Assassin's Creed II - White Collector's Edition

Assassin's Creed 2 is a much better game than its predecessor. For one thing, it's actually a complete game, possessing a beginning, a middle, and an end, where the original Creed had a very interesting beginning and a satisfying end connected by 20 hours of interminable grey tedium. And while this sequel may not feel quite as fresh as the first game's handful of exceptional moments did, it serves up a more consistently enjoyable experience from start to finish.

AC2 isn't without its flaws, but it benefits from a completely reworked structure that keeps the pace snappy and makes those minor issues fairly painless. Without a doubt, the most important improvement here is the way Ubisoft Montreal revamped the core mission design. The first Creed offered a sharply limited palette of objectives: Scout the area, undertake a set of investigative assignments, kill a guy, repeat. ACII offers more varied primary tasks, largely relegating the previous game's toilsome errands to the sidelines. You may have a friendly chat with Leonardo da Vinci one minute and kill a politician at a gala event the next, while events like races and extracurricular assassinations are almost entirely left to the player's discretion. One could conceivably play the game strictly for the story missions, which would result in a lean, cinematic, eight-hour adventure.

Click the image above to check out all Assassin's Creed 2 screens.

The great thing about AC2 is that you don't have to play it that way. You don't have to play it any particular way, in fact. At any moment, the game is bursting with available objectives, both mandatory and optional, spread across half a dozen beautifully rendered city-states of Renaissance Italy. These range from the obvious (advancing the story) to the obligatory (hunting for cash and collectibles) to the exceptional (exploring a number of self-contained tombs crammed with Prince of Persia-style platforming challenges). Completing any of these tasks results in a real sense of accomplishment with tangible rewards, giving AC2 an addicting, just-one-more-mission appeal.
ac2 is truly a fantastic game.

Set in Renaissance Italy, in the cities of Florence, Venice and Rome and other sites, this sequel is likely to change the game for the better.

Enemies can actually check for hiding spots, even after leaps of faith, but allows Ezio to assassinate guards easily and quickly when they draw near. Aside from that, you can swim and then hide in the canals of venice, assassinating curious guards the same way as was mentioned before.

Besides having dual wielded blades, throwing knives and a new mysterious wheel-lock firearm, Ezio will be able to utilise weapons from disarmed foes as he rises up in skills.

The presence of famous figures from the period will be made, with Leonardo da Vinci himself making a rather shady appearence to lend aid to Ezio, as well as the presence of figures such as Lorenzo de Medici and Niccolo Machiavelli.

But to those who played the previous game, there wil be more variation within missions, with around 15 mission types, more tactical combat as Ezio is able to fight with multiple enemies simultaneously, and the role of da Vinci's inventions to aid Ezio in his quest for revenge.

This is gonna be a great sequel!