The Hidden Blade Assassin's Creed in Depth

For me the movement of the figure and its relationship to its physical surroundings are what count. And in that both ACII and brotherhood are big steps back.

What's special about AC is the level of physical presence in the game space. Being somewhere is mostly a sense of physical presence for the mind. Altair feels like a body with mass in a space. Ezio looks like a cartoon figure.

And that's 100% a question of animation. Not textures.

They'd better upgrade the game engine a lot. I don't know whether AC3 will come out this year or next, but in either case, the Anvil engine they're currently using will be outdated then or very quickly afterwards. So, yeah, I consider a revamp in order (especially if they're going to do those huge-ass cities like Rome again).
What was a nice improvement from AC2/AC:B over AC1 were the cloths. They actually were more than 1px wide, so they looked as, well, clothes, instead of sheets of paper. I hope that they will fix the leaves in the next release as well. Other than that, I'd prefer the more 'zoomed-out' style of AC1 coming back.

Then there's the character animations Al-Assass mentioned. In AC1 these were very smooth and a high-profile kill had Altaïr's hand perfectly on the body, instead of in the body as is the case with Ezio.

I'd like everything to seem doable as it did in AC1. Ezio's adventures were too "cartoony" like Al-Assass mentioned. What I'd like to see is movement and graphics that of the Uncharted series for AC3. An Assassin should jump slightly farther than Drake, but the look and feel should be there, in my opinion.

But I think most of us would agree that the engine needs an overhaul.

Oh my goodness, clipping when assasinating (and pretty much at any time) was a HUGE problem I actually had just as many problems with it in AC1. Also, the gravity for falling always seemed kinda off, and ezio and altair had no falling animations to speak of. And adding animations for running up steps would be great. But when I say I want a better engine, it's not so they can make it prettier. It's so they can make it prettier and have it run smoother. Screen tear can happen in cutscenes where the characters are just standing around talking, and the gameplay lags significantly in both AC1 and ACB.

But animations are a totally different subject, so lets concentrate on things that a new engine can provide: dynamic lighting for instance. Or a better physics system. Or a ragdoll system as amazing as Halo: Reach's.

All of these things will contribute to making the game seem like a definate step up. Good animations will seal the deal, of course.

Well, ragdoll systems kind of fall into the reach of animations, don't you think?

Meh, I guess a little bit, but not that much. It's a system that calculates how the body should react when it hits something, like what parts should be stiff and what parts should bend. Once again, animation only supplements it, it can be good without it.

They should use the Frostbite 2 engine DICE is using for Battlefield 3. That thing is the most advanced piece of gaming tech I have ever seen 0_o

In all seriousness I think the game needs a new engine completely for the purpose of improving everything. Unfortunately, with a new title coming down the chute due in Autumn 2011, the engine will most likely remain the same. This is disappointing, but we should find out more at E3 in June.

I haven't really done any in-depth research, but is Frostbite capable of handling a huge city like Rome and at the same time manage all the characters? The Battlefield games are shooters, which means a very limited number of NPC's and environmental objects to interact with when compared to the AC franchise. Despite it's many capabilities, I don't think the FB engine is a good choice for the next AC game.

Have you seen the size of maps in Battlefield? They're absolutely gigantic! I think if they apply Impostoring from Halo: Reach (makes objects that are further away cheaper to draw) and the Frostbite 2 engine, not only would the game play better with less frame-rate issues while still being able to handle an open-world, but it would also look fantastic.

I'm only kidding about this insane fantasy, but still

There's a reason why open-world games don't look as great as games which are more scripted: crowds, and Guard patrols. The frostbite engine can not handle displaying hundereds of fully animated character models following paths around a giant city and reacting to the player. FPS's can have big maps in multiplayer because there is no-one on the map but players, but even then, since players can freely walk around , they have to tone down the graphics from the more linear campaigns, because everything must be displayed at once.

AC needs an engine update, but going for a hyper-real one like frostbite would be a mistake. They need to make the game being able to run smoothly while thousands of people walk around in a huge environment and the player is looking at all of it from the top of a tower, and make that their top priority. And then make sure that whatever improved graphics they add on are optimized to prevent screen-tearing and fps drop.

I hope that the new game uses the new engine, so they can have some practice with it.

OMG, they came up with another name for level of detail? I suppose they think they invented something that's been around since 1976.

I'm sure there's more to it than that. "Makes stuff farther away cheaper to draw" was just an extremely brief and basic definition.