The official Assassin’s Creed account just tweeted about Basim causing a stir among the characters and elevating everyone’s anxiety to the highest level. I must confess that I am in the same boat. Verily, they accompanied the tweet with the caption ‘Wish we all had this effect IRL’ alongside the hashtag #MainCharacterEnergy and the timing couldn’t be more perfect as the Valley of Memory update has just rolled out. There is no doubt that Basim has that kind of charm who can simply walk in and silence every one of the others. The gamers, however, are completely on board with it.
The tweet is very straightforward and so are the comments…. oh boy! The comments are a flood of happiness, requests, and even utter confusion. The whole audience of Assassin’s Creed has in a way congregated in a single spot and simultaneously expressed their opinions. Some users are shouting from the rooftop about the character of Basim, calling it ‘pure power’ and ‘the pinnacle of intimidation’, while others, let us just say not every character comes with a fan base.
In a very blunt manner, one of the gamers called Basim the ‘most uninteresting character ever’ of the whole Assassin’s Creed series, which is quite painful to hear. However, the very next gamer was so quick to reply saying, ‘Have you ever played Odyssey or Syndicate? Basim is the best hero since Origins. It’s your delusion.’ And this is one of the reasons why we can’t have nice things, folks, and the debate is on, alive, and messy.
What is most fascinating about this is the number of people that are linking this specific moment to other iconic characters? Someone even compared Basim to Captain Jack Sparrow in that scene, which honestly? I can totally see it. There is that same charm and ‘I can tell you something you don’t know’ aura that is both scary and delightful at the same time as you are wondering what will happen next.
However, things are getting extremely messy – the tech issues are coming in floods. A large number of ps5 gamers are demanding post-processing motion blur toggle as an option, one gamer revealing that sprinting makes it ‘unplayable on ps5’ and another quirky and simply asking ‘please add the option in the game wtf lmao’. It’s a hard decision when one is trying to enjoy the protagonist’s vibes but at the same time the motion blur is making one feel sick.
Then again, the problems with the control setup have surfaced – one user detailed how the whole free run up and jump interference has been a problem, saying he was using a custom scheme and didn’t want free run up on R2/RT. The gamer is asking if the prompt could be switched from press to hold, which seems to be a reasonable request? But once more, game design is not a walk in the park and what we find easy may actually be the hardest thing to execute.
Demands for character’s looks are also steadily coming in, players want Basim wearing training robes from the Alamut opening; they want the hoods of the Altair and Ezio costumes to be corrected; they want the last costume with the hood off just like in the last mission. It looks like every player has a pretty clear picture in mind about how Basim should look while giving everyone the jitters.
And then there is the begging for ports – requests for Mirage to be available on Switch 2, Unity and Syndicate on Switch 2, and the like, they just keep mentioning every title in the Assassin’s Creed series and appending ‘on Switch 2 please’ at the end. One user even said, ‘Just saying, we all would give you our money if you would just give us a nice AC game in return,’ which is… honestly, a valid point.
On the other hand, it is a positive thing to see the players sharing their own content – one user shared his ghost and reaper run, calling the Roman Fort ‘literally one of the most difficult ghost runs EVER’ but still loving the kill. Another user started a whole series on the game and shared it with the community. The creativity of the players in this community is really impressive, even when they are complaining about the motion blur.
The cinematic quality of this scene especially seems to be the one which players really liked and appreciated. A user explained how it was ‘very very cinematic’, praising ‘extremely well crafted facial expressions and build tensions’ and those ‘eyeballs meeting with dissent and flashes of word tensions and pauses of silence and suspense’. They were indeed very observant and that is why the gamers reward the developers who put in extra effort for working on such moments.
And of course there are players who are simply asking for MORE Basim – a game set in Constantinople with Basim is a frequent comment, and one even asked, ‘Make more cutscenes like this in a game setting Basim in Constantinople pretty please?’ Meanwhile, Ubisoft continues to monitor feedback across their platforms.
