Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines

I recently remembered that Emily actually owned a PSP, so I decided to grab Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines to try it out. Unfortunately she has some kinda what-the-fuck 30mb memory stick in it, so I can't download any system updates, so that bit will have to wait, but here's stuff about the game.

Have you played the original Assassin's Creed? It's that, but everything is scaled down. Instead of a whole city being one map, it's split into areas (for obvious memory-constraint reasons), all the animations are just from AC1 with some frames taken out, the sounds are very similar except for some reason Altaïr's voice actor is different. The controls are also slightly different; due to there being no right analogue stick, you have to hold the L button and then press the face buttons to control the camera. Not useful in a chase situation, but it's a fair solution. Also there's some kind of buying upgrades system based on coins you pick up which are in hard-to-reach locations, like flags. Makes Altaïr into an unstoppable badass by the end I'd wager. Auto-block?! Enough of the technical side.

The plot seems kinda random, what with Maria somehow being useful to the Assassins despite hating them fervently and whatnot. There is the whole "now the templars hate me too" thing, but I don't think it sticks very well. The world is still excellently fleshed out as I would expect from this franchise. I'm enjoying it so far, bare though the experience is. Climbing up shit is still fun, even though EVERY wall in this game is climbable. There's also a simple achievement system full of stuff like "stab 50 guards" so that'll be done in no time. I've heard the game is pretty short and I've spent perhaps 3 hours on it so far, so who knows, another 7 before it's done I guess.

It did only cost me £10!