Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag - PlayStation 3

I was not planning on buying this game at launch. I've been a fan of the series, but Revelations was buggy and disappointing. AC3 was great at times, but also disappointing at times. I didn't want to get sucked in to the hype again, and I figured I'd just buy this when the price came down and some of the bugs were patched out. But, I watched a gameplay trailer with my wife. She loved it and said that she wanted to play it as soon as it came out. Who am I to argue with that? Well, it has been pretty awesome. I'm about a fifth of the way through the main story. I don't want to comment too specifically on the story but I will say that I don't really care about the Edward Kenway character yet, and I'm completely OK with that. I wanted to like Connor, but all of the pivotal moments in his story were just missing or undeveloped in the game. Now, I just don't care, and that's better. One of the main reasons I was on the fence about this game was because of the pirate thing. "Really?" I said. "A pirate assassin? Pfft." Well guess what, past self. You love pirates. You know you do. You're just trying to act cool. When you (you the reader, not my past self) were playing AC3, if you did, did you ever find yourself saying "Man, these naval missions are awesome! I wish I could just get out and sail around though. They could make a whole game out of just this!" Well, then this is the game for you, because that is exactly what Ubisoft did. There's still plenty of running around in small island towns, with typical AC fare, but this game is pretty much naval missions. Sink ships and loot, raid forts, visit little islands and big ports. That's what this game is, and I'm loving it so far.

The only other AC game I've played is AC3 so I don't have much to go by in terms of the series. Note that this review is for SINGLE player. I haven't played in multiplayer. In general AC4 is a lot like AC3 except it's in a different setting and there's a lot of sea time. It seems to me more user friendly to navigate the menus than before and the game in general seems to be a little more polished and elaborate. There is less time spent in the Animus which seemed never ending in AC3. Animus missions are still silly and a waste of time IMO. There are a lot of the "tail" and eavesdropping" missions for example, making it too repetitive. Although for the unseasoned player like me this could be a plus since it forces you to practice and come up with new tactics to complete the missions. I don't expect the game to be a simulation or realistic but a tornado constantly circling an island getting in the way of you capturing a for is kind of odd... Just one of many minor annoyances. I like how the mechanics of the game such as in combat and how main character interacts with the world in general. Combat is not overly complicated and the 3rd person perspective looks quite realistic. This is compared to the 3rd person view of other games like Fallout 3 or other Bethesda games where the character just didn't move realistically, giving the impression of sliding over the ground (not sure how else to describe it). I own this game in both PS3 and PC. Although the console version looks great, the PC version definitely looks a lot better in ultra settings. I really love this game and can't wait for Unity to come out! It is definitely very enjoyable. More than, say, Call of duty (in single player) where the scripted or linear nature if it gets old really fast. Gave it 4 stars just because of the repetitive nature of the game, but definitely I would recommend it.

When I first started playing this game I quickly became bored with it and it took real effort to pick it back up again and give it a second chance, and then a third and a fourth. Besides the amazing graphics and beautiful world in this game, the gameplay at the beginning seemed to be the same as the other AC series. I found myself gathering the same tokens and items as I did in all the other AC games. My problem was not concentrating on playing the story line further from the very beginning. Once you do, the game really opens up and flourishes to reveal a very different gameplay not seen before in the past AC series games full with naval battles and challenging gameplay. I don't remember the last AC game that made it so challenging to play yet so rewarding to beat those same battles which put you in the grave moments earlier. The game is so full of interesting and challenging quests to achieve on and off land that you find yourself fully immersed in the experience. Unlike my initial thoughts - this game is not just the newest iteration of a successful game franchise that has been spit out just to make another profit, but a truly well thought out and totally reworked addition to an already successful legacy.

Husband and I are huge fans of the entire AC series but after being a bit disappointed by AC3 (just couldn't get into the story for some reason) we put AC Black Flag on the backburner; however, that was a huge mistake! And we should've played it a lot sooner. It's an absolute blast: naval battles are amazing, it's so easy to "pillage and plunder" for hours upon hours on the open world sea, and hunting out on the open sea is a new experience for me. We have had a dry spell finding titles that the both of us could enjoy playing together (why the lack of local co-op games?!) but we have a great time taking turns playing as Edward Kenway and with so many side tasks and events to do, I think we'll be satisfied for quite some time. Overall great addition to the AC series, don't pass it up like we did for over 6 months!

To me this has the best game-play of all the assassins creed games thus far. Its so much fun to captain a pirate ship and plunder other ships on the high seas. My only gripe is the fact that everything else on land is too similar to previous games, and like the other games its sometimes hard to follow the story as you can spend days between story missions. But overall recommended.

I am really just getting started, but the storyline appears good as always with the Assassins Creed series. One complaint is the ease with which you can slaughter guards to no end with little or no consequence. Another complaint is when you try to think outside the box to perform a mission, sometimes the game glitches up and you are stuck with a dot on your radar to go to, but nothing is there (this most usually happens during side missions such as assassin contracts), which is a real pain without multiple save games. When I finish the game I will come back and update this review.

I picked this game up. I was told that it was good. Played it Turned out it was the best game, I've played that year since then played all the Assassin Creed games by far this one was the best in my opinion.

This game is the first one I've played in a long time that actually had me running back to my console to play more. The idea of sailing the high seas, traveling across the Caribbean is amazing and the accompanying pirate shanties add a depth to the experience I wasn't expecting. Changing weather patterns and cities full of various characters add to the ambiance as well. The addition of a mobile app that allows players to control their fleet, battle, and amass wealth while on the go adds an interesting and immersive quality to the gameplay I wasn't expecting. If you played the others in the series or even if this is your first foray into the genre, do yourself a favor and get this game.