You still get a relatively open-world experience within each mission, but you don’t have to worry about losing significant progress if you’re playing the game casually while waiting at line in Starbucks or on your commute. The game is divided up into short, mobile-sized missions that feature objectives and challenges. It’s been scaled down nicely for mobile: While the regular Assassin’s Creed games are played in an open-world format with ongoing missions and objectives, Assassin’s Creed Identity is divided up into mobile-sized missions. Pairing the game with an external MFi controller improves the experience significantly, though. All things considered, these controls aren’t the worst I’ve used in a touchscreen world, but they occasionally get confusing (you’ll tap and hold the right side of the screen to look around and end up walking off a building) and that’s enough to cause frustration in a game that requires sneaky finesse. The game is played with two virtual d-pads-tapping and holding down the left side of the screen gives you a movement pad, while tapping and holding down the right side of the screen lets you look around.

In its attempt to stay true to the original Assassin’s Creed gameplay (scaling walls, jumping from building to building, performing aerial assassinations and leaping into haystacks), Assassin’s Creed Identity does struggle a little with its controller scheme. The controller scheme, which features two virtual d-pads, can be trying at times…

All the elements you love from the console games are present, including relatively open-world gameplay, the ability to scale walls and stealthily take down guards and enemies, and impressively detailed (and beautiful) graphics. It’s got console-worthy elements: Assassin’s Creed Identity looks and feels like a real (albeit scaled-down) chapter in the franchise-this game plays more like a port of the original titles instead of a supplementary afterthought.

Assassin's creed identity gameplay