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Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood Game Review

Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood is a 2010 action-adventure video game developed and published by Ubisoft for PC and other platforms. It’s another terrific entry in this venerable series.

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“A true leader empowers the people he rules“

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When this game was released, it was a hit and it garnered strong reviews. Although it is not quite held to the highest esteem, certainly not as much as its predecessor, it actually came very close to that game’s remarkable quality, leading to one of the better entries in the series and one of the most underrated.

This is the second game in the Ezio trilogy of stories that continues his arc. Ezio must kill Cesare Borgia, the son of Rodrigo, and prevent him from further wrecking havoc on the city of Rome. This script is rather underrated. It’s not quite as sophisticated as the previous game’s storyline, but it came close, especially in regards to better supporting characters and terrific dialogue. The Desmond scenes set in the present are for once actually interesting and memorable with that twist cliffhanger ending being so intriguing.

The overall narrative and main quest part of this entry is rather short, but the story still flows very well and it’s continuously highly engaging to follow. Lucy, Shaun and Rebecca are quite fun and perfectly solid characters in the present-day scenes while Ezio received a rather strong, moving romantic subplot with well realized Cristina.

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Those sequences were quite cinematic even and the same goes for most of the moments portraying various characters’ deception and betrayal. Ezio’s arc overall, though, is not as strong as in the previous installment. But Leonardo da Vinci is back and some of their moments together were quite playful and fun. Cesare is the best character in the game as this strikingly competent and memorable villain. Chasing him throughout the main campaign was a lot of fun. Lucrezia was also lovely as one of the more over-the-top villains.

Unlike the previous games in the series, Brotherhood is set in just one city. Naturally, this decision was made for better and for worse. On the one hand, the resulting game lacked variety, but on the other hand, it was more meticulously detailed and complex. Rome as it was depicted here was so authentic, so realistic and so beautifully designed in backgrounds, various shops and famous buildings. The highlight is the Coliseum itself, which was epically grandiose. The NPC residents of Rome would behave in rather advanced ways for the time. Couple that with so many interesting side quests and personalities that you meet while solving them and you’ve got Rome that felt very much lived-in.

As is usual for the series, Brotherhood is an open world action-adventure stealth game that is played from a third-person perspective. For the first time ever, the game included a multiplayer mode, but because I played the Steam version over a decade after its original release, I had no option to play the multiplayer as it is now discontinued. Apparently, it was quite good, which poses the question whether this series should embrace this mode more in the future.

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Ezio is the protagonist, but you also play as Desmond in a couple of rather well designed levels that resembled a platformer in a way. The combat is changed and for the most time improved upon its predecessor. The strikes are now deadlier, thus forcing you to play in a more offensive manner. I actually liked this choice as somebody who loves fighting multiple enemies at once. I just wished that the A.I. was smarter as way too often they would just stand there and wait for you to punch them instead of attack you first.

And this brings me to my major issue with this game, which is its overly relaxed difficulty level. It is so easy and breezy to play through this game, especially in its main campaign. When you kill one enemy, you can start an execution streak that makes you kill multiple enemies consecutively. This felt so effortless that it did not pose a bit of a hurdle. On the other hand, the animations are so strikingly cool and Ezio’s movements almost balletic in feel that the end result was still a combat system that I really enjoyed. The stealth in this entry is significantly more important, which was great as it required more patience from you as a player, but the tailing missions were still quite long and dull.

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The hidden blade was my favorite weapon in Brotherhood as it’s a very stealth-focused installment, so killing enemies with the blade was extra efficient and satisfying. As for the other weapons, they are all well realized, even including the pistol. Some complained that it made the game too easy, but I disagree as the pistol was so realistically primitive and thus difficult to use that it was still better for me personally to stealth kill most enemies with the blade. This game also included other unique enemies with the cavalry being particularly well utilized. You can even kill horsemen jumping from your own horse, which was super cool. Stealing their weapons and beating them to death with their own spears and axes was also a freshly added element that really worked.

You have to destroy these Borgia towers scattered throughout Rome. There are twelve of them and this system is terrific as you destroy them to minimize their control over the city. This means that these side quests in the game are for once meaningful to the main narrative instead of being just there as an additional gameplay option. Destroying these towers and killing the main soldier in charge of the city’s area was such a fun mechanic that led to you taking control of that region, which meant that you could now recruit assassins.

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And now we come to the main difference between this and the previous two installments. People who are being harassed by the guards become your personal assassins when you help them out. You can then send them on various missions, but this system was barely customized and overall rather boring. The crux of the recruitment experience was making use of these assassins during your own missions. With a special button, you whistle and the assassins arrive from a couple of different positions, assassinating your targets with the blade. This mechanic was so much fun and absolutely crucial during some harder missions, but again it was one additional thing that made the overall playthrough way too easy for me personally.

There are additional missions that are either in the main game or in the DLC that was released afterward. The Copernicus missions were quite a breeze and they were a lot of fun. He was well realized as a character and some of his dialogue was quite interesting. But unfortunately I have to say that I really disliked the Leonardo missions. You do unlock the parachute, but it’s barely used within the game itself after that point.

The flying missions were ridiculously hard because that thing was hellish to operate and so primitive. But the tank mission was by far the hardest one for me to 100 percent, which I eventually did by abusing a certain glitch. It was another horrible vehicle to operate and I wish that they excluded these missions. Thankfully, the main campaign had one early cannonball mission that was overall quite solid, but for the most part these types of levels, though a breath of fresh air initially, proved to be too frustrating.

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Other side missions include assassinating templar agents, which is always a lot of fun to do, and completing challenges for the ally fractions, which include courtesans, mercenaries and thieves. How all three groups were incorporated into the gameplay was terrific and they all made the game quite varied and complex. The Cristina missions are easy, but the romantic storyline in them was quite moving. The highlight was finding the treasure of Romulus in these underground lairs that were quite sophisticated and lavishly designed. These levels were pleasantly reminding of Prince of Persia and they were among the most difficult mission to 100 percent, especially those of the timed variety.

That brings me to my next point – the difficulty level is quite high for the completionists among us. The game gives you the option to relive memories, which means getting to play those missions that you failed to 100 percent the first time all over again. This was a unique aspect to this game and it prolonged the playthrough significantly. The game is way too easy in the main campaign, but frustratingly difficult to fully complete due to the finicky nature of controls, A.I. movement patterns and too many timed missions present.

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Each treasure chest contains certain ingredients that are necessary to gather in order to complete the assignments from doctors etc. These would then unlock treasure and flag maps that made it much easier for you to find these objects. It was quite a superb system. The flags and feathers were also easier to find in this game than in the previous installments. Investing in the city was also a more accomplished feature this time around with more shops, buildings to buy and paintings to obtain. I did miss Mario’s mansion, but otherwise the action moving to just one city made things easier to navigate. Traveling through these tunnels was also a great mechanic.

Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood is visually quite dazzling. There are a few glitches here and there, but for the most part the game runs smoothly and the graphics are phenomenal. Rome is meticulously detailed, superbly designed and quite colorful in its inhabitants and buildings that you get to visit. There is a lot of joy to be had when leaping from the tallest towers or when climbing some of the famous landmarks of the city.

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The score isn’t amazing. Though serviceable, it’s too similar to the last game with some cues being repeated in their entirety. The controls are just as clunky and as overly complicated as ever, but the length was just right for this game and the variety to the missions made it enjoyable throughout. The voice acting should also be praised as it was absolutely incredible. Each actor delivered such a nuanced, lively performance that elevated even the smallest roles in the story to greater heights.