Assassin's Creed 2 casts you as such a character. Not only are you a thief and all-round shadow-dweller, you’re also a hired killer, ready to slip a knife in whomever the highest bidder wants.
This mobile version takes the rather traditional form of a scrolling platformer, but still lets you use your assassin’s skills with every move. You can hide in shadows, take out enemies unawares and swing between rocky outcrops in street-runner-meets-tarzan style.
It’s all controlled with the keypad, while each level takes a similar formula. You work your way through a city, to wherever your victim is, generally taking out a few guards on the way, then kill them and spend the next minute or so scurrying back, with a procession of footsoldiers hot on your trail.
While the console version of Assassin’s Creed 2 is an open-world game, this mobile outing takes you by the hand each step of the way, offering on-screen prompts whenever you need to press anything out of the ordinary. This has both advantages and downsides.
It lets Assassin's Creed 2 become very cinematic, with set pieces galore happening around you as you jump and dash through each level. However, it also lessens the amount of control you feel over your character. As buttons are often context sensitive, they occasionally won’t respond the way you want them too.
So, while you can in theory jump over an enemy’s head and run away from them, upon contact with them you’ll automatically enter ‘combat mode’ where your jump button makes you block. Thanks to the extent that Assassin's Creed 2 filters what you can and can’t do, you’re pretty much stuck with hacking away at them until they drop.
For the most part, this isn’t too big a problem, but it makes certain sections of the game unnecessarily frustrating, especially when Assassin's Creed 2 ups the pace as you’re trying to escape.
There’s no denying that this is a top production with excellent, atmospheric visuals. However, by the time you’re half way through you realise that Assassin’s Creed 2 doesn’t really offer you up that much control over your character’s nimble-ness. Instead, you’re just given an impression of acrobatics that’s quite rigidly controlled.
There are arcade-style vertical shooter interludes that pop up every few levels, but they don’t quite manage to eclipse these frustrating moments. Unfortunately, these were the same issues we had with the game’s predecessor, released back in 2007. If you’ve not yet experienced this game though, Assassin's Creed 2’s flashy tricks are worth gawping at.
