Here we are again, talking about Assassin’s Creed 3 as if we haven’t done enough articles on this game already. We’ve delved into general gameplay and the features of the multiplayer system, but there is another aspect of this game that deserves a spotlight – the naval combat portion of Assassin’s Creed 3. With everything this game has to offer, the naval combat really shines due to the obvious work Ubisoft has put into making this unique combat system work perfectly.
The game takes place during the Revolutionary War and it is well known that battles were fought on land and sea. Assassin’s Creed 3 features a brand new naval combat system that takes the franchise off land for the first time. It is a daring move but appears to be executed perfectly by developer Ubisoft Montreal. It blends in perfectly with the stealth action-adventure franchise.
If you haven’t pre-ordered it yet, hit up Amazon to Pre-Order Assassin’s Creed 3 for Xbox 360 to make sure you receive the game when it comes out on October 30th. For PS3 owners you can pre-order AC3 as well to secure the same date.
Ubisoft puts the game’s main character, Connor, in the role of a ship captain. As captain, Connor is in full control of his ship, from where it sails to whom it fires upon.
In this position, you will be able to guide your ship to victory by means of different forms of weaponry. Obviously, the bread and butter of the weapons will be standard cannon shots. Cannons function to basically wreak enough havoc to sink enemy ships. However, sinking rival ships is not always the goal.
At times, Connor will have to assassinate someone on board. If this is the goal, or if Connor has to board the enemy ship for another mission, you can use a chain shot to try to take out a vessel’s mast, making it immobile in the waters. Ubisoft has gone to great lengths to make Assassin’s Creed 3 historically accurate. During the war, ships often ran short on ammunition and crews were forced to scrape up anything they could find to fire upon enemies. The grapeshot in the game orders the crew to scrape up garbage and other materials on deck, shove it into the cannon and fire it upon the opposition.
Naval combat features a completely new dynamic weather system. This is really one of the coolest aspects of Assassin’s Creed 3. With the dynamic weather system, weather could change at any moment. This not only changes the weather, but also how the game will look and how it plays. The randomized system will make each mission aboard your ship completely unique from one another.
On top of the varying weather conditions in the environment, there will also be mines, gunboats and many other random obstacles in the waters that will need to be dealt with in order to safely traverse the waters and accomplish your missions. For instance, some missions may involve carefully maneuvering through an enemy minefield while others may involve bombarding a fort from the safety of your ship. Still other missions, as I hinted at before, will involve boarding other ships to assassinate a Templar on board.
These ship battles look and sound like one of the single most intense things in the history of the Assassin’s Creed franchise. My only fear is that it somehow ends up as the siege minigame a la Assassin’s Creed: Revelations. However, the naval gameplay battles appear to be truly epic, especially when you get to partake in battles that have made history such as the Battle of the Chesapeake.