Assassin's Creed Brotherhood

 The third installment of the Assassin's Creed series, not counting the online game, Project Legacy. Assassin's Creed Brotherhood brought something to the table that none of the other Creed's contained, Multiplayer. It had a short storyline as usual and took Ezio to Rome. "This was bound to be a great game", I thought, but was I correct?

   Singleplayer will be touched upon first. There are a few new combat implications, the crossbow, which is probably the coolest long range weapon of stealth ever. The development team also created the use of the hidden gun while using swords and hammers seen in the picture above. The poison blade has gained the ability of long ranged poison, which is pretty awesome, but overshadowed by the more powerful and quicker weapon of destruction, the crossbow. The base combat has been upgraded to be faster and a lot more awesome. This sometimes makes combat too easy, making it feel like your swatting a group of flys instead of elite guards. Assassinations stay in the same basic concept, though you dont start out with your hidden blade from Assassin's Creed II, you have to buy it from Leo. The additons of the Assassin recuits lets you train them and use them to battle foes on the field. After training them long enough, they can become full fledged assassins, which are almost invincible. The game gains a lot from these awesome assassins.

As every Assassin's Creed game has been for me, once you finish the story mode and complete any side quests, it becomes boring. The same is true for Brotherhood. Though the storymode is amazing and gives you a feel of living Ezio's deadly life, it is extremely short, as mentioned before. There are more side quests than in Assassin's Creed II, but in an overall feel, Brotherhood seems like the same game. The only differences between Brotherhood and #2 seem to be a slight graphics upgrade, multiplayer and a different story, combined with a few new weapons and a different combat setup. It is still worth it's cost for the singleplayer if you're a fan of the series.

The multiplayer has a few modes, Wanted, Manhunt and Alliance. If you get the free DLC you also gain Chest Capture mode. There are variations of a few modes, resulting in a hardcore mode. Multiplayer though is a lot more enjoyable than singleplayer. Duking it out with serveral friends, or participating in a ranked match against battle hardened foes who are constantly owning you give Brotherhood a new edge. There is a normal level up system with perks, abilities, death and killstreak rewards and character customization that are unlocked at various levels. This leads players to have a reason to play, if not for just plain old fun. The graphics, if it's not just me, seem to be better on the character models in multiplayer. This is probably because lots of Brotherhood singleplayer models were salvaged from #2.

 Overall Score: 8.0