Assassin's Creed Mirage

Assassin's Creed Mirage was originally going to be DLC for AC Valhalla but ended up being released as a standalone title -- the latter was definitely massive enough without yet another addition. Mirage takes place before Valhalla, in the second half of the 800s in Baghdad, focusing on young Basim ibn Ishaq. At the beginning of Valhalla, Sigurd brought the Hidden Ones Basim and Hytham to Norway where Valhalla's protagonist Eivor met them the first time.

A homage to Assassin's Creed 1

Basim being an antagonist in Valhalla definitely didn't make Mirage particularly enticing for me. However, he has not yet remembered who he is in this one and is just a regular street rat. He didn't feel like the character I hated.

Basim's thieving adventures lead him to getting involved with the Order of the Ancients and the Hidden Ones whom he obviously joins. The Assassin Brotherhood is still going by the Hidden Ones name set by Aya and Bayek in AC Origins, which made me realize that's true for Valhalla, too, even though I recalled otherwise. But the Assassin Brotherhood obviously didn't emerge with the name until Hasan-i Sabbah who was born in the 11th century.

The time periods didn't quite line up like I had started to imagine. With Mirage "going back to the series' roots" and Alamut having been confirmed to be in the game, I had thought it would take place during the organization's re-foundation. But no, Alamut is still under construction and the Assassins are still Hidden Ones.

Mirage's plot is the usual stuff of hunting down Order members. There is bit of a surprise twist at the end -- which I never saw coming -- but it's of no significance. The only lore detail I found to be of interest in the grand scheme of things is found in the Valley of Memory update the game got in late November. AC Mirage was added onto Game Pass months back already but I had been waiting for the update: because of it going to be free, it was bound to be included with the base game and thus on Game Pass as well.

Anyway, the detail is Basim's mother having been from Norway. I don't remember that ever being mentioned in Valhalla -- I could be wrong. But it does explain how a seemingly random guy all the way from the Middle East, with presumably quite different genetics, is somehow like Sigurd and Eivor: of the Isu group that tried to survive the demise of their species via reincarnation. Basim's mother being Norse gives Basim similar genome of the same generation as the Raven Clan warriors. Makes it all seem far likelier.

I thought it amusing that they didn't bother giving her a name, though. Like surely it wouldn't have had that heavy of a lore impact that just throwing something random would've mattered. Awfully convenient that Basim's father happens to be so close to leaving his mortal shell that stuff such as names no longer come to him.

As is tradition, characters often say an occasional sentence or use phrases in the local language. However, at least on English audio, "God is great" is never spoken in Arabic as far as I could tell, probably for being too triggering. Ali ibn Muhammad sure likes shouting it as he's spurring his rebellion. It's kind of diabolical that Ubisoft set a French studio, Ubisoft Bordeaux, to helm this project. Then again, what place hasn't suffered an Islamist terrorist attack by this point.

Stick to the shadows

I had read about Mirage going back to the series' roots in gameplay as well but then I had also seen comments saying that it's just more Valhalla. Both are true. While the engine and general gameplay feel is the exact same as in Valhalla, combat does not provide the same experience. You don't have powerful abilities, no slow motion effects for you to reposition. You can attack, dodge, and parry and that's it. Parrying is not like in the first game of the series either: trying to fight multiple enemies head-on often got me killed pretty fast even on modest 'Assassin' difficulty.

Dodging red attacks was easy enough but parry will be late if the enemy already flashes orange. You have to learn from which side each enemy type does their parriable attacks so that you can hit the button when they're still winding it up.

Go, go, gadget

Despite open conflict not being desirable, you no longer need to flee from it after you're few hours into the game. You can have complete control by utilizing your assassin tools even if they're a bit clumsy to use in combat due to you having to aim them before throwing. Selecting a different one is also a hassle -- or at least I couldn't figure out how to smoothly use them. You also have a limited amount of each, so you have to resupply eventually.

In addition to throwing knives and smoke bombs, you get blow darts, proximity mines, and noisemakers. Smoke bombs have enough of a duration for a change for you to take out at least 4 guards within one bomb even if the assassination animations are again excruciatingly long. With a perk you can chain assassinate two targets at once to hasten the process. Basim however tends to throw a knife instead if there's even a bit of distance to the second target, which can be problematic if the guard in question is heavily armored and your knives don't have their armor piercing upgrade selected. Thus it's usually better to use your hidden blade first on the big guys.

Each tool has upgrades in three tiers. The first tier ones you get eventually all but from the other two you get only one per tier at a given time. The upgrades can be switched around at the Hidden One Bureaus (which look like in the first game, having their entrance on the roof.)

Lite return of full sync challenges

In addition to the Order target assassination, there are fast and easy side contracts to complete for upgrade materials and other rewards. If you're going for 100% completion after the Valley of Memory update, you will do most of the contracts again via the added Animus Sequence replays. The system has a reward progression based on completing the missions' 4 added challenges (like staying undetected, not taking damage etc.) The rewards include an armor outfit, a pair of weapons, and skill points so you might want to do them even if not being a completionist.

One of the added achievements requires unlocking all of the Animus Sequence rewards. You don't have to replay every mission to 4/4 to get there and I'd suggest avoiding most of the main missions because they're much longer and harder to 4/4 than the contracts. The Valley of Memory map has more easy contracts to replay if the base game's weren't enough.

Mostly without magic

While gameplay is generally a lot more grounded than in AC Valhalla, Basim does have one super power: Assassin's Focus. After its tutorial, I didn't try to use it for the longest time because I thought it was just the chain kill ability from AC Liberation and by default you only have enough charges for two targets. Once I started unlocking the perks related to the ability and working towards its achievements, I got puzzled why I couldn't activate the ability in combat. Turned out that it's more akin to Rush Assassination from AC Odyssey, to be used when undetected. The difference between them is Basim having to select all the targets beforehand unlike the Eagle Bearer who picks a new target after each kill. But Focus similarly teleports you to the targets even across otherwise impassable gaps and heights. I used the ability a lot once I learned what it actually was.

I suppose some of the effects on weapons and armor -- in style of Valhalla -- are a bit magical as well: like triggering a poison cloud when killing a poisoned enemy in melee. The base game has an Isu vault where mysterious shards obtained from enemies allow Basim to unlock a set of Isu gear. The armor and weapons probably aren't canonical because their fancy Isu visuals are completely out of place. The helmet also adds a distortion filter to Basim's voice. This game too has a transmogrification system, though.

As Mirage is, again, on the same engine as Valhalla, I could run it on High settings and still get 60fps. That's certainly a change from the many Unreal Engine games of late. Busy places, particularly the Bazaar (which was delightfully familiar-looking), did run a bit less smoothly.

I found Mirage quite pretty. Out in the wilderness outside Baghdad, I was reminded of Origins. You can make Mirage look even more similar because it has a bunch of color filters from other AC titles (unlocked as Animus Sequence rewards), including a rather orange one from Origins. The AC1 filter desaturates the visuals so much that it actually makes the game more difficult to play.

Assassin's Creed Shadows is not yet topical for me because its system requirements look a tad too steep for my setup and the game is not even completely done. Ubisoft+ Premium also feels a tad expensive for one game, even if you do get an access to the complete edition.