Make no mistake, I am a sucker for the world of Pirates. It’s one of the few settings that somehow manages to still feel wide open and worth exploring in my many realms of interactive media. It basically elevates everything it is applied to – with no better example than Assassin’s Creed Black Flag. Edward Kenway’s nautical misadventures turned me from an Assassin’s Creed sceptic to a full-blown believer. So you best believe I am very much on board (heh) with a revitalisation of that same adventure on modern hardware.
Shown off as part of an Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced Showcase, players were treated to an in-depth look at how vast this remake intends to be, far beyond a mere visual update. Of course the journey to modern hardware promises a staggering visual overhaul with advanced water physics, dynamic lighting, and highly detailed character models, but developers also spoke to objective changes such as additional story content in the base game and sanding off some rough mechanical edges. Black Flag was already pretty impressive for a 12-year old game, but players know there was plenty to measure up and keelhaul from the original. Let’s break down some of the things that have me most excited.
First up, a controversial one: they are modernising the combat. I enjoyed the old school Assassin’s Creed style combat, the deliberate nature of it worked well for a title that was based around professional murder-mans and their long suffering feud against the Templars. BUT… I will admit that the simpler combat styles of modern AC games had let me focus more on mastering the supplementary systems that flesh out the rest of the games. Stealth is a lot more fun when the prospect of screwing it up isn’t the ensuing stressful melee battle. Is this a selfish revelation on my part? Probably, but as I am the one writing this it shouldn’t surprise you. A more streamlined biffo system means I can drink in more pirate-based stealth, and that is a big factor for my excitement.
Speaking of stealth, a well known pain point from ye olde pirate game was the horrendous tailing missions. The spotlight did a lot to point out that these have been fundamentally changed to remove the critical fail state of those missions, so that when you are discovered you can instead switch to plan B: Kill the witnesses. Now I am unsure if this means that every tailing mission is now an optional one, but even if it is a threshold where mostly completing the tailing before deploying violence is acceptable, that is a huge step forward. This is a great deal better than the original play where you would be kicked back to the start of the mission and need to do the entire ball-aching ordeal again every time.
Now I am not one to ask for any narrative changes, but the idea of having a few new chapters within the game is a pleasant one. The implementation makes a ton of sense too, basically adding some new faces that will serve as officers on your ship and allowing you to jump into a side narrative to explain how you came to recruit them. That promises new people, new areas, and new motivations besides the primary story path – and if I am reading into it right, some new jungle adventures for Edward. If you are remaking a game you might as well pack in some surprises where you can, and turning these new helpers into a personified ship upgrade path fits nicely.
The next is less of a feature and more the confirmation that one particular gameplay framework is not coming to Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced, with the devs being pretty blunt in mentioning it – the game is not an RPG. As in, this game is not going to follow in the footsteps of Assassin’s Creed Origins, Odyssey, Valhalla, and Shadows with skill trees, gear looting and the like. They might be remaking the original Black Flag, but they are not remolding it into something it never was, meaning I can gladly skip looting a [Razor Sharp Cutlass of Bloodletting] from a random boar.
The thing that makes me swell with hope is the mention of how closely they are working with Black Flag and Origins director Jean Guesdon, even going so far as to make a cheeky comment that if he doesn’t sign off on something, it doesn’t happen. As remakes become more and more prevalent in our current gaming landscape, there is always a level of concern felt when the previous creatives are entirely available to consult on a project, but are just ignored. At the very least it feels disrespectful, at the very worst it feels lazy considering the wealth of experience on offer. Some of my favourite modernisations of games come from insights as simple as “that shitty feature was a product of its time, and we would have changed it if given the chance.”
All in all, it’s a supremely promising showcase – even ending with a shot of a very cool physical Collector’s Edition. I know, I know, that isn’t indicative of game quality, but in my younger years I distinctly remember how neat the OG Black Flag statue was, and regretted the fact I never got my hands on one. It was a simpler time, and for a brief minute I was that same younger me that was super jazzed at a piratical Assassin’s Creed experience. It may be the bias talking, but I am hungry to get my hands on Black Flag Resynced and see if it can scratch all those same ship-borne itches that I enjoyed so long ago.
Bring on July, ya scurvy dogs.
