the iceberg. There are TONS of bugs in the game. One of my favorites was entering the homestead to find THREE copies of Connor's mentor, one seated in the chair and two standing one behind the other. And then there's the craptastic wardrobe malfunctions near the end of Connor's story. The "stealth" is useless and inconsistent in this game, as many reviews have pointed out. Missions are tremendously linear, leaving only one path to achieve full sync. Even the iconic preview movie scene is probably entirely impossible. And even if it isn't, playing out the mission like that will fail the full sync objectives. The buildings are so far apart and the roofs so heavily occupied that rooftop running is practically dead in this game.

Recruiting assassins is completely borked, with many of the mission markers not showing up. But then, Connor treats everyone like crap, so who cares if you get recruits. Besides the linear nature of the missions, many of the main story missions are tedious at best and don't make a compelling case for how Connor would have been involved in these historic events.

I could go on and on, honestly. I haven't even touched on half of the issues raised by others. In fact, the only remotely enjoyable thing about this game was the naval mini-game. But then, it's so completely different from the rest of the game that it really just feels like it should be part of a different game. And even then, I literally had my ship run aground by a cut scene in one mission and lost a full sync objective by a cut scene in another mission. So even as amazing as they are, they were still mired by bugs.

But in the end, I just can't get over the way the ending was handled. Not just what the ending was, but how it was done. There were so many possibilities for this game to have the most amazing ending of any series I've ever played. All of the hard work was done, the build up was complete. And then this game comes along and flushes five games worth of story down the toilet. Disrespectful.… Expand

As a long time fan of the assassins creed game series, i was seriously disappointed with this game, while the graphics and physics were great and i have to admit the premise of the game sounded very intriguing. it just didn't play out that well at all. The game has many bugs and glitches that make game play rather annoying at times but as these have been covered in many other reviews i wont get too into that here.
Now what really p***d me off about this game was, well for starters it almost seemed as if they had 2 teams working on the game, one making assasins creed 3, and another clueless to the series making an rpg based on a young native boy trapping and selling furs, and they just mashed them together, for example, gone is any resemblance of the stealthy sneaking around and assassinating people, this game is far more about button pounding hack n slash battles against 20-50 gaurds at a time then you have the completely annoying naval missions which wouldn't be so bad if they were just side or optional missions, but no this was a main mission in the story the ship controls were horrible and very difficult to get passed and again, wtf does this have to do with assassins creed? Then you have this whole thing of hiring craftsmen and workers to fill a town to make goods for you to sell, gather resources, craft items, etc etc,, LOOK, if i wanted to play minecraft, id play it, i wanted to play assassins creed 3, no such luck this time though.
Anyway i could go on and on about how bad this game is, I will just say, if you never played assassins creed before, check it out you might like it, however if you are a fan of assassins creed, do not get this game as it will ruin it for you.… Expand