The Hidden Blade Assassin's Creed in Depth

My personal theory is that since Ezio needs to have two children, he's already had Subject 16's ancestor by the events of Brotherhood, or even before entering the Vault. This is for a couple reasons -

1) Minerva says "Desmond" in the Vault. Since Abstergo knows how both Pieces of Eden and the Animus work, they would have figured out she was referring to an ancestor. They probably would've captured Desmond right after viewing that, instead of waiting until they needed another guy to revisit Altair's life. So I don't think Subject 16 was even able to access the actual Vault memories.

2) There probably won't be glyphs in AC:B, which would make sense as Subject 16 wouldn't be able to put code into Ezio's Rome memories.

3) Ezio sleeps around a lot.

...Does anyone care what the hell happens to Christina? Obviously she has a lot of history with Ezio. They approached each other with such comfort. They seemed in love. Was that explained in the book or was it just tossed aside to make room for his 2 other love interests?

So how do we know that Subject 16 and Desmond are BOTH descendants of Ezio? Couldn't 16 have been a descendant of one of the other Assassins?

Yeah, it's explained in the book. If I recall, she gets married after being tired of waiting for Ezio, though she still loves him. She eventually gets killed by Savonarola's men, though.

IIRC, one of the early development interviews/articles stated that Ezio is the last common ancestor of Subject 16 and Desmond.

See, I'd want to see that. There are a lot of things in the game that they just seem to leave alone and I want loose ends tied up.

What's "IIRC"? (I bet I actually know this...)

If I recall correctly.

I think we're also forgetting that Ezio had a literal "roll in the hay" with a woman following a horse time trial in Florï. While we don't know much about her, perhaps Ezio did in fact father an illegitimate child with this woman. A very small chance, but still a possibility.

Joey also brings up a good point in that Christina could have fathered one of Ezio's children. By the time we get her into bed we've already had our family killed the next day and are on our way to Monterigioni by the end of the week, never to see her again. It's also very likely that Ezio fathered an illegitimate child with her.

Then there's Rosa, and although the game doesn't show it, the book apparently explains that they had a very steamy relationship. So she's also a candidate, and because he's in Monterigioni and she's still in Venice (being that she wasn't among the people accompanying Ezio at the end of the game), it's possible he fathered an illegitimate child with her.

Finally, we have Caterina, and the Ubi devs were none to shy about showing us the freaky stuff that she and Ezio so willingly put on display. She could possibly be a mother to one of Ezio's children, and being that she had eight with two other people, my money's on her.

But we have no idea at this point, so our best bet is to put Ezio and these four ladies on

And don't forget the courtesans in Sister Teodora's house. And weren't there two of them? Hmmm, I'm getting an idea.......

Tee hee! Thanks for noticing. I was afraid someone quicker than me would beat me to the punch.

I've given much thought to the subject of Ezio's mate(s). These are some important points:

• Miss "roll in the hay" is named Amelia.
• Cristina Vespucci (a.k.a. Cristina Calfucci in the book) was killed by Savonarola's men during Bonfire of the Vanities.
• In order for Desmond to possess genetic memories from Ezio's life, his ancestor must be conceived after those events. AC: Brotherhood extends Ezio's story into 1503. This lets out both Cristina and Amelia as Desmond's ancestor (or at least that encounter with Amelia).
• The lifestyle of the Assassins was passed down from generation to generation all the way from Altaïr to Desmond. Either Ezio, his wife, or both of them raised their children as Assassins. Any illegitimate children raised by prostitutes, riding instructors, etc. would not carry on that tradition.
• Ubisoft has hinted that Ezio is the last common ancestor of Desmond and Subject 16 (see issue #207 of BUZZ magazine, for example). I haven't been able to find an official statement to confirm this as a fact.
• If we accept the "last common ancestor" meme, then Ezio must have at least two children. If he had only one, then it would be a nearer common ancestor. The two children may have different mothers.
• It's possible that Subject 16's ancestor was born earlier than some of Desmond's genetic memories. In AC2 Lucy says something like, "I think Subject 16 knew about the Vault." This would suggest that his ancestor was conceived later rather than earlier.

To me, all indications suggest Rosa as Desmond's ancestor. My only concern is her age. I expect to see them marry and raise some Assassin babies.

I hope we see a family tree at some point to clear this up, i'd also like to know how many generations are between Altair and Ezio, but we know the ancestor who built the villa lived in the 13th century, only around 100 years after Altair was around.

This may have been Altair's grandson who built the Villa. In the writings on the walls inside the Auditore crypt (downloadable by Uplay) he explains his entire life leading up to creating the Villa. It implies that he was beyond middle-aged when he did this. Not necessarily elder, but old nonetheless. I still think that this age hint makes it conceivable that he could have been Altair's grandson.

Didn't it said at the beggining of ACII in the Animus menu that it was searching for the latest common ancestor and then shows the birth of Ezio?

Oh yeah...well, there ya go! Mystery solved (right from the get-go!)

For storie, characters and such, I can't help but give you this site : http://assassinscreed.wikia.com/wiki/Assassin%27s_Creed_Wiki really complete on the subject.

Nope, it didn't say anything. All we see is Subject 16 on one side and Subject 17 on the other, then it scans stuff under both and finds a commonality.

It certainly could be a common ancestor but it doesn't have to be. It doesn't even have to be the most recent common ancestor.

As far as I am concerned, the only thing that makes sense for Lucy to be looking for is information on the vault. That was her goal all along and she made that perfectly clear both in the beginning of the game (on the elevator) and at the end. Lucy could have used any of Desmond's ancestors to train him to be an assassin, even using Altair's earlier life. But she chose Ezio because that's where the information of the vault was, during Ezio's lifetime. Two birds, one stone.

If Subject 16 was Ezio's descendant (conceived after the vault experience) then Lucy would already have all the info she needed from him and wouldn't need to send Desmond into Ezio's life. From Subject 16, Lucy only learned of the vault's existence and the fact that it foretold of a threat far more dangerous than the Templars. She didn't really have any more info than that. It only makes sense that Subject 16 was not an ancestor of Ezio because he was aware of the vault but didn't have any hard information on it. I theorize that the vault was the common link found in that animus menu in the beginning, and that Subject 16's ancestor was likely one of the other assassins we see in AC2 who heard about the vault from Ezio but was not actually there to see and hear Minerva's warning. This would fit perfectly with the idea of Lucy looking for any common reference to the vault in both subjects' ancestral memories – two ancestors existing in the same time period who each were aware of this vault and the fact that it contained a serious warning.

Merely looking for Subject 16 and Desmond's most recent common ancestor just doesn't have any significance. It doesn't make any sense for that to be the sole reason when we know full well that Lucy was trying to find out about this big threat. I seem to be the only one who believes this, however.

You just converted me, Asaic. That absolutely makes the most sense.

I would love to see a family tree as well. I've tried to do some figuring on my own, but it's really difficult. There was a discussion about it on GameFAQs a while ago (http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/956856-assassins-creed-ii/53159012 but please don't read the thread because I was very stupid in it ). I'll quote the relevant post:

So, this is what we know:
Ezio's great-great-grandfather, Domenico, built the Villa Auditore in 1290.
At this point Domenico had his son with him, so the LATEST Ezio's great-grandfather could have been born is also 1290.
Giovanni, Ezio's father, is born in 1436.
146 years between the birth of Ezio's great-grandfather & the birth of his father?!
Have I missed something here or have Ubisoft just not checked their numbers? (by: Logic_Crocodile)

I think there's an outside chance that Altair's grandson could have built the Villa - if the Villa were actually constructed in 1290 as the database says. There is reason to believe that it was not.

I'm not sure if divulging info given in the Auditore family crypt could be considered a spoiler or not, so I'll use the tags just in case. If it's not a spoiler please tell me so I can dispense with the tags.

So I think it's safe to assume that the Villa Auditore was not actually built in 1290. That also eases the difficulty of the 146 years as well.

But that's an illustration of the difficulty. We can't always rely on info given in the game.

It could be that the Villa was built in 1290, but Domenico only moved into it and added the Sanctuary after Dante's death.

I was just going by a rough estimate.

Asaic's logic does make perfect sense. That animus screen you see right before Ezio's birth says "searching for relevent MEMORY", i never understood why people took this to mean Desmond and S16 were related.

S16 had an ancestor who knew about the vault(possibly one of the other assassins) and Desmond had an ancestor who saw the vault(Ezio). It doesn't need to be any more complicated then that.

Getting back to the topic of AC:Brotherhood, i'm curious how the future storyline will progress in the game. Lucy mentions a cabin where they have a secondary hideout so perhaps we'll get to do some more parkor as Desmond out in the open.

You happen to have a link to this interview? I don't remember reading anything like that and unless they state it in the game it shouldn't be canon.

In this video at 00:58 Ezio stabs an enemy and simultaneously shoots another. Sorry, I just thought it was badass.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWR20R_Jvw0&playnext_from=TL&videos=EEfxX...