Thoughts after finishing Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag

This is the first Assassin’s Creed game I’ve played since Brotherhood, and the first single player title I played on PS4. Here are some roughly collated thoughts on parts of the game.

• Being a pirate in an open-world is a lot of fun. The developer has done a great job integrating sailing and traversal mechanics to make the process of ship-to-ship-combat and boarding enjoyable from end to end. The game has an aesthetically distinctive look and feel that sets it apart from other games in the series. This is even more apparent when you dress Kenway in either Ezio or Altaïr’s outfits.

• Close quarters combat still feels stilted and disjointed. In previous titles this hasn’t been an issue, since often you’re only engaging in combat for a mission, or long enough to carve out an escape route. And as an assassin, direct combat is not your strong suit; you deal in subtlety and subterfuge. In...