Assassin’s Creed Unitymay have released back in 2014, but it has aged like fine wine. Admittedly, it may not have been ready for launch, but every update since then has only made the game that much more replayable. It’s no longer a buggy mess, which may have been what turned off a lot of fans to begin with. WhenAC Unitywas given away for free andUbisoft donated a ton of money after the Notre Dame fire, that was the first perfect time to replay the game since launch. 2 years later, there’s another.
While it’s nowhere near comparable to the efforts and support that came from the community after the Notre Dame fire,Assassin’s Creed Unitydoes have one big reason to be on everyone’s mind right now:Assassin’s Creed Valhalla’s Siege of Paris DLC. After all, everything that the DLC does well was done inAC Unityfirst, and perhaps the biggest thingValhalladoesn’t do well enough is perfected inUnity.
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The Siege of Paris vs. The French Revolution
Because ofAssassin’s Creed’s time period and location-hoppingthat occurs with every game, there’s hardly every overlap in areas, but there are areas.Assassin’s Creed 3andAC Rogue,for example, share a few locations, but are set some years apart.Assassin’s Creed Valhallaplayers can travel to Lunden, nearly a 1000 years before players can checkout Victorian London inAssassin’s Creed Syndicate. Now,AC Valhalla’s Siege of Paris DLC has players return to the same location asAC Unity: Paris. In each of these overlaying areas, there are clear differences because of time period and technology, but that has little reason to do withAC Unity’s Paris.
In short, the best parts of Siege of Paris were first done byAC Unity, with its worst parts not being an issue in the latter. For example, while theBlack Box Missionsand city design are pros in Siege of Paris, the fact that there’s hardly any “Assassin’s Creed” content is heartbreakingly unsurprising for many fans. As such, if it’s Black Box missions, a tightly designed Paris, andAssassin’s Creedcontent fans want, there’sAssassin’s Creed Unity.
Valhalla vs. Unity: Parkour in Paris
Hoods, hidden blades, intrigue, and conflicts with Templars are all par for the course of aclassicAssassin’s Creedexperience, one fully realized inAC Unity, but there’s also one big gameplay element that stand out. Stealth and parkour inAC Unityis some of the best defined in the series, coming just before parkour became clunkier and clunkier. WhileValhallatries to bring back elements of social stealth and classic gameplay, the parkour in it is far more limited than it is inAC Unity, which is extra shameful. This remains true of the DLC, which while the city design helps parkour quite a bit, it’s still rather clunky in comparison to many games in the franchise.
While, of course, Assassins have been free running and utilizing parkour for hundreds, if not thousands of years in-game, parkour really began as a discipline or was at least popularized in France during the late 1980s. As such, there’s a connection here that makes parkour in France hit just a little different. And if it’s parkour in Paris that fans want,Assassin’s Creed Unitydid it first and did it better.
Assassin’s Creed Unityis available on PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.
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