Solid addition to the franchise and some cool new additions, but some glaring problems as well. The story and characters is top notch as usual, with some food for thought and philosophical musing. It has some interesting commentary on North America as it is today as well. The combat has some new combos and enemies to try out, muskets being an interesting addition that is handled well. The funnest addition is probably the naval combat, great fun and very atmospheric, can't wait to play 4. The wilderness parkour is incredibly intuitive and natural, it's fantastic how seamlessly and fluidly you travel through the trees, with subtle directional hints that are still easy on the eye. However that's the only real appeal of the frontier, for the space you have to travel to, there is very little to do apart from hunting, which gets dull pretty fast. This is the games primary problem, there is insufficent interesting mid and end game content outside of the story, it is far too grindy and unoriginal. I did not look forward to completing missions in the same way as previous titles and I didn't feel the same incentives from the rewards. Hopefully something to be rectified in AC IV.*Some Spoilers* As with all games the ending is very important, yet for all the build-up and hype that I'd generated for it over all the previous games, waiting to find out finally what actually happens, the word to best describe my reaction was honestly just 'meh'. It had the hint of a rushed finish to it, not that it was bad necessarily, just that it didn't live up to the expectations I had of it. Whether that's simply because I had my sights too high for the series story finale is up to the judgement of anyone else who plays it of course.

Solid addition to the franchise and some cool new additions, but some glaring problems as well. The story and characters is top notch as usual, with some food for thought and philosophical musing. It has some interesting commentary on North America as it is today as well. The combat has some new combos and enemies to try out, muskets being an interesting addition that is handled well. The funnest addition is probably the naval combat, great fun and very atmospheric, can't wait to play 4. The wilderness parkour is incredibly intuitive and natural, it's fantastic how seamlessly and fluidly you travel through the trees, with subtle directional hints that are still easy on the eye. However that's the only real appeal of the frontier, for the space you have to travel to, there is very little to do apart from hunting, which gets dull pretty fast. This is the games primary problem, there is insufficent interesting mid and end game content outside of the story, it is far too grindy and unoriginal. I did not look forward to completing missions in the same way as previous titles and I didn't feel the same incentives from the rewards. Hopefully something to be rectified in AC IV.*Some Spoilers* As with all games the ending is very important, yet for all the build-up and hype that I'd generated for it over all the previous games, waiting to find out finally what actually happens, the word to best describe my reaction was honestly just 'meh'. It had the hint of a rushed finish to it, not that it was bad necessarily, just that it didn't live up to the expectations I had of it. Whether that's simply because I had my sights too high for the series story finale is up to the judgement of anyone else who plays it of course.