The Hidden Blade Assassin's Creed in Depth

I was replaying AC2 the other day, and I looted a dead guys body, expecting the camera to flip to a view of ezio's face from the ground in front of the body. But then, I remembered, that was never in AC2. At the best of times, things like this happening disorient me, at the worst of times, they clip through a wall or are obscured by a person. This happens in AC2 and ACB for air assassinations, and animations for activating switches and the like.

In a game where it's very easy to feel disconnected from climbing a building as you hold forward on the stick and press A, I think it's important that the player feels connected to his actions. Wresting control of the player's camera away from them during mundane occurences that will happen many times during the next 10 minutes is a good way to break that connection. I always get shivers when I see Altair/Ezio's interaction animations from my natural camera view. It makes me feel like he can actually move in ways other than "high profile" "high profile sprint" and "low profile".

For cutscenes that move the story along, I don't mind. Ubisoft has gotten so much better with their cutscenes with Brotherhood, they're really fun to watch.

For air assassinations, they can grate if they happen on every joe blow you come across. (a toggle button for normal guards would be great) But on assassination targets, it would be fine, and would show you you killed someone important in an awesome way. (maybe slow-motion before you land on them and slit their throat. as long as it's a story assassination.)

For opening doors, that transfer to another area directly, fine. If it just opens a part of the map, then let players have the camera.

During mini cinematics in an assassination mission, where the guy you're chasing does something big that forces you to adapt, then fine.

For looting/flipping switches/picking daisys/ect, just let the players have the camera. It feels very tactile in an unexplainable way, it was the first moment of AC2 where I thought "This game is freaking amazing". And I miss it.

At least it's not as bad as Red Dead Redemption, which literally flips your player camera to a random angle after it's done showing you skinning an animal from the animal's pov. In the open plains of the west, there's no easier way to get confused.