Previews// Assassin's Creed: Revelations

While the last Assassin’s Creed game introduced the Brotherhood (which makes a return in Revelations), the big new concept here is the Dens. Dens are hotly-contested areas in which you have the option (or in some missions, requirement) to attack to gain some ground against the war with the Templars and Byzantines.

Running into an occupied Den is akin to crossing into Restricted Territory - enemy forces will not take kindly to you and you will have to fight if spotted. This makes things a bit of a hassle if you’re simply trying to get to the next Memory waypoint - one drawback to Constantinople’s size is that you can easily wander into a Den without intending to. Still, it’s just a case of hiding in a bush - or stabbing people in the eyes - to overcome this little problem.

If you cross the boundaries on purpose however, you’re more than likely attempting to attack the Den to claim it as your own. This kicks off an entertaining little sub-mission where you must take out a number of standard guards in the area, before ascertaining the identity of the Den’s captain and assassinating him. Light the fire in the territory’s tower to send the Templars packing.

More interesting are the Den Defence missions, which sees your own areas get challenged by enemy forces. This is probably the biggest change to the Assassin’s Creed formula - tower defence gameplay from the third-person viewpoint of Ezio, the Den commander! It’s not as uncomfortable as it sounds - in fact, I found it incredibly enjoyable.

As Ezio, you observe an area of the Den from a single location. In the stage I played, this was a narrow street leading to a base camp, from atop a tower. You’re rooted in place and can’t move, but from where you’re sat there’s no way of missing any of the action. The weapon wheel allows you to select units and place them around rooftops using the A button. Placing an infantry leader allows you to slam down a couple of soldiers by his side, and the money you collect from the kills these guys make allow you to spend more on a higher-quality squad.

As enemies charge down the road, you also have the opportunity to place wall barriers to slow their assault. In this stage, it gave the archers and gunners on my rooftops the perfect opportunity to snipe them from afar. Soldiers can also be placed behind barriers, and barriers can be upgraded to make life more difficult for the enemy. When powerful enemies start to arrive, Ezio can join in the assault by shooting with the X button - this also targets foes for your soldiers to focus on.

It seems that Ubisoft has been a lot more adventurous in the design of its standard Memory missions. Travelling around the districts of Constantinople, Ezio will be tasked with stirring citizens up to cause riots, exploring vast underground caverns, racing against a boat of Templars for one of five special keys and even dressing up as a Lute player and infiltrating a royal party to stop the assassination of Prince Suleiman, the next in line to become the next Sultan.

These aforementioned keys are crucial in helping Ezio tie up the loose ends to Altaïrs story. It appears that the star of the first Assassin’s Creed game has hidden these keys around Constantinople in order to lock away a secret weapon that’s said to end the Templar-Assassin war forever.

To learn more, however, Ezio has to access Altaïrs memories and play through the events that directly occur after the killing of Al Mualim. With Desmond already in some sort of Black Room trap in the Animus, it’s all gone a little bit Inception around here.

Desmond’s story is also said to be tied up in this episode, but I wasn’t able to discover for myself how exactly this will play out. As it stands now though, you can expect Assassin’s Creed: Revelations to be every bit as interesting and satisfying as its forebears - in both the storyline and the gameplay department.

Whether this all ties into one big melting pot of awesome, though, remains to be seen. Signs are looking good though.