Assassin’s Creed Rogue Remastered Review (Xbox One)

Assassin’s Creed series is no stranger to remasters. It has received a remaster featuring the entire Ezio Saga on the PS4 and Xbox One in addition to getting a free 4K update for the original Assassin’s Creed on the Xbox One X. Assassin’s Creed Rogue is the latest remaster to join the current craze of releasing a last generation game with improved visuals on the current generation consoles. It is launching in the same month as Burnout Paradise Remastered and it was just preceded by Shadow of the Colossus remake, so it often feels like a lot of the old games are getting re-released this year.

In term of the upgrade to the visuals, it definitely feels like there has been some great work done in other to bring the game up to the current generation standards. The improvements to the visuals is not just comparable to the high end PC version, which launched after the original PS3 and Xbox 360 release, but it also manages to surpass it in many ways and ends up being a pleasant surprise. This remaster seems to offer much better improvement for the graphics compared to the Ezio Trilogy, which had the fans divided due to the difference in visuals from the original games.

Assassin’s Creed Rogue was released at the tail end of the last generation consoles. It was the time of Assassin’s Creed Unity as an exclusive to the current generation consoles while Rogue was announced for the PS3 and Xbox 360 to be released in the same year. Even though Unity ended up being a major disappointment, Rogue was a surprisingly decent game that was developed on the foundation of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag. It features the same ship traversal and combat that made Black Flag stand out among the other Assassin’s Creed games.

Despite being one of the better games after launching alongside Assassin’s Creed Unity, Rogue feels outdated after playing through the gorgeous open world of Assassin’s Creed Origins. The open world no longer feels as immersive and engaging due to the limitations of its old engine. Thankfully the story for Rogue is still pretty good and instead of being lighthearted in nature, it directly tackles the dark aspects of the battle between the Assassin’s and Templars. The game takes a completely different approach to storytelling compared to the other Assassin Creed games by making you a part of the Templars.

The beginning deals with the lead character Shay as he is mentored by the Assassin’s Brotherhood, however the story is often difficult to follow due to the convoluted nature of the plot. The game caters to a linear design instead of the open ended nature of Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag and the missions follow the same structure. While I did enjoy my time with the story, it is hard to deny that the missions are repetitive in nature and the story is mostly full of fetch quests. When the game does open up, it can prove to be fun with the new additions to your weapons arsenal.

Considering the amount of work done on Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, Rogue appears to have taken the same tools of trade to construct a new narrative for the series. If you liked the sailing element of Black Flag, you will find more of the same in Assassin’s Creed Rogue and it has been greatly expanded offering you more tools to take down other rival ships as you sail to new coasts. Even though there is a lot to unpack here, the game still feels best when you are controlling your character on land and the decision to make it a spin-off that bridges the gap between Assassin’s Creed 3 and Black Flag gives the developers a lot more freedom in the story department.

The remaster might have greatly improved the visuals but it still retains the same dated design, so you will be stuck with a last generation open world. The freedom to climb buildings or objects feels severely limited next to the current generation Assassin’s Creed games, and while the visuals and animations are still nice to look at, there are certain sequences where even they can’t manage to keep up with the current generation standards leading to a jarring experience as you play through the game.

I am glad that fans have a chance to play through Assassin’s Creed Rogue since it is a definitely an interesting experiment for the series, one that was executed really well. However, the remaster is only recommend if you are a dedicated fan of the series since it won’t certainly please the newcomers, especially those who have already spent a considerable amount of their time with the recent games in the series. If you have the patience to play through the dated mission design and open world, this is honestly not a bad Assassin’s Creed game by any means.