mac_d wrote:
It seems I misunderstood Xbox Live's Games with Gold thing. I thought it was a case that for having Gold in a given month, I always got to play the game. I let me Gold lapse at the end of last year because I rarely used it. Outwith some brief time on Mass Effect Andromeda and when my buddy and I would play competitive Madden, I don't use it. When I go to boot a GwG game, it tells me I need to resubscribe. I'm not all that surprised, my concept I thought was a really good deal and finding out it's not the actual deal makes it more in keeping with what I would expect.
After enjoying Arkham Knight I wanted to play something else that had a fair bit of collecting things from a map so booted up Assassin's Creed Unity. Now, I'm a former fan of the series. AC was a good game, though needed a fair bit of work to really make it great. AC2 was brilliant. Great plot, good combat (although this would be improved later) and Ezio is one of my favourite videogame characters. Brotherhood and Revelation were great too, though 3 games in 3 years did leave me rather fatigued with the series. AC3 marked the end of my love affair. Mixture of boredom of the series and crap plot pacing. The first half or more was slow and awful and the last chapter lacked any emotional climax after the excellent chapter leading into it. Black Flag I enjoyed again, though I could have done without the naval combat aspects. Then we have Unity.
Now, I remember this game got lambasted at launch for just being a broken, unfun mess. I'm not caring for it too much. I don't like the combat, I don't like how everytime I move to go anywhere every guard sees me and hates me. I don't like the riddle missions. I find the control clunky in a way I do not recall from the previous games. I do think Paris is beautiful in game and the murder mystery missions are fun. It has some cool concepts but basically, it feels like a step backwards. That said, I haven't had any glitches at least. Of course, it's been 3 years or so since I played Black Flag and longer for the Ezio trilogy so perhaps I'm not remembering issues they have,
Also annoying, I can get AC2 Ezio Trilogy for £15 on Amazon but the download code version is £40. I pretty much never trade games in so I don't really care about physical vs digital and digital is better for my being a lazy *inaudible*.
My thoughts on the AC series are also fairly similar. I think it went downhill massively after Black Flag. My issue was simply that they seemed to simplify it so much, it made the free running easier (just hold a button and push forward) and that for me lost a lot of the fun in the game. I also never understood the hate for AC3, i really enjoyed it! Although for me, it was building up the homestead that was more fun than the main story.
Don't know if you're just an xbox player or play on PC too, but there's currently a Ubisoft sale on Steam which gives you every AC game for £38.