Assassin's Creed: Syndicate - Standard Edition - PlayStation 4

In the grand scheme of games Syndicate will hardly rank among the finest or most beloved games, but it is a solid Assassin's Creed game. I played it on PS4.Gamers are, broadly speaking, little more than irrational malcontents going by the general thoughtlessness of their critiques and their eternal dissatisfaction with all things. Series like Assassin's Creed are easy targets for these hopeless creatures, because Ubisoft doesn't hide away in mountain tops and come down 5 years later like the folks at Rockstar and allow everyone to believe that GTA V somehow needed 5 years to be virtually the same concept as GTA IV. Think what you will about Ubisoft Major, but the teams working on Assassin's Creed have done a fine job of making each game distinct despite the natural overlap in concepts and the break neck release schedule. I thought the series was over when I saw what a mess AC III was, but every game in the series afterwards has been completely worth the money and a lot of fun (I purchased Unity after they had patched out nearly all of the launch bugs) to experience. The complaints have become so indefensible that you can find people suffering from "series fatigue"! As if they are in an Assassin boot camp where they are literally being forced to live out the memories of their ancestors in an Animus! A yearly release slate doesn't mean "everyone has to buy all AC games and play them against their will" ... it simply means that there is another one on the market if you want it! ... Series fatigue...what a world we live in.I am by no means an apologist for this series because it does have plenty of flaws and facepalm worthy moments and decisions, but it seems like people have forgotten what we have been getting from this franchise year after year, which are excellent facsimile representations of historical locales and a surprisingly strong cast of playable characters (even if they appear within stories that often leave a lot to be desired). The series definitely has lacked a coherent evolution from one title to the next, but the silver lining is that we have games which are more distinct than people are willing to admit. Who could have imagined the naval aspect would be so fun and fit so well with the series before that huge departure from the typical urban centers of the previous games?Why all the preamble? Because Syndicate is far more distinct from Unity and really every other AC game to date than anyone is giving it credit for. This is not just Unity in London by any means, but I'll use Unity as my reference.Unity was an attempt to give AC a stronger sense of role-playing and in a lot of ways was most similar to AC II. Combat returned to a more defensive system and Arno is probably the biggest lightweight of all the Assassin's in order to make combat and strategy feel more meaningful. Looting and gear were far more important as well.Syndicate says to hell with most of that! Jacob and Evie are not only two of the best acted characters in the franchise (either could have held the game up alone, but they're so much better together) they are also supreme death dealers with one of the better arsenals in the whole series:- The zipline is great and anyone who plays this game will miss it going forward or when playing older games. It isn't just for quick climbing, it also has a big impact on your stealth and infiltration abilities.- Speaking of stealth, this is the best in the series. It is simplified from Unity's somewhat clunky system and there are new stealth perks that impact how brazen you can be. No improvements to AI however.- The whistle is back! You can also move and hide bodies again.- Throwing knives are better than ever and guns make a return, of course, along with berserk darts.- You get your classic smoke and new stun bombs (that I never really used, but can be quite handy).- There are three weapon types: brass knuckles, sword canes, and kukris, which all have different strengths, being speed, stun, and lethality.- The Rooks function in a similar way as the Assassin recruits in Brotherhood and can be used creatively as a distraction to get something done or flush a target out or just kill everyone in sight.The major departure from Unity is how fast-paced the combat is and how powerful Jacob and Evie are compared to Arno. There is a largely meaningless combo multiplier that applies to a single melee perk, but you'll probably want to stretch it just for the hell of it. They have also brought back multi-kills, which take out 2-4 weakened enemies at a time, but the cool contextual kills from Unity are gone. Instead of the sometimes unpredictable and strange dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge system of Unity, Syndicate has a strict counter, attack, break defense system that is far more straight forward. All in all, Syndicate is a world apart from Unity in terms of how fast-paced and powerful you are--almost too powerful really.Syndicate also has an enlarged skill tree that improves combat, stealth, and misc. abilities. I highly recommend doing Evie as pure stealth and Jacob as pure combat or else you will not be able to appreciate the distinctions between them. I would also suggest that you never get Evie's invisible perk until you need the trophy, because it is really irritating and unnecessary (think Chameleon in Bioshock). You are so incredibly strong by the end, you might prefer to unlock perks sparringly to keep combat interesting and maybe unload points later for the trophy.Another unique component in Syndicate are the carriages. They are no replacement for the sailing of Black Flag and Rogue, but they are a hell of a lot more interesting than the cars in Watch Dogs. You can tell that a lot of time was put into the carriages and they are fun to crash around in the races and chases (London Drift never gets old!). It isn't a really deep system, but certainly more than I expected going in. However, there is an unpredictable game error that will leave your game starting and stopping during random carriage scenes and train sequences, which ruins them, but thankfully it doesn't happen every time.Syndicate at first glance looks pretty bad. The reason for this is some truly horrendous character models (not including Jacob or Evie, of course) that look like they were ported from PS3. The views are also not as impressive as they were in Unity and they have also eliminated whatever filter Unity used that gave it a highly cinematic look and created some really striking if overly-diffused lighting effects. There appears to be a trade off in the form of a day/night cycle among other things and once you settle in, the game still provides plenty of screen shot worthy moments.As for misc. content and side missions there is a ton. If you enjoy this aspect, you will be busy for tens of hours. You have carriage races, carriage defenses, carriage hijacks, train robberies, thug assassinations, thug kidnappings, clearing outposts, boat robberies, fight clubs, and the usual treasure and glitch gathering. As per usual you free areas from enemy control and it is somewhat more interesting via the gang fights at the end. All these activities are pretty basic stuff though and handling them creatively is entirely on you as the game never pushes a challenge on you. After awhile, you'll feel a certain amount of boredom with most of these activities.The activity that is pretty fun, though not quite "there" are the detective stories, which typically do a good job of keeping you at least somewhat uncertain until all the clues are gathered.The main story is acceptable, but it's not going to redefine or elevate the series. The Templars feel uniquely underwhelming in this title, perhaps because I don't know of them like many of the characters in other games, but Jacob and Evie were always enjoyable enough that it never really bothered me. You'll also find a cool segment where you get to play as a third Assassin, which acts almost like a mini DLC to break up the main campaign.All in all, there is a good amount in Syndicate that is unique to it and unlikely to appear in the next round of games, especially if they do end up going to ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome (yes please!), so if you're "suffering" from "series fatigue" this isn't a cure for that, but only a blind, dishonest, fool could pretend that Syndicate is a stale repetition of Unity. Swapping between the two will instantly expose the vast yet subtle difference in their approach, play style, and pacing. It is really too bad that not only Rogue, but now Syndicate is suffering for the sins of Unity's launch, but again there may be a silver lining in that all the post-AC III games have been a step away from being not just solid series games, but great games in their own right and the unfortunate low sales might allow for some needed polishing and refining. So, by all means hold off or wait for a sale, but don't believe or pretend that Ubisoft hasn't made an acceptable effort to distinguish Syndicate from its predecessors.

If you like modern ac games you will like this

This review is for the PS4 version.I am pretty late to the game with AC games. Recently, I played for the first time and completed the Ezio Collection and although there were some things I found that I didn’t like about the games, I was hooked. So, when some of the other AC games went on sale, I grabbed them, including Syndicate.As with the other AC games, there is lots to do with the main missions, side missions and collecting stuff. As it is with the collecting things, it does get a bit repetitive and probably the least favorite part of the game. My least favorite of these are collecting the helix glitches which are hard to see, hard to find and a pain to collect at times with the requirement to exactly put the grapple hook in a certain area to be able to grab the glitch, in addition to looking like the fast travel icons on the map. The find the killer side missions are fun though and something different to do in the game. The boxing matches are fun although I found a bit glitchy as at times, the fighters get stuck on the outside of the ring. There are the horse races which are ok but nothing particularly special.The London landscape is detailed and well done with really good graphics. The basic gameplay is pretty much the same as the previous games as I have played which makes it feel familiar and easy to start playing but at the same time, it feels the same as the other games with only a few new additions.I am not big fan of multiplayer so the lack of a MP option is not a big deal for me.With the Ezio collection, I felt that the gameplay controls were a bit awkward especially for jumping and climbing. Syndicate seems to be much smoother in that respect, especially with the climbing that feels smooth and easy to do, although there are times that the character does something different than I expected or wanted it to do. The one awkward thing to me is how they do the leap of faith jumps that take 3 buttons. I really would have preferred this to be a bit more simplified.There are lots of places to see and things to do and I really like exploring the varies areas around the city. There are more places that you can go inside, such as the pubs and such although outside of mission specific things to do or collecting, there isn’t much to do. It would have been nice is there is more opportunity to interact with the environment and various citizens of the city. It is cool to be able to play as either the brother or sister characters, although the abilities page is pretty much the same and there doesn’t seem to be a lot of diversity in what they can do.Although I have enjoyed playing the game, I do have a few grips though. There are times when there are glitchy camera views that make it hard to see and do things, such as a massive tree blocking your view in the middle of a fight. There are long loading times in various parts of the game, especially when you have to restart a mission. Sometimes, when you need to push a button to do certain things, the game gets a bit finicky as to the specific area you need to stand to do so. Normally that isn’t a problem but when you are on a timed mission, such as the stop the train mission, this can be a bit of a pain. The grapple gun is a cool addition to gameplay but sometimes is a pain to use as it only allows certain areas of a roof to grapple to. I am also not a fan of the trend to pay with microtransactions to get extra stuff concept but luckily you can avoid that and still build your character without paying extra to do so.I can see where people can be frustrated with the sameness of the series but for me, since I have only played the Ezio Collection, I am enjoying the game even with some of its flaws.4 stars

Liked: Excellent plot and gameplay. Vehicle combat, it’s great! As somebody else put it, you almost don’t want to follow missions because you have somuch fun playing through it your way.Disliked: The bloom setting forced on the PS4 player (PC players have options). I suppose the developers chose this as a trade-off, to create a “steampunk” feeling, but I wish there was a setting on PS4 to disable it.

El juego venía sellado y todo bien con ello, el único problema fue la calidad de la bolsa con la que se envió. Nada protectora y sin nada más en su interior para cuidar la integridad del producto. Una simple bolsa de plástico y ya.

Buen juego, es bastante divertido y las nuevas mecánicas que implementaron hacen que tanto el combate como el recorrer el entorno sea más fluido. Ambos personajes son bastante buenos, lo único que le impidió que le pusiera las cinco estrellas es que en lo personal la historia no es tan buena como en Assasin's Creed. En cuanto a Amazon el disco venía suelto y pues ya es como la cuarta vez que me pasa, lo bueno es que al ser discos Blu-ray son más difíciles de rayar y pues el disco estaba en perfectas condiciones

Después de haber jugado el Unity, con sus cambios en el modo de juego, regresar a las raíces fue como jugar algo totalmente diferente. El juego tiene una historia bastante larga y divertida. Y como siempre, un montón de "side quests" muy variadas. Buena compra!!!

Product received in a day. Christmas gift. My husband loves this series