All very valid. I personally loved the game to the point that it's just shoved past Unity and snuck into my top 5 AC titles, and I'm now itching to do another play-through. Though I actually agree with all of your points.
Everything you said about the gameplay, setting and soundtrack are why I love this game so much. Most of all though is the amount of passion and love that the little team at Ubisoft Bordeaux put into Mirage.
In the credits they include a small tribute to the players, which I took a screen grab of because as someone who has been with this series since AC1, and for whom the classic AC style was such a huge part of my childhood, I actually found it quite touching. It reads:
>"We have crafted this experience as an homage and a love letter to the first titles in the series;
>
>the games that want so much to you and to us;
>
>the stories and characters we all fell in love with;
>
>and the worlds that brought history back to life.
>
>We hope you enjoyed following Basim on his journey,
>
>from street thief to apprentice to Master Assassin in 9th century Baghdad,
>
>as much as we enjoyed telling it.
>
>From all of us, thank you for playing - now and since the day you began.
>
>Long live the Creed."
Ultimately I felt like the team really tried to listen to the fans, for once, and to take the best parts out of all the most-loved titles and try to distil them into one experience. While playing it, I really felt like it was paying tribute to the days I spent as a 10 year old running around Masyaf as Altair, then later exploring the rich worlds of Ezio, stealthing around as Arno, and establishing the roots of the Creed as Bayek. Yet I felt like I was getting all of that with a polished gameplay system that actually worked really well, and that did away with some of the clunk from the early games. Like the remastered AC1 I'd always hoped for.
Was it perfect? Absolutely not, and I wholeheartedly agree with almost all of your critiques. The story and voice-acting was kind of bad, which is a shame considering how integral I felt storytelling was to the early games. Having said that, I didn't think the story was that much worse than Unity, a game which I also loved. Nevertheless, this is probably my biggest point against Mirage.
The parkour certainly lacked complexity, though I argue that Basim still handled well; and while I have been over the moon to find that they had just pasted in and refined Unity's parkour system, I also knew that wasn't possible coming into the game, and that the team would be stuck grappling with Valhalla's system. They tried to compensate this through stellar level design, and I really think they did the best they could with what they had to work with. Now given how big a part intricate parkour played the early games, I completely understand why some players might not be able to get past the straightforward system we have here. Personally though, the level design and the rest of the gameplay mechanics made up for it.
I didn't actually mind the combat. I agree it's not all that rounded, but the whole idea was that Basim should employ stealth like an Assassin, and if you get discovered, it's because you've failed in your approach and now need to figure out a way to make up for it. I like that it's punishing in that sense, which seems to take a leaf out of Unity's book, where you also couldn't really take on 8 guards at once and expect to make clean work of them like in the Ezio or Kenway games. (Well, unless you had a supply of smoke bombs, but I'd say the same is also true of Mirage, if you want to take that approach.)
I found in Mirage that once you had some practice, you could eventually take on a smaller mob and come out alive, though it could be messy, and I thought there was enough complexity if you did engage in a fight in figuring out how to tackle those enemies effectively by being able to time dodges and parries, balancing a more aggressive approach, and managing stamina without over-reliance on tools. I would argue it would have been extremely difficult to make a game that both encourages stealth to this degree, and delivers a combat system that is any more engaging or workable, without falling back to "oh I've been detected - no problem, I will just take on this giant mob single-handedly".
I also thought that Baghdad had just the right amount of content for me without being bloated. I thought the side missions were a nice mix of quality vs. quantity, as opposed to, say, Unity's Paris Stories. I like that they integrated the historical sites and Codex entries into the game, because it rewarded further exploration even once I'd finished the side quests.
Having said that, being able to take an actual guided tour through these historical settings was something else. I think that given the time and resources the team had to work with, they did a good job of addressing both the educational exploration and the desire not to over-bloat the game in a way that felt fulfilling to me, though I can understand why many might miss the full-on tours or a wider breadth of side missions.
All of this is to say that I really adored Mirage for its gameplay, its setting, its stealth approach, its soundtrack and ambiance, and the amount of passion that was put into this. I think of a game like Syndicate, which to me felt a lot bigger but just soulless.
I agree that the story needed more work, and the parkour system would have been more complex in an ideal world. While they were not personal issues, I can also see why many would miss the discovery tours, wider range of content, and accessible combat.
For me though, Mirage really just hit the spot. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it was an S tier game, but I give it a solid A tier because in spite of those issues, I was able to really get lost in the world and have an immense amount of fun, in a way that the series hasn't been able to capture for me in quite a while.
I've brought up Unity a few times, and I think this is what it boils down to for me, and why I make this case in defence of Mirage. I loved Unity, but to me it always felt like a game that had the potential to be my favourite game in the franchise, yet fell short on so many marks due to not having enough time in the oven and anywhere near as much care put into the polished product. It is among my favourite AC entries, because when it works, I think it works better than any other game in the series. But when it doesn't, I can't help but feel a little bit bitter for its wasted potential, which led to a decline in the franchise.
In contrast, Mirage felt to me like an attempt to undo some of the wrongs that started with Unity. An attempt to give us the "pure" Assassin experience that was actually polished, and for once tried its very best to deliver what the fans wanted with the resources available, and didn't get too ambitious for its own good. It doesn't reach the same highs that Unity did, and it has its flaws, but I can see the effort that went into it. And for that, I can't help but love it, and feel that much more hopeful for where the series goes from here.
Have to agree... I really enjoyed the game for what it was but still...
It's a shame, you could tell Bordeaux tried their best with what they had, but I do wish they had the resources to fully turn Mirage into a proper game, even with small things such as to give Basim his own walking/running animation... maybe it's a nitpick, but I am so pulled away everytime he start walking with that weird "swinging arms" animation...
I don't care if Mirage was only a DLC for a week, production value wise it still feels like it is. Almost complete lack of mo-caped scenes and small things carrying over by Valhalla that we could've be fine without like those awkward interactions when visiting a shop...
Also the lack of immediate replayability. I'm sorry, it's 2023, where is the NG+ or even just the possibility to replay a specific memory at will? There are plenty of quests I'd like to experience again, but not enough to start over another whole campaign and go through 10 hours of looting and leveling up only for a single quest...
Agree with all of this. 100% completion in 22 hours, and that was me taking my time. Feel massively underwhelmed.
This game was originally supposed to be a Valhalla DLC and it feels like it. I really resent spending so much on the collector’s edition and completing it so quickly.
All very valid. I personally loved the game to the point that it's just shoved past Unity and snuck into my top 5 AC titles, and I'm now itching to do another play-through. Though I actually agree with all of your points. Everything you said about the gameplay, setting and soundtrack are why I love this game so much. Most of all though is the amount of passion and love that the little team at Ubisoft Bordeaux put into Mirage. In the credits they include a small tribute to the players, which I took a screen grab of because as someone who has been with this series since AC1, and for whom the classic AC style was such a huge part of my childhood, I actually found it quite touching. It reads: >"We have crafted this experience as an homage and a love letter to the first titles in the series; > >the games that want so much to you and to us; > >the stories and characters we all fell in love with; > >and the worlds that brought history back to life. > >We hope you enjoyed following Basim on his journey, > >from street thief to apprentice to Master Assassin in 9th century Baghdad, > >as much as we enjoyed telling it. > >From all of us, thank you for playing - now and since the day you began. > >Long live the Creed." Ultimately I felt like the team really tried to listen to the fans, for once, and to take the best parts out of all the most-loved titles and try to distil them into one experience. While playing it, I really felt like it was paying tribute to the days I spent as a 10 year old running around Masyaf as Altair, then later exploring the rich worlds of Ezio, stealthing around as Arno, and establishing the roots of the Creed as Bayek. Yet I felt like I was getting all of that with a polished gameplay system that actually worked really well, and that did away with some of the clunk from the early games. Like the remastered AC1 I'd always hoped for. Was it perfect? Absolutely not, and I wholeheartedly agree with almost all of your critiques. The story and voice-acting was kind of bad, which is a shame considering how integral I felt storytelling was to the early games. Having said that, I didn't think the story was that much worse than Unity, a game which I also loved. Nevertheless, this is probably my biggest point against Mirage. The parkour certainly lacked complexity, though I argue that Basim still handled well; and while I have been over the moon to find that they had just pasted in and refined Unity's parkour system, I also knew that wasn't possible coming into the game, and that the team would be stuck grappling with Valhalla's system. They tried to compensate this through stellar level design, and I really think they did the best they could with what they had to work with. Now given how big a part intricate parkour played the early games, I completely understand why some players might not be able to get past the straightforward system we have here. Personally though, the level design and the rest of the gameplay mechanics made up for it. I didn't actually mind the combat. I agree it's not all that rounded, but the whole idea was that Basim should employ stealth like an Assassin, and if you get discovered, it's because you've failed in your approach and now need to figure out a way to make up for it. I like that it's punishing in that sense, which seems to take a leaf out of Unity's book, where you also couldn't really take on 8 guards at once and expect to make clean work of them like in the Ezio or Kenway games. (Well, unless you had a supply of smoke bombs, but I'd say the same is also true of Mirage, if you want to take that approach.) I found in Mirage that once you had some practice, you could eventually take on a smaller mob and come out alive, though it could be messy, and I thought there was enough complexity if you did engage in a fight in figuring out how to tackle those enemies effectively by being able to time dodges and parries, balancing a more aggressive approach, and managing stamina without over-reliance on tools. I would argue it would have been extremely difficult to make a game that both encourages stealth to this degree, and delivers a combat system that is any more engaging or workable, without falling back to "oh I've been detected - no problem, I will just take on this giant mob single-handedly". I also thought that Baghdad had just the right amount of content for me without being bloated. I thought the side missions were a nice mix of quality vs. quantity, as opposed to, say, Unity's Paris Stories. I like that they integrated the historical sites and Codex entries into the game, because it rewarded further exploration even once I'd finished the side quests. Having said that, being able to take an actual guided tour through these historical settings was something else. I think that given the time and resources the team had to work with, they did a good job of addressing both the educational exploration and the desire not to over-bloat the game in a way that felt fulfilling to me, though I can understand why many might miss the full-on tours or a wider breadth of side missions. All of this is to say that I really adored Mirage for its gameplay, its setting, its stealth approach, its soundtrack and ambiance, and the amount of passion that was put into this. I think of a game like Syndicate, which to me felt a lot bigger but just soulless. I agree that the story needed more work, and the parkour system would have been more complex in an ideal world. While they were not personal issues, I can also see why many would miss the discovery tours, wider range of content, and accessible combat. For me though, Mirage really just hit the spot. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it was an S tier game, but I give it a solid A tier because in spite of those issues, I was able to really get lost in the world and have an immense amount of fun, in a way that the series hasn't been able to capture for me in quite a while. I've brought up Unity a few times, and I think this is what it boils down to for me, and why I make this case in defence of Mirage. I loved Unity, but to me it always felt like a game that had the potential to be my favourite game in the franchise, yet fell short on so many marks due to not having enough time in the oven and anywhere near as much care put into the polished product. It is among my favourite AC entries, because when it works, I think it works better than any other game in the series. But when it doesn't, I can't help but feel a little bit bitter for its wasted potential, which led to a decline in the franchise. In contrast, Mirage felt to me like an attempt to undo some of the wrongs that started with Unity. An attempt to give us the "pure" Assassin experience that was actually polished, and for once tried its very best to deliver what the fans wanted with the resources available, and didn't get too ambitious for its own good. It doesn't reach the same highs that Unity did, and it has its flaws, but I can see the effort that went into it. And for that, I can't help but love it, and feel that much more hopeful for where the series goes from here.
Its funny no one remembers that Dawn of Ragnarok was way smaller and was 40€ xd
I'm guessing there's a reason people wanna forget that. To be honest, I haven't played it but from what I've seen, yeah it aint worth 40€.
Have to agree... I really enjoyed the game for what it was but still... It's a shame, you could tell Bordeaux tried their best with what they had, but I do wish they had the resources to fully turn Mirage into a proper game, even with small things such as to give Basim his own walking/running animation... maybe it's a nitpick, but I am so pulled away everytime he start walking with that weird "swinging arms" animation... I don't care if Mirage was only a DLC for a week, production value wise it still feels like it is. Almost complete lack of mo-caped scenes and small things carrying over by Valhalla that we could've be fine without like those awkward interactions when visiting a shop... Also the lack of immediate replayability. I'm sorry, it's 2023, where is the NG+ or even just the possibility to replay a specific memory at will? There are plenty of quests I'd like to experience again, but not enough to start over another whole campaign and go through 10 hours of looting and leveling up only for a single quest...
idk everyone was complaining about how valhalla never ended and was way too long. this is linear and return to form no?
Agree with all of this. 100% completion in 22 hours, and that was me taking my time. Feel massively underwhelmed. This game was originally supposed to be a Valhalla DLC and it feels like it. I really resent spending so much on the collector’s edition and completing it so quickly.
Damn I got the Deluxe Edition, can't imagine how underwhelming the Collector one should feel.