Depending on where you are on the world, Assassin’s Creed: Mirage is either already out or away to come out as I write this. Ubisoft’s latest entry in the long-running Assassin’s Creed franchise is a much smaller game than what we’ve seen, with a focus on returning to what made the series popular in the first place: stealthy stabbing.
Of course, the Assassin’s Creed games have found a lot of success in recent years. In dire need of a refresh, Ubisoft pivoted the games to a bigger, open-world style with hundreds of hours of content, RPG mechanics, settlement building and loads more. However, after Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla there was feedback that people wanted something smaller and more focused, which is what Assassin’s Creed: Mirage is supposed to be.
So, how has this more condensed and streamlined game reviewed? Pretty well, it seems. Over on Opencritic, Mirage currently holds a ‘Strong’ rating of 76 across 79 different reviews. By comparison, Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla holds a rating of 82, indicating that while many critics are enjoying the latest game, they aren’t as impressed with it.
Jarrett Green of IGN was fairly impressed with it, awarding the game an 8 out of 10 and saying, “I’d recommend Mirage to anyone who’s lapsed on Assassin’s Creed, as its back-to-basics approach is a successful first step in returning the feeling that the earlier industry-defining games gave me so long ago.”
Those words resonate with me because I’ve been one of the people missing the older games’ focus on sneaking around and assassinations.
Meanwhile, Jordan Ramée of Gamespot noted that it felt like the story really struggled to stand on its own, requiring knowledge of prior games to enjoy properly, especially Valhalla. But he also praised the investigation-driven assassinations, awarding the game a 6 out of 10. He writes, “Mirage does get back to the basics that first defined the series by refocusing on social stealth and making it fun to learn about a city’s history, but a weak cast of characters keeps it from reaching the same heights as some of its earliest predecessors.”
One of my favourite reviewers, SkillUp, published a video review that states he does not recommend the game overall. In the video he says he loved being an assassin again and preferred playing Mirage over the sloppy action-combat of the RPG-focused AC titles. But he also said that after a few hours without the gameplay evolving, “it dawned on me that Mirage is what we all kind of feared it might be: it’s the old formula shuffled out the door for one more go around with very little effort made to evolve what that formula is or how it might be used.”
Alice Bell of Rock Paper Shotgun is a lot more impressed with the game than Skill Up. In her excellent review, she finished up by stating: “Mirage takes the good bits from what the series has become in decades of not being a stealth RPG, polishes them up a bit, and puts them together with some of the best bits from the early games in the series, in a neat little package. It’s smaller, sure, but you don’t miss out on anything, and when you’ve finished you don’t feel like you wasted any time. This is how big companies should make better games.”
And finally, Push Square gave it a 7 out of 10. They also pointed out weak characters as being a major flaw but seemed to really enjoy the more streamlined gameplay. “Assassin’s Creed Mirage sets off in search of its roots, and it finds them — both for better and worse. Undeniably basic in its approach to stealth and combat, it feels oddly dated in terms of design, but it’s also a refreshing reminder of series’ original strengths.”
It seems your enjoyment of the game hinges on how you feel about the modern titles, then. If you’ve find Valhalla, Odyssey and Origins to be too bloated and lacking in actual stealth then Mirage might be the game you’ve been waiting for. However, if that old-school design doesn’t sound like it would hold up too well in 2023 it might be best to skip this one, especially given how freaking stacked October is.
Personally, I’m very tempted by this one. Plus, I like the idea of Ubisoft slowing down the development of the big Assassin’s Creed games to give us something smaller. These big triple-A publishers are so intent on crafting bigger and bigger games that the entire gaming economy is really struggling to keep up with inflated costs, so smaller games could be the answer.
