Assassin’s Creed: The Rebel Collection Review

Needless to say, the Nintendo Switch proved to be a great platform for the re-release. Be it Doom, The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, many older games are getting new life on the portable console. Earlier this year, Ubisoft jumped on the bandwagon with Assassin’s Creed 3 Remastered, a collection of two games that didn’t make much of an impression due to its focus on some of the series’ less popular games. That’s one mistake the latest set of remasters, Assassin’s Creed: The Rebel Collection, doesn’t make.

Arriving just a few months after AC 3 Remastered hit the Switch, The Rebel Collection puts the better foot forward with a more interesting pair of offerings in the form of Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag and 2014’s Assassin’s Creed Rogue. These games mark the swan songs of the stealth-action series in the PlayStation 3/Xbox 360 console generation, the Assassin’s Creed generation began, and as such, they make for an interesting time capsule for fans to delve into. in the series with its later titles and haven’t had a chance to experience last-gen Creed yet.

However, they will need a Switch to do so, as this new collection is exclusive to the console, unlike the multiplatform AC 3 Remastered. That might disappoint some fans, but then again, since both games are on current-gen consoles, a new collection isn’t absolutely necessary on, say, the PS4 or Xbox One. Focusing on the Switch is also a smart decision, not only for its popularity, but as it marks the first time that much of its content will be available on a Nintendo console, opening the door for a whole slew of new players. to enter the series.

Included alongside the two main games is the rest of their single-player DLC (hard break for those who remember Black Flag originally had multiplayer), which includes Black Flag’s hefty standalone DLC, Freedom Cry, and its bonus missions staring Aveline de Grandpré from Assassin’s Creed Liberation. Throw in some bonus content including a concept art/trailer gallery, an illustrated journal written by Blackbeard’s version of Black Flag, and the first volume of that game’s manga adaptation, Assassin’s Creed Awakening, and there are plenty of goodies to round out the package.

Best of all, The Rebel Collection runs like a dream on Switch. While the Switch version of AC 3 Remastered suffers from some performance issues, here all the games run without any serious hits to graphics, frame rates, or load times, which look just as good , if not better, than before. in process. Further improving things are console-specific quality-of-life improvements like motion-control aiming and the ability to navigate menus via the touchscreen, as well as a clean overall layout of menu that makes it easy to switch from one game to another.

Honestly, it’s pretty smart of Ubisoft to pair Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag and Assassin’s Creed Rogue together like this. “The Rebel Collection” accurately describes how these games and their stories offer different perspectives on the series’ centuries-long war between the Assassin Brotherhood and the Templar Order. In Black Flag, we have the pirate captain Edward Kenway, who only happens to fight when he sets his sights on the mythical treasure the Templars are after. In Rogue, we see a darker turn as Shay Patrick Cormac goes from a disillusioned assassin to a furious Templar hunting his former comrades.

There’s also a more prominent gameplay element that connects these two: sailing. While AC 3 introduced the ability to sail a ship and engage in naval combat to the series, Black Flag and Rogue put it front and center by making it the primary means of traversing their large maps. In this way, these games really encourage players to explore the high seas, loot other ships to get resources to upgrade theirs, and occasionally sail through storms. . This makes for some of the most engaging modes of travel in any game, not to mention some of the most fun gameplay the series has to offer.

Outside of the naval aspects, however, the games in Assassin’s Creed: The Rebel Collection, have a lot to offer, as longtime fans already know. While these games may not employ the more nuanced map design, improved mission structure, and gameplay depth that the series achieves in more recent entries like Origins and Odyssey, the open-world sandboxes that they provide offers a lot to do and a lot of ways to get. around through the well-implemented parkour system. Players are never far from a new item to collect, a new treasure chest to open, or a new sidequest to take on in any of these games the many cities and islands of the area they are in at any given moment.

Overall, then, these games offer a very strong offering. It’s likely that most players tend to prefer Black Flag over the other offerings, which shouldn’t come as a surprise. Many to this day consider Black Flag one of the best Assassin’s Creed games, if not the best. Meanwhile, Rogue still offers a solid experience, even if it mostly reads off what Black Flag did better and ultimately doesn’t do as much of the “Assassin vs. Assassins” angle as it could.

In fact, if there’s any major problem with The Rebel Collection as a whole, it’s that, gameplay-wise, it’s pretty much the same. Since all of the games will feature the same version of the classic AC gameplay formula (with the same mission scenarios, items, and ship upgrades appearing multiple times), it can actually make for more tedious games. elements, such as climbing to high places to quickly unlock travel points, can sometimes be a bit of a slog.

What saves the experience in the end is the strength of the stories these games tell and the characters players follow. Even if the gameplay fails to differentiate itself from one game to another, there’s enough difference in tone and personality between the journeys of Edward, Shay, and Freedom Cry protagonist Adewale to make it worthwhile going and seeing where they end up.

Without a doubt, Assassin’s Creed: The Rebel Collection offers the strongest selection of AC games on Switch to date. The titles are more engaging, the Switch port works wonderfully, and the overall package has dozens of hours of content, all for just $39.99. With the Assassin’s Creed series developing more than it has in recent years, this is a great way to experience some of the best examples of what made it so beloved in the first place.

Assassin’s Creed: The Rebel Collection is out for Switch. Today Technology was provided with a Switch code for this review.