Assassins Creed II Achievements

Personally, I really think that at least some achievements should be “leaked” before a game is released. I love achievements and I almost always check a game’s achievements before buying the game. There is one game I probably would not have bothered buying if I had read the achievements before hand. I honestly do not think that, generally speaking, letting people have a sense of some of the achievements would turn them off to the game. I do think that it would help generate some excitement about the game. Not because achievements make or break a game, but because, at least in this case, I think that any news is good news. So many games are coming out this holiday season that I would think that anything that helps set you apart from the other games and makes players more interested is a good thing. Besides, achievements are available online so quickly that most people can see them before they make it to the store. Why wait?

Here is a list of the Assassins Creed Achievements found on The Planet Xbox forums:

* Master Assassin – Unlock All Trophies (Platinum)
* The Birth of an Assassin – Be reborn as Ezio Auditore Da Firenze. (Bronze, 20G)
* Arrivederci Abstergo – Break out of Abstergo. (Bronze, 20G)
* Welcome to the Animus 2.0 – Enter the Animus 2.0. (Silver, 20G)
* The Pain of Betrayal – Complete DNA Sequence 1. (Silver, 30G)
* Vengeance – Complete DNA Sequence 2. (Silver, 30G)
* Exit the Son – Complete DNA Sequence 3. (Silver, 30G)
* Bloody Sunday – Complete DNA Sequence 4. (Silver, 30G)
* Undertaker – Discover the Assassin’s Tomb inside the catacombs under Santa Maria Novella. (Silver, 20G)
* The Conspirators – Complete DNA Sequence 5. (Silver, 30G)
* An Unexpected Journey – Complete DNA Sequence 6. (Silver, 30G)
* Bleeding Effect – Complete training and reenter the Animus. (Silver, 30G)
* The Merchant of Venice – Complete DNA Sequence 7. (Silver, 30G)
* The Impenetrable Palazzo – Complete DNA Sequence 8. (Silver, 30G)
* Masquerade – Complete DNA Sequence 9. (Silver, 30G)
* Bianca’s Man – Complete DNA Sequence 10. (Silver, 30G)
* The Prophet – Complete DNA Sequence 11. (Silver, 30G)
* The Vault – Complete DNA Sequence 14. (Silver, 30G)
* An Old Friend Returns – Escape the hideout. (Gold, 100G)
* Myth Maker – Find the 8 statuettes in Monteriggioni. (Bronze, 5G)
* Vitruvian Man – Unlock all 20 pieces of Subject 16′s video. (Bronze, 20G)
* Street Cleaner – Hide 5 dead bodies in a Bale of Hay. (Bronze, 10G)
* Fly Swatter – Kick a Guard while using the Flying Machine. (Bronze, 5G)
* Messer Sandman – Stun 4 guards at once by throwing sand in their face. (Bronze, 10G)
* Doctor – Perform an Air Assassination on a Poisoned NPC. (Bronze, 20G)
* No-hitter – Kill 10 enemies while remaining in conflict without being hit. (Bronze, 20G)
* Kleptomaniac – Pickpocket 1000 Florins. (Bronze, 10G)
* Lightning Strike – Sprint for 100 meters. (Bronze, 10G)
* Sweeper – Sweep 5 guards at once by using a Long Weapon. (Bronze, 10G)
* Venetian Gladiator – Discover the Assassin’s Tomb inside Santa Maria della Visitazione. (Bronze, 20G)
* I can see your house from here! – Discover the Assassin’s Tomb inside the Torre Grossa. (Bronze, 20G)
* Hallowed be thy name – Discover the Assassin’s Tomb inside the Basilica di San Marco. (Bronze, 20G)
* Prison Escape – Discover the Assassin’s Tomb inside the Rocca di Ravaldino fortress. (Bronze, 20G)
* Choir Boy – Discover the Assassin’s Tomb inside Santa Maria del Fiore (The Duomo). (Bronze, 20G)
* Assassin For Hire – Complete your first assassination mission for Lorenzo Il Magnifico. (Bronze, 10G)
* Macho Man – Defend a woman’s honor. (Bronze, 10G)
* Steal Home – Win a race against thieves! (Bronze, 10G)
* Show your Colors – Wear the Auditore cape in each city. (Bronze, 10G)
* Handy Man – Upgrade a building in the Stronghold. (Bronze, 10G)
* I like the view – Synchronize 10 View Points. (Bronze, 10G)
* High Dive – Perform a Leap of Faith from the Top of Florence’s Giotto’s Campanile. (Bronze, 10G)
* Mailman – Intercept a Borgia Courrier. (Bronze, 10G)
* Tip of the Iceberg – Use your Eagle Vision to scan a Glyph in the environment. (Bronze, 10G)
* A Piece of the Puzzle – Unlock a piece of Subject 16′s video. (Bronze, 10G)
* Art Connoisseur – Buy a Painting from Florence and Venice. (Bronze, 10G)
* Podestà of Monteriggioni – Reach 80% of your stronghold’s total value. (Bronze, 30G)
* Perfect Harmony – Tint your clothes with those colors: Wetland Ebony and Wetland Ivory. (Bronze, 10G)
* In Memory of Petruccio – Collect all the Feathers. (Bronze, 30G)
* Red Light Addict – Spend 5000 florins on Courtesans. (Bronze, 10G)
* Man of the People – Toss more than 300 florins on the ground. (Bronze, 10G)
* Victory lies in preparation – Get all Hidden Blades, Item Pouches and Armor upgrades for Ezio. (Bronze, 10G)

Assassin’s Creed II PS3
Assassin’s Creed II 360
Assassin’s Creed II PC

Assassin’s Creed II: Discovery  DS

Assassin’s Creed II (Black Edition) (PlayStation 3)
Assassin’s Creed II (Black Edition) (Xbox 360)

Dawn of Discovery

Dawn of Discovery is a sequel in a series of games. While I had played the next most recent 1701 AD, I had played it on PC and thought that this series would be a good buy for the Wii. The fact that the game is also $15-$20 cheaper on the Wii sure did not hurt my decision.

Dawn of Discovery is a city building game that I would say is somewhere between SimCity and Civilization. In order to build your settlement you must find an island. Of course, there are several things to consider when choosing the island. Size is obviously important if you want to build the settlement to one of the larger classes. As your settlement grows more buildings and bonuses become available. So, choosing an island with room to grow is fairly important.

The second, and perhaps the most important thing to consider is the resources that are available on the island. Not every island can produce everything a settlement needs to grow. When choosing an island in the beginning it is wise to find one that will give the most basic of needs. As the settlement grows it is possible to find other islands to settle in order to expand the empire.

There are two gameplay modes available when you play Dawn of Discovery, Story Mode and Continuous Play. Story Mode is pretty much a very very long tutorial. There are seven chapters to play through with each teaching different aspects of the game. If you have played any of the games in the series then it would probably not hurt you to much if you went straight to continuous play. The game is rated 10+ and so the storyline is right up there with watching The Care Bears. In the Story Mode players take the role of William, the handsome and peace loving prince. William of course has a jealous brother who feels that war is the only way to succeed and *spoiler alert* it is no surprise that in the last chapter peace loving Prince William must eventually go to war and capture his evil brother. Oh, did I mention that Prince William gets to marry the beautiful and exotic princess in the end? *yawn*

While the game is fairly simple to play, a lack of planning can make it more difficult. Any mistakes are fairly easy to correct, but with good strategy players might be able to avoid most mistakes altogether. Some of the areas that I had trouble were mainly in maintaining enough goods to keep my citizens happy at the social class that they were in at any given time. As the population increases it puts a strain on resources. The reason this is a problem is because there is no easy way to gauge supply and demand. If the population’s needs become greater than the supply a warning message is given, but if you do not have the resources to increase production the population quickly reverts to lower class levels taking their high tax dollars with them. A lack of income makes it even more difficult to increase production if the population needs several things at the same time.

Another problem I had with this game is that there is a serious lack of any real information. At times players are offered to pick a new technology that will give some sort of bonus. Sounds good, right? I am sure it is if there was any indication what these technologies actually do. Even when in the construction menu there is no information about these special buildings. Some are obvious such as houses and churches, but I still have no idea what a tea house actually does. I actually never even figured out how to save my game! There are points in Story Mode where it suggests that the game be saved, but that is about as close as it got for me. I honestly hope this is not a problem in Continuous Mode.

I know there seems to be a lot of negatives about this game, but I actually did enjoy playing it. The negatives that I have stated do make the game fairly frustrating at times and would probably make the game downright infuriating if the game had been any more complex. The good news is that the game is pretty simple and that might have just been its saving grace. The game is simple enough to understand and problems are simple enough to fix that even though the faults in the game could be major, they end up not effecting gameplay all that much.

I think that in the future I might give the PC version a try. I have a feeling that it will be much more in depth, which if the problems with the Wii version are not fixed could be a major waste of $50!

Dawn of Discovery (Wii)
Dawn of Discovery (DS)
Dawn of Discovery (PC)

DSi

I think it might be fair to say that I have been looking down on the Nintendo DS and DSi for a long time. Any recent interest that I have had in the Nintendo handhelds was solely based on the E3 coverage of Scribblenauts. Then for some reason I decided to take a look at the games that are offered for the Nintendo DS and DSi. Within an hour my Amazon Wishlist jumped up 50 items.

I think it is pretty obvious that in the areas of graphics and hardcore games the DS is not going to compete with PS3 or 360. I will also say that, in my opinion, there seems to be a lot of CRAP out there for the DS. All that being said, I can see how a lot of the games/software could easily cure daily boredom.

I often find myself not wanting to buy games due to the shear fact that I also like to watch tv. With only one tv in the apartment I really have to decide if I would rather play the flavor of the week game or watch any of the 30 (probably more) tv shows on my DVR. This is usually the problem with a lot of the Wii games. While I really do like Animal Crossing: City Folk, I am not sure I like playing it more than I like watching Heroes, Top Model, Flash Forward, LOST, or any of many others. With a handheld console this is obviously less of a problem.

The other thing that makes the DS/DSi more of a consideration for me is that I am a full time student that has to park two hours before my classes if I want to find a spot at all. I am sure I could find lots of productive ways to fill these 8 hours a week, but I usually end up in a reading room listening to podcasts. If I had a DS/DSi I could spend those 8 hours listening to podcasts while playing Peggle Duel Shot.

Another important consideration is that new games for DS/DSi seem to be a third of what they are for PS3 or 360. It is really not hard to find games for PS3/360 that are in the $50-$60 range while new DS/DSi games are around $20. What does that mean to me? Well it is pretty simple. I am far more likely to shell out $20 once every week or two, but $60 makes me really have to think hard even if I haven’t bought a new game for months. Plus, if I spend $20 on a game and it turns out that I don’t really like it I won’t hate myself nearly as much as wasting $50-$60.

Ok, so there has to be a downside. My main downside is that with all the price drops there has not been one for the DSi…yet. I have no idea if there will be one, but at a price only $30 less than a Wii, I think it might be a little high. That is not to say that $170 is outlandish, but I am personally not ready to shell out that much money right now. Will it be on my Christmas list? Yes, but there is a lot of other things I can spend that kind of money on. If the price does drop to the $100-$130 range than it will probably make it to my “to-do” list for the week. That being said, I should also note that the DS lite is around $130.

Overall, I could easily see myself having a Nintendo DSi in the next 6 months. (My birthday is in March.) I don’t really foresee a lot of you running out and buying a DS/DSi tomorrow, but I do hope that you will at least give it and it’s collection of games a look.

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