Review: Assassin’s Creed II

Assassin’s Creed II tells the tale of Ezio Auditore da Firenze, a 15th century Italian who gets drawn into the world of assassins when family members are executed.

With Leonardo da Vinci as his gadget wingman, Ezio strides his way through multiple levels of bad guys, trying to get to the truth behind the killings. The expansive game provides detailed renditions of several Italian cities, including Florence, Toscana and Venice.

Of course, like the original Assassin’s Creed, the past-life assassin is really just a virtual trip induced by chemicals and electronics, allowing a present-day descendant to experience the action from a laboratory in order to retrieve important information from the past to use in the present.

Living as Ezio means that life is always at risk, as the quest to find and eliminate those who are behind the killings leads down many roads. The path is a winding one, however, with many obvious and not-so-obvious conspirators.

The story spans 40 years of Ezio’s life. All the big names of the day are here – Borgia and Machiavelli and Medici – as the seemingly lone assassin seeks to foil a grand plot.

The game looks great. The rendition of the cities is both detailed and vast. The flourishes of the buildings and the teeming people within the walls bring the time period to life.

There is also plenty to do in game, something the original Assassin’s Creed, released in 2007, had a problem with.

There is, of course, the main storyline. Then there are side quests to earn money – assassination contracts, races, cheating husbands to reform, gold chests to find, assassin’s tombs to explore, feathers to find and more.

There is also a mini-game of sorts that involves earning money in order to restore the family villa. As money is earned, it can be applied to aspects of the villa, thereby allowing the villa to earn more income. It does not figure into the main gameplay and is not terribly intricate, but is a nice diversion.

There is also another storyline beneath the surface – one involving computer-coded glyphs scattered throughout the world by another participant in the experiments – that offers puzzles based on classic paintings and famous people. Finding the glyphs and solving the puzzles reveals “The Truth.”

The game also implements what developer Ubisoft calls Uplay, an enhancement to the Xbox achievement system. Completing certain tasks or levels within the game earn the player points that can be used to unlock themes, costumes or locked levels.

The variety of options is what keeps Assassin’s Creed II fresh and engaging from start to finish.

With the chief business at hand being assassination, Ezio has much at his disposal. He has weapons and skills and armor. He can scale buildings to gain vantage points. He can hide in specially-marked areas and strike from concealment.

He can become anonymous by traveling with small groups of people. He can hire groups to aid him – courtesans, fighters and thieves – who will engage guards to distract them.

All the while, Ezio must monitor his notoriety. The more notorious he becomes, the quicker guards will take notice.

The action leads up to an ultimate showdown with a powerful opponent and some trippy peeks into possible future Assassin’s Creed titles.

Assassin’s Creed II is a vast improvement over the first game. The game developers took a solid concept, implemented some of many game players’ concerns and the result is one of the best games of 2009.

Platform: Playstation 3, Xbox 360 Rating: Mature Manufacturer: Ubisoft Score: 9.5 “assassino” chilies