Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced Review

Ubisoft seem to be in a bit of a tricky spot when it comes to their portfolio of games. Big financial losses, constant restructuring, layoffs and games such as Skull and Bones and xDefiant have hindered the company; there has been a dark cloud over the company for some time. There is always one franchise that always seems to perform exceptionally well, though, and that is Assassin’s Creed. Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced has finally landed on Xbox Series X/S, and after the success of Shadows, it was pretty obvious that this would do well on sales.

The game is now available on Xbox Series X/S, Playstation 5 and PC, a whopping 13 years after the original. The question is, is it worth your hard-earned cash if you already clocked the game all those years ago? You’ll be glad to know that this review is based off me purchasing the game.

Gameplay

Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced stays true to the core gameplay of the original outing. It’s a wonderful blend of ship exploration, combat, stealth, assassination and quest chasing. Where things have changed, though, is how the game looks and feels to play now. Movement has been refined to bring more fluidity and flexibility in almost every avenue, whether it’s stealth, swimming or the classic parkour aspects, it all just feels smooth.

Ship combat has been refreshed with alternate fire modes and the ability to recruit NPCs. This area does exactly what Skull and Bones should have done with its ship navigation. I appreciated the ability to manually aim where your shots would fire, rather than just tapping buttons. General hand-to-hand combat is a mix of the original game and that of the recent title Assassin’s Creed Shadows. Timing parries correctly grants the ability to assassinate someone, usually slicing the blade across the jugular. The gore is intense and realistic, and it makes stringing attacks together awesome to execute. The controls aren’t perfect by any means, and I found melee combat without weaponry a bit cumbersome, but after a chunk of hours, it all becomes natural.

The Animus system can be a bit of a bugbear, and I found it a little bit of a distraction. Ubisoft do have a habit of filling their games with lots of cosmetic goodness, at a cost. Whilst I don’t really mind gaming experiences making extra revenue out of purely cosmetic stuff, I don’t like it thrust into my face. I don’t know if it’s just me, but I’m not sure why you’d spend more money on a cosmetic outfit for a single-player campaign game. It is, however, an option if you like that kind of thing. There are some extra goodies if you purchase the Deluxe Version of the game, which include costumes, weapons, trinkets and other bits and bobs.

Visuals & Audio

Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced is much more than just a new lick of paint. It looks dramatically better and has been fully rebuilt using the Anvil engine. With fidelity and performance modes, it’s a bit of a trade-off depending on what you want your eyes to experience. If you choose fidelity mode, you’ll get ray-traced lighting and reflections, but at no more than 30fps. Performance mode targets 60 fps, but you’ll lose the ray tracing, but you’ll have a much smoother all-round experience. Personally, I stuck with performance mode for the majority of my playthrough, and it’s simply stunning throughout. I’d love to have tested the game on a few more devices, such as my gaming laptop or even my Lenovo Legion Go, but I was restricted to console only, sadly.

Ubisoft hasn’t radically changed the audio design here, but it still stands in superb stead. Voice acting is strong, with a brilliant narrative throughout. Sound effects all tie in with the atmosphere of the game, the sound of the ocean, and the blast of ship cannons and the clash of swords; everything here ticks all of the boxes.

Final Thoughts

Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced is a beautiful rework which retains the legacy of the original game whilst bringing some meaningful additions and upgrades. Does it mimic the magic of the 2013 outing, however? I’d say that if you have never played Black Flag, then this will feel like a fresh game to you. If you completed it 13 years ago, then you’ll still find fun in reliving the memories with around six hours of new content. With a visual overhaul, updated combat and parkour mechanics, reworked naval combat and lots of quality-of-life improvements, this is an exceptional remake and not just a quick cash grab. For Assassin’s Creed fans out there, it is a must-buy. Alternatively, you could subscribe to Ubisoft Plus and try to smash out the campaign without investing in the game fully.

If you fancy picking up a copy on Xbox Series X/S, you can pick up a copy HERE.