Difficulty:

Just Right

Time Spent:

20 to 40 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Don't believe the hype"

Assassins Creed III looks great, sounds great, and for the most part plays great, but there are plenty of bugs and glitches, and the overall unpolished delivery of the game keeps it from being the supremely enjoyable experience we were expecting.

Many reviews on major websites and in publications have given AC3 high marks. However, when you have spent as long as I have with it, it begins to seem pretty ridiculous. The game suffers from all sorts of glitches, such as your crafted goods randomly disappearing, getting stuck in the environment, as well as on NPCs. Furthermore, the free-running which seemed so polished and improved in the beginning is really not. Users now push and hold the right trigger to free run, A is no longer necessary. This often results in you getting stuck on walls, in bales of hay or piles of corn which you probably figure from past games, you use to hide in.

While this might not seem like a big deal, consider the mission variation we have grown accustomed to in the AC series. Often times, we are following people around, chasing them, doing eavesdropping missions etc, and it is really frustrating when you keep getting stuck on the environment. I have even been stuck on a chicken. Yes. A little chicken. I have also been stuck on people in the middle of the street, as well as under rocks and trees in the environment, and it always seems to happen at the most inopportune times. It is a constant, grating, and absolutely annoying experience which, given that the game is pretty long, really starts to detract from the experience.

I don't think that it is a terrible game. I do think that for sixty dollars, our big-shot reviewers here at Gamespot, Game Informer, and IGN should be a little more honest with us when it comes to recommending games. Is AC3 good? Behind all of its stupid, unpolished problems which appear to be more a sign of laziness, rather than a technical inability to fix, it is a good game. It is a great game. Is it worth sixty bucks? Hell no.

We as gamers are settling often times for games that are really not ready to be released when they are. Before you guffaw and start griping about what I am saying, consider this: Diablo 3 was not even close to being fully optimized when it was released. For Mac users and even many high end PC users, it was nigh on unplayable. For some, this problem persisted for months. PS3 users should think back to Skyrim, and how to date developers have still been unable to get the DLC to work with the game, resulting in a bevy of disappointed users. I could go on and on here. The point is, if developers are going to ask us to shell out sixy bucks for a release, it better be in a finished state. We should not be parting with our hard earned money for AAA titles that are full of glitches and bugs, that inevitably end up make us want to break our controller.