Assasins’s Creed-European Syndicate

In the present, Abstergo continues it’s attempt to clone an Isu, this time seeking the Shroud of Eden.  Shaun Hastings and Rebecca Crane try to figure out what they’re up to, but barely escape after being found out by Berg and De Costa.

 

Meanwhile, the Helix user (The player) goes into the past to find out where the Shroud Of Eden is located. The time is the Industrial Revolution, and the characters are Evie and Jacob Frye, twin siblings.

The two discover that the Assassin Brotherhood in London is in dire straits, and also that a powerful piece of Eden (Shroud) is located there after stopping a Templar trying to harnass the power of the apple. The Templar Grand Master, Crawford Starrick, has much of London under Templar control using his ties to industry and other ventures, and naturally also seeks the Shroud.

There, they meet the leader of the Brotherhood, Indian Henry Green (Who takes a liking to Evie and vice versa). The twins work on a strategy. Evie will search for the shroud with Henry Green, while Jacob will primarily work on bringing London’s  gangs under his control as “The Rooks”. They also come in contact with many historical people-Charles Darwin and Dickens, Marx, Florence Nightingale, Frederrick Aberline,Alexander Graham Bell, PM Benjamin Disrali,and of course, Queen Victoria.

 

Along the way, they deal not only with extra Templar conspiracies-including a mind-altering drug called “Soothing syrup”, robbing the bank of England, and attempts to shake up the politics of the time. Evie also finds clues to the location of the shroud in the old Kenway estate and other London landmarks. She also develops a relationship with Henry, and a rivalry with Templar second-in-command Lucy Thorne, who steals the key to the Shroud. Also, Jacob’s acts complicate Evie’s in a few ways, causing a bit of a rift between Brother and sister (and also with Green, when Evie starts to become detached to focus on her mission).

It all culminates at Buckingham Palace, where Starrick manages to find the vault containing the Shroud despite the best efforts of Evie, Jacob and Green.

 

However, together they are able to overpower Starrick, even with the powers of the Shroud managing to heal him. They decide to just leave the Shroud in the vault.

They also get honored by Queen Elisabeth for their efforts. But the story doesn’t end there….

They help a young Arthur Conan Doyle solve a particular bit of Crimes in “The Dreadful Crimes”, a weird series of interconnected capers which ultimately lead to a attempt to steal the Queen’s scepter.

Then help exiled maharajah Duleep Singh against a templar plot in the Last Maharajah…

 

However, the most consequential of their adventures involves Jack The Ripper. Twenty years later, Jacob, investigating the Ripper’s murders, is himself ambushed by the Ripper, injured and imprisoned. Evie, now married to Henry Green, returns to England to help track the Ripper down, using new techniques she learned in India.

 

It turns out the Ripper is in fact, a former Assassin, a mentally deranged student of Jacob who went nuts (Basically, Darth Vader to Jack’s Obi-Wan Kenobi). The game allows you to play not only as the older Evie, but also as Jack in some placements. Eventually Evie tracks down and kills Jack, rescuing her brother but tells Aberline that nobody must ever know of Jack’s link to the Assassins

 

Finally, a helix rift-and the help of the Juno A.I-in the main game brings the action to World War I, where you play as Jacob’s assistant, Lydia, who deals with a Templar plot around the time involving yet another Sage. It’s revealed that Evie and Jacob are also still hanging around, although probably quite elderly at this point.

Meanwhile, back in the present, Abstergo manages to get their hands on the Shroud, despite Shaun and Rebecca’s best efforts…..

…..And then the whole plotline is pretty much dropped, as AC Origins and Odyssey decide to take things in a different direction with their modern day story. Well, at least in video game form. The plotline is resolved in a comic book instead.

 

Gameplay-wise, AC Syndicate plays a bit like it’s predecessor (skill trees, similar weapons), but with some major changes. #1 there’s  a grappling hook which helps with some of the taller structures.

Second is the Rook gangs you can recruit, which can be used as distractions/ co-fighters etc. similar to the way you could summon Assassins in some of the other games.

Horse-drawn carriages also play a substantial role in the game, as opposed to just using horses or the occasional carriage-related mission in the earlier games. They can also be stolen, which has led some to label the game “GTA: Assassins’s Creed).

 

 

Like several of the other games, there’s a “hub” with various mementos, ways of generating income etc. This one’s a Train hideout. It’s used in a few missions here and there too.

 

After the somewhat bleak and chaotic world of Unity, the game’s also far more lighter and ‘fun’ than it’s predecessor (apart from the Jack The Ripper expansion, for obvious reasons).

 

Next: AC hits the big screen-and it’s canon!(Sorta). Plus, we finally learn the origins of the order itself in Ancient Egypt and Greece…and we have a new protagonist as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Assassin’s Creed Part IV-European Unity

Now we move to Assassin’s Creed Unity. The first game developed for current-gen systems, the game returns to the European setting, this time in France (mostly Paris). However, the game is somewhat infamous for heavy glitches at launch, including a “No face” one. Nevertheless  the game includes graphical and gameplay updates, although the sailing aspects of III,  Black Flag and Rogue are non-existent, as instead we have the crowded city streets of the French Revolution in Paris.

 

In the Middle ages, between Assassin’s Creed I and II,  The Templar Jacques De Molay is killed, creating a major setback for the group….but not before he and an associate manage to hide a sword and book.

 

In the present, Abstergo is now trying to retrieve Isu DNA. They already have the body of one saga; now they need another. An Assassin leader, Bishop, wants you to track down the whereabouts of the body using a Helix Animus. Occasionally, you’ll also slip into Helix glitches which will take you to other eras of French history, and even meet a familiar lady under construction and get a chance to climb the Eiffel tower too, although these have nothing to do with the Arno part of the story.

And in the 19th century, Shay Cormac has just killed Charles Dorian. His son, Arno, is taken to the care of Templar Grand Master De La Sarre, whose daughter, Elise, he has just met.

Years pass. Arno and Elise fall in love, but Arno is unaware of the whole hidden war going on. Arno, doing chores for De La Sarre, gets a note but decides to just leave it under De La Sarre’s door and visit a party Elise is attending (Unbeknownst to him it’s her initiation into the Templar order).

After leaving her to return, Arno accidentally stumbles on De La Sarre, who has been killed! He is then taken to the Bastille in Paris.

At the Bastille, Arno is able to see strange writings on the wall, and makes the acquaintance of Pierre Belec, an Assassin, who knows what happens to his father and begins to train Arno in the ways of an Assassin.

They eventually escape during the storming of the Bastille. Returning to Versailles and meeting with Elise, Arno  discovers that the note he slipped under the door would’ve warned her father about his death. It turns out that the people who killed him were part of a Templar faction led by a mysterious figure.

Arno joins the brotherhood-who are somewhat skeptical of him given his relationship with a Templar woman and his motives for revenge,  but accept him anyway.

Meanwhile, the French Revolution is now underway. Along with Eloise’s help (although she is obviously not trusted by the Brotherhood), as well as figures of the time like Napoleon Bonaparte and Marquis De Sade, Arno hunts down the Templars involved in the conspiracy. It turns out Le Barre wanted a treaty/parley with the Assassins, and that was why he was killed.

Eventually he also encounters Francois Thomas-Germain, who although posing as an ally of Arno at first, is actually the French Templar grand master who ordered De La Sarre’s murder. He’s also a Sage, one of the Isu reincarnations of Juno’s husband.

However, an internal schism is developing with the brotherhood itself. Bellec kills the leader of the Assassin council (In part because he disagreed with his methods, but also to frame Eloise), causing Arno to kill him in return. Later, he messes up an attempt at getting Germain in order to save Eloise, and gets kicked out of the Brotherhood. For a few months he goes on a bender, but eventually is convinced to come back, as now France is in the grips of the Reign of Terror.

After dealing with Robespierre,  Arno and Eloise track down Germain who is now seized a Piece of Eden-the powerful Sword of Eden, which Molay was hiding.

Overcome with settling the score with Germain, Eloise attacks him but she is unfortunately killed during the battle. Arno brutally kills Germain but leaves his body in the crypt.

Years later, he returns to get the skeleton of Germain, and then puts his skull in the Paris catacombs, where it’s among thousands and would be incredibly difficult for the Templars/Abstergo to find.

Later, Arno, although sort of still an Assassin (In the DLC “Dead Kings”), is still in mourning for Eloise. Marquis De Sade contacts him in Franciade, where he receives word of a new Piece of Eden underneath an Isu temple in the city-this one being an Apple. Arno is able to retrieve the apple, and sends it to Egypt for safekeeping as he suspects his old friend Napoleon is after it for his own ends. Although Arno’s attempt is ultimately in vain-Napoleon gets the apple when he later has his own Egypt campaign-as revealed in earlier games.