Assassin’s Creed Rogue - game review

Assassin’s Creed Rogue was first released in 2014 and is the 7th main installment of the Assassin’s Creed franchise. Although it wasn’t as long as its predecessors, Assassin’s Creed Rogue does add something tangible to the series.

A lot of complaints arose especially from those who didn’t like Black flag regarding the mechanics, story, and visuals of the game, but either way, the game was a diversion from the usual conflict we see between the Assassins and the Templars and it’s the first Assassin’s Creed game to allow the fans to play with a Templar.

Story

The events of Rogue take place in the 7-year war between the events of the Black flag and Assassin’s Creed 3, which means it offers a fresh perspective on this era and ties the two games together.

If you’ve played Black Flag and Assassin’s Creed 3, a lot of things in the story will line up and make sense. You will start the game playing with the Irishman Shay Patrick Cormac who’s affiliated with the assassin brotherhood, which is a pretty standard way to start any Assassin’s Creed game; however, when you dive further into the game, you’ll notice subtle changes in Shay’s character.

He does go rogue, but you will find yourself sympathizing with him and understanding why he decided to leave the brotherhood and join the templars.

When the Assassins start deviating from their brotherhood’s principles, he goes to join the templars, which are not all evil. Some of them, even Haytham Kenway, are pretty decent guys.

Rogue’s story will give you a new point of view; it tells players that not all Assassins are good and Templars are always bad and you experience that firsthand. After you play with Shay for a while, you will find him to be compassionate and kind, as opposed to the lethal killer depicted in the trailers.

Characters

You'll get to see multiple new characters in Rogue, but you will also see characters that you might be familiar with if you’ve played the previous installments like Adewale from Black Flag and Achilles from Assassin’s Creed 3.

You’ll often see both these characters interact, which is an example of how Rogue ties Black Flag and Assassin’s Creed 3 together. However, you’ll see them from a different scope or rather Shay’s scope who faulted them for doing dangerous deeds that go against the creed. Shay, who’s an assassin for about a quarter of the game, is your typical righteous assassin -until he isn’t.

He is compassionate, sometimes naïve, but overall a lovable character -that is, if his thick Irish accent hasn’t already gotten on your nerves already. Other members of the Assassin brotherhood are interesting in their own right, but they’re just linear and won’t add much to the story as merely being assassination targets.

Rogue does not stop at linking previous Assassin’s Creed games together even when it comes to the ending. A notable character from the eighth major installment, Assassin’s Creed Unity makes an appearance in the last mission, and some events in Unity make sense afterward.

Fans of Assassin’s Creed like it when the games are connected and Rogue excels at that using instruments, like the setting and characters, to bring the fictional world of the games closer.

Mechanics

Rogue adopts the same system for the old generation consoles, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, which was Ubisoft’s last try at telling a story using that system before releasing Unity, which used the new system for Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

Of course, the game has been remastered in 2018, but it did little to console the players. Rogue, like Black Flag, has the same seafaring and naval war mechanics. You can upgrade your ship, and sack the goods from other ships, just as you did in Black Flag with minor tweaks here and there.

The glitches players experienced in Black Flag when walking, climbing, jumping aboard the ship, or even fighting are still present, causing great irritation to players. When it comes to collectibles, bounty hunters, and destroying forts, there wasn’t any substantial diversion from the system of Black Flag.

The usual smooth parkouring and fighting are not very prominent in Rogue. Hence, making Rogue a great disappointment for players, despite the new templar perspective.