Game Review: Assassin’s Creed Mirage
Basim’s Origins
Hello, dear readers! My name is Victor, and I am a totally blind gaming, technology, and entertainment journalist. I am also an ambassador for universal design, an accessibility consultant, advocate and tester.
Ubisoft is preparing to launch Assassin’s Creed Mirage worldwide in just a few days and we were fortunate enough to receive the game for review purposes last Friday. We have played it since then and with the embargo on all coverage lifting today, I have prepared a spoiler-free article for you.
Developed by Ubisoft Bordeaux and published by Ubisoft, Assassin’s Creed Mirage is the thirteenth major installment in the Assassin’s Creed series. The action is set in 9th-century Baghdad and features Basim, a character who previously appeared in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.
Most of you know already that I am totally blind now, but before that, a long time ago, I was a huge Assassin’s Creed fan and played a lot of these wonderful games before losing my sight.
Over the years, the talented people at Ubisoft expanded this beloved universe with more entries that became bigger and more complex. Of course, this means that a lot of new mechanics were introduced, which also means that I wasn’t able to experience the games on my own.
Story and Gameplay
This year’s Assassin’s Creed Mirage is a departure from recent releases. Long gone are the overwhelming RPG elements, the huge map, and other such elements that would push such a game to over 100 hours of playtime. The team at Ubisoft Bordeaux went back to the drawing board and, taking inspiration from the first titles of the series, managed to bring us a more personal, grounded, and narrative-driven story.
In AC Mirage, we play as Basim, a cunning but quite charming street thief haunted by nightmarish visions. Seeking answers, retribution, and justice as a result of a deadly event that I will not spoil for you, Basim arrives in Baghdad and joins the ancient organization known as The Hidden Ones. Experience Basim’s story, from a defiant young man to a refined Master Assassin with a conflicted destiny, in this tightly crafted, narrative-driven action adventure that will delight and entertain fans of the Assassin‘s Creed games.
9th century Baghdad was one of the largest, most populated and bustling cities found in the Middle Ages. It was also one of the most important trade nerve centers on the Silk Road and an attractive place for travelers, merchants, scientists and scholars. This historical context is used to great results by Ubisoft Bordeaux as it favors plenty of gameplay and narrative opportunities, making the most of this highly immersive and reactive sandbox.
The gameplay is very similar to the one in the first Assassin’s Creed, with our hero blending in crowds, pickpocketing clueless people on the streets, and silently assassinating targets. A higher emphasis is put this time around on stealth mechanics, as Basim is more of a thief than an actual skilled soldier. This means that most of the time we will need to make as little noise as possible and hide ourselves from searching eyes.
Both my colleagues Alex and Alina put around 22 hours into the game, but that’s just to finish the main story. With the additional side quests, I think you can get 3 to 5 more hours out of Mirage.
Presentation and Performance
From a presentation point of view, Assassin’s Creed Mirage looks good and sounds great. The city is quite big; you realize that when you use the eagle to check out points of interest. Of course, Ubisoft Bordeaux did a great job when it comes to capturing the look and feel of the place. Citizens are milling the streets, the architecture is impressive, and sneaking up on unsuspecting enemies or jumping on them from buildings is quite satisfying.
The music of Assassin’s Creed Mirage is absolutely epic; I surprise myself humming the main theme from time to time while working on this article. Also, the voice acting is excellent as we have some renowned actors bringing important characters to life with talent and emotion. I won’t give you any more details, but fans of The Expanse should keep an ear out for one of the main characters of the show.
You can play Mirage on performance or presentation modes and as expected these will give you 30 FPS at 4K or 60 FPS at dynamic resolutions. There are some bugs and glitches, but that’s to be expected especially for a pre-release version of the game. Ubisoft has already pushed a patch that enhances the graphics and also fixes many issues so I’m confident that they will continue to improved it in the coming weeks and months.
Accessibility
Now, before moving on to the conclusion, I must address the accessibility features available in Assassin’s Creed Mirage. Ubisoft is definitely one of the pioneers of accessibility in video games and with each new release, they bring new features to their impaired and disabled players. Right now, I don’t believe that blind gamers will be able to play AC Mirage without running into difficulties, but there are definitely some improvements that can make the game more approachable.
Immediately after booting up the game, I was greeted by the screen reader which can be enabled and works quite well. This time around, the TTS can be used successfully to navigate all the menus, read objectives, logs, messages in the game, letters, maps, the codex and even to make our way around the world.
AC Mirage comes with navigation assist, but its implementation leaves a lot to be desired at this moment. First of all, the player needs to find their own direction using the right stick to rotate the camera. When the camera faces the direction in which we need to go, the text-to-speech will tell us the distance to the objective, but right now this feature is broken and the distance is reported erroneously back to us. Alina was able to confirm that the numbers are changing on screen. This little problem, which I hope will be fixed soon, in combination with level design that’s not that accessible will leave blind players stumbling in the dark. I am sure that if a blind consultant is brought in to try out the game and give feedback to the developer, everything can be fixed. If anyone from the accessibility team at Ubisoft Bordeaux reads this, please reach out and let’s make AC Mirage the first game that’s actually playable by the blind.
A lot of the groundwork is already here; the text-to-speech works well, navigation assist needs to be fine-tuned and I think that we have enough sound cues throughout the game to actually pull this off given that the developer is willing to invest more time and resources into accessibility. I am talking here from my own perspective as a blind player, but those who are low vision or deaf can also take advantage of some really helpful features such as adjustable text sizes, captioning, color filters, outlines, or larger subtitles.
I will also upload some videos on my YouTube channel exploring accessibility features and the initial setup, plus probably some gameplay to show you how much I’m able to play on my own and where the problems begin. As always, I will continue to explore the game and try it out from time to time after updates are released and especially if accessibility fixes are communicated to us by Ubisoft. I will update this review with new information when and if available.
Last, but not least, I want to congratulate the individual responsible for coming up with the idea of turning on and off the screen reader by pressing R2 from anywhere you are in the settings menu. That’s absolutely brilliant and much appreciated.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Assassin’s Creed Mirage is one of the best titles in the series. With a likable main character, a wonderfully detailed city to explore, and a captivating story, Mirage will appeal to both old-school players and newcomers alike. The shorter campaign, the linear narrative, and a large range of accessibility features make it also the most approachable and accessible Assassin’s Creed yet.
Even though my own adventure was stopped short due to the fact that level design and in other accessibility implementation stood in my way, I’m sure that low vision and other players will be able to take full advantage of this captivating experience.
Score: 8.5 / 10 – Great
Review copy provided by Ubisoft
Assassin‘s Creed Mirage will be available tomorrow, October 5 on PlayStation 5, PS4, Xbox series X/S, Xbox One, PC, and Luna.
Review copy provided by Ubisoft
Victor Dima
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