Nostalgia is treacherous and tends to sweeten everything we accumulate in memory. Fictional memories that, like an Instagram feed, only show the good, the best. For this reason, when someone tells me that this or that thing is a “return to the roots”, I tend to distrust. And Assassin's Creed Mirage aims to be just this, a "return to the roots" of Ubisoft's most important franchise. And, in fact, they have achieved it. They can be proud of the result, although this look back comes with some friction.
Assassin's Creed Mirage recovers the setting of the first installment of the saga, if only on an aesthetic level: we return to the Arab empires of the Middle Ages, specifically the Abbasid Empire during the 9th century. “The height of civilization at that time, during the dark ages of Europe,” says the game's artistic director, Jean-Luc Sala. The protagonist of this adventure is Basim, a young thief born on the streets of Baghdad who will come into contact with The Hidden Ones and rise in the Brotherhood.
This new installment replicates many elements of the first Assassin's Creed and not only does it on a formal level or with the mechanics. Basim's story is the same as Ezio's and also maintains a very similar structure to Altair's. Basim must progress through the ranks of the Brotherhood, growing in strength and spirit, to become a master assassin. The end of the story, in fact, is already written and the players know it in advance. Basim will end up in Great Britain helping Eivor and his clan of Vikings during the events of Assassin's Creed Valhalla.
When I asked Jean-Luc Sala to define Baghdad in a single sentence he told me this: “a city of gold, a truly living city.” But Sala was not just referring to the now classic hundreds and hundreds of characters that move and wander through Ubisoft's fictional worlds. The vitality of Baghdad also lies in the water that flows almost everywhere and in the greenery of the plants, fields and gardens.
Baghdad is not just dust and sand – which there is – it is also commerce, irrigated agriculture, philosophy, architecture, mathematics and great inventors. Baghdad, in the middle of the Silk Road, was the center of the world and Assassin's Creed Mirage tries to recreate this vision. And the word “recreate” is important because, unfortunately, there is no palpable trace left of that city of Baghdad.
The story of Assassin's Creed Mirage takes place just before the Zanj revolution, known as the largest slave revolt in history. In fact, Basim will meet a very important historical figure: Ali ibn Mohammed, the leader of the revolution. Well, with this almost civil war begins the decline of the Abbasid Empire, which ended with the fall of Baghdad to Mongol armies in 1258. The siege razed the city to its foundations and, currently, there is no trace of that circular Baghdad.
From Ubisoft Bordeaux – the studio that heads the development – they had to rely on many documentary sources and theories from various historians to imagine what Baghdad was like in the 9th century. The key element of the city was its circular shape with the Caliph's residence in the center, since he wanted to be at the same distance from any point in the city. But many other elements were a mystery.
The end result is a living and immersive city. It is a pleasure to walk through the streets collecting codex fragments. With this collectible, informative articles that tell part of the history, the historical figures or the city are unlocked. Something that was already done in the first Assassin's Creed.
Assassin's Creed has always wanted to be a stealth saga, but it has never succeeded. And it's curious because Ubisoft is also responsible for the Splinter Cell franchise. Neither Ezio nor Altair were ever Sam Fisher. The Assassin's creed urges its followers to turn their blade from the innocent and move through the shadows until they reach their target. But by design, Assassin's Creed has always felt more like an action game than Hitman. And Mirage is no exception.
The ideas are there, they return mechanics that, on paper, are fantastic, like the notoriety system. But in the end Basim leaves a trail of hundreds and hundreds of corpses accompanying his few targets. Stealth is always an option, but it seems that to achieve this you have to fight the game. And not because it is especially difficult. In fact, I recommend playing it on hard mode, because on the other difficulty levels the guards are too permissive and sometimes seem to have severe nearsightedness problems.
Let's go back to the notoriety system for a second: there are three levels, and if someone sees you committing a crime, they go up one level. Depending on your notoriety, guards and civilians react differently to your presence. When Basim's face covers every wall in the city, the guards attack you and people point at you shouting "criminal." But returning to anonymity is as simple as bribing a preacher or tearing down three posters. And that's it. On paper it seems to work, but the real consequences of “committing a crime” are so few that in the long run it doesn't matter.
Despite this, there are many moments where stealth shines. Especially when Basim camouflages himself among groups of civilians, sitting on a bench or avoiding combat to hide between the awnings of a roof. There is friction between the different pillars of the game, but when synergies occur and they work cohesively, the result is incredible.
Another of the great forgotten pillars in Assassin's Creed Mirage is parkour. Yes, like all the protagonists of the franchise, Basim is a parkour expert. Furthermore, as Ubisoft Bordeaux points out, one of the main attractions of a city like Baghdad is having many buildings close together and with flat roofs, which makes movement easier. But the parkour in Assassin's Creed Mirage is expendable and quite boring.
In the first Assassin's Creed it made sense to run across the rooftops: it was the fastest way to move. The other alternative was to run down the street, where you bumped into people and took more detours to reach your goal. But in Mirage you can go through Baghdad on a camel or running and it's almost always faster than going on rooftops. Additionally, installments like Assassin's Creed Revelations, with the hook on the hidden blade, added a minigame on the move. It was fun to calculate when to activate the hook. While the parkour of Assassin's Creed Mirage is summarized in pressing A – or X on PlayStation – and moving the stick forward.
In the original games, movement was activated with the triggers. From the beginning it was thought of as something essential and combat was relegated to the buttons. But Assassin's Creed Mirage replicates the control scheme of Assassin's Creed Valhalla. The video game industry has a lot to thank From Software and Dark Souls, but not every game needs to have combat on the shoulder buttons and triggers and another button to roll. Assassin's Creed Mirage should drop the ballast of action if it really wants to be a good stealth game.
And in this line it does many things well. Weapons are no longer a mess of stats and numbers, Basim has a skill tree, but he doesn't have a specific level and neither do enemies. Baghdad is an open city and the challenge of each area depends on the number of guards and their archetype – weapons, behavior and resistances – but not on an arbitrary level. And finally, the hidden blade kills again with a single blow.
Before I criticized the action in Assassin's Creed Mirage, but I said it because of the contradiction it represents in terms of the approach of the game. Because, when Mirage embraces action and combat, it's a lot of fun. Managing groups of enemies, squaring off counterattacks, and browsing through assassins' tools to find the most useful one at any given time is truly satisfying.
Assassin's Creed Mirage is best when it loses its fear of being unique, when it embraces what it really is: a mix between classic games and the post-Origins generation. It is easy to understand why Ubisoft sells it as a “return to the roots.” Nostalgia sells and thus the marketing is more attractive. In fact, there's even a blue filter to make the game look like the first Assassin's Creed.
But, if compared to the installments starring Altair and Ezio, Mirage has the underdog. As I said at the beginning, nostalgia is treacherous and, surely, no Assassin's Creed will take me back to those high school afternoons when I jumped across the rooftops of Constantinople. And going back to the roots is more than copying old mechanics or aesthetic elements, it goes beyond recovering things like the notoriety system or setting the game in an Islamic empire during the Middle Ages.
Assassin's Creed Mirage is one of the best installments the franchise has had throughout its history - 13 main games - and it is much more Assassin's Creed than any recent title. Baghdad exudes passion and affection in every corner and it is worth running through its streets and rooftops. I don't know if Basim lives up to the great characters of the franchise, but he is undoubtedly a worthy heir to the legacy of Ezio and Altair.
Assassin's Creed Mirage will arrive on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PC and cloud gaming platforms next Thursday, October 5.
