The Assassin’s Creed franchise has been on quite a roller coaster since the original was released over 15 years ago. At first, each successive title seemed to enhance the core mechanics of the stealthy gameplay you’d expect from a game with the word “assassin” in the title. But then Assassin’s Creed Origins changed up the formula a bit. Assassin’s Creed became an open-world game, with more similarities to Far Cry than the original Assassin’s Creed games. The next two entries in the franchise, Odyssey and Valhalla, built upon that formula. With Valhalla, it felt like the combat had finally reached its peak, but something was lost along the way. It no longer felt like Assassin’s Creed. In fact, Valhalla often discouraged you from taking the stealth route.
Mirage seeks to return the series to its roots, so to speak. Instead of a sprawling open world, Mirage takes place in a single location: Baghdad in the year 861. It sheds the massive free-roam style in favor of a handcrafted linear experience, with a focus on the story and getting to learn the ins-and-outs of the bustling city of Baghdad. And while still keeping the polished and optimized combat from recent entries, stealth becomes the focal point once again. For the most part, Mirage achieves its goal of returning to its assassin ways. But in some ways, it also shows me why Ubisoft made the decision to take the franchise in a new direction in the first place.
Assassin’s Creed Mirage (PC, PS5 [Reviewed], PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One)
Developer: Ubisoft
Publisher: Ubisoft
Released: October 5, 2023
MSRP: $49.99
The Hidden Ones
In Mirage, players take on the role of Basim, a character those who have played Valhalla will recognize. Mirage is essentially a prequel to Valhalla, taking place a decade before the Viking invasion of England. In Valhalla, Basim is already a Hidden One—the name of the Assassins before the later formation of the creed.
But Mirage focuses on the story of a younger Basim, as he grows up as a thief in 9th century Baghdad, learning about the Hidden Ones and eventually joining their ranks. Even though those who have played Valhalla might appreciate this prequel story a bit more, the narrative is its own confined experience. You do not have to have played Valhalla to understand what’s going on in Mirage.
The events of Mirage take place over eight different chapters, in a mostly linear fashion. Around the halfway point you get to choose which order to tackle three of the chapters in, but all of them must be completed regardless. Afterwards, it continues to be completely linear.
The story is definitely a strong point for Mirage. It’s probably an unpopular opinion, but I was a fan of the modern-day story in the earlier Assassin’s Creed titles, back when Desmond Miles was the main character.
While Mirage doesn’t have a strong focus on the modern-day story, it does touch on it at times. But the main focus is certainly what’s going on in Baghdad in the year 861. It’s got some twists along the way, and overall is one of the stronger stories Mirage has told yet. My favorite in the franchise story-wise beforehand was probably Assassin’s Creed 3, and I feel like Mirage is right up there with it.
Basim Holmes
The primary gameplay loop of Mirage is Investigations. Essentially, each chapter of Mirage has an ultimate goal. For example, in the first chapter, you are trying to track down Ali ibn Mohammad, a leader of the rebellion against the Caliphate in Baghdad. He’s been taken captive by the Caliphate, and you are tasked with rescuing him. It’s a more fluid system compared to previous entries that would either beeline you to each objective.
You will start with a breadcrumb and a single clue to track someone down who may have more information about your investigation. Along the way, each person will give you more clues as well as other leads to follow up on. Once you have gathered every clue for a specific Investigation, you can move forward with the original objective. Overall, I feel like the Investigation system is a nice touch to the formula of tracking down your target and building up your knowledge base about them. It’s a very rewarding feeling to unlock each clue and build your Investigation.
Plenty to do around Baghdad
Of course, in between investigations, there’s plenty more to do. The series staple of climbing the highest points of the city to synchronize with it, thus revealing the surrounding area and creating a fast travel point, makes a return in Mirage. There are also assignments you can pick up at the Hidden Ones Bureau that give you side missions, with rewards including resources and Favor Tokens. While it’s nice to shake things up between Investigations, there’s not much of a point in doing so. The only time I took on assignments was when I needed extra Favor Tokens.
Resources can be used to upgrade your gear and unlock new tools. Favor Tokens can be used to enlist the aid of various groups around Baghdad. For example, you gain Notoriety when being seen carrying out nefarious acts like pickpocketing, killing someone, or trespassing. Your Notoriety has a meter, sort of like a Wanted Level in Grand Theft Auto. You can visit a specific NPC to exchange a Favor Token for completely erasing your Notoriety. Once again, the system just feels irrelevant, unless you are a completionist and want to fully upgrade and collect everything. It’s nice that it’s here, but doesn’t feel overall worthwhile to do.
In terms of visuals, it’s sort of a mixed Bag(dhad). I originally tried Quality Mode but struggled to stay above 30 FPS. Honestly, it wasn’t necessarily unplayable, but it was pretty close. I feel like there are some optimizations that could be made there. In Performance Mode, I consistently stayed above 60 fps. But the downside to supporting a previous generation was definitely visible. From far away, everything looks beautiful. But up close, textures are pixelated and low resolution. It’s a shame because the bustling city of Baghdad is a beautiful sight at a glance, but when you take a closer look, not so much.
RPG-Lite
Even though Mirage strives to be more like the originals, there are some RPG elements that have become prevalent in more recent entries. As you complete main story missions you will unlock skill points which you can use to unlock skills on your skill tree.
Unfortunately, most of the skills feel rather inconsequential. Nothing is really game-changing in any way, instead just offers minimal enhancements. To give you an idea, the ability to evade an attack via dodge and then follow up with a counter has become a staple early-game skill in the recent AC titles. However, in Mirage, this is a final skill in the tree.
The same can be said for a lot of the other RPG-like elements, such as gear. You can find different weapons and armor throughout Badhgdad, primarily in Gear Chests. You can even take them to blacksmith NPC’s and enhance them, making them better. But the enhancements are minimal as well, granting just a little more damage.
It’s evident that Ubisoft wanted to keep some RPG mechanics in Mirage, but no longer make them a focus like they were in Valhalla and Odyssey.
Hardcore parkour
Mirage is the best assassin simulator yet. Scaling the beautifully architectures buildings in Baghdad is peak Assassin’s Creed. Pickpocketing and assassinations are well-executed and don’t feel like a hassle. Even the combat is probably at its highest quality. Mirage definitely wants you to avoid combat if possible. Stealth assassinations still take enemies out in a single attack, while combat is a more lengthy—and challenging—experience. But when you do break out the sword, it’s the well-refined combat system similar to Valhalla, which was probably one of its strongest elements.
But once again, the formula has its issues too. Most of the end-of-the-investigation missions are the same. Find a way to sneak into a heavily guarded building, then navigate its multiple levels to track down a target. This isn’t necessarily a bad mechanic—it’s been in a lot of the previous AC titles—but for some reason in Mirage, Ubisoft decided to put a lot of doors in its buildings.
The problem is that some doors are essentially walls and cannot be interacted with at all; some are barred shut from the inside, and some can be opened from both sides. I spent a lot of time running around similar-looking corridors of doors trying to find which one I was supposed to interact with to proceed. They all look the same, and most are essentially just walls. This is the biggest problem with Mirage. In between the good parts, things can get really boring and just not fun.
A glitch in the Animus
Unfortunately, I did encounter some pretty annoying bugs and overall tedium throughout Mirage. If you played previous entries, surely you know the staple “feature” of always grabbing onto the wrong thing when trying to scale buildings or evade guards that are hunting you down. Sadly, this is still a thing in Mirage.
I also encountered a pretty annoying bug deep into an assassination mission where, when I tried to execute a running assassination on an enemy, the animation caused me to drop straight down off a ledge, through the roof of a building, and into a locked building with no way to escape. I clearly wasn’t meant to be in there and had to reload a previous save. erasing about 25 minutes of progress.
There are also some pretty glaring oversights in terms of game design, that really bog down the experience. The ability to use Eagle Vision to highlight enemies’ returns in Mirage, which in itself is a good thing. However, the enemies glow red for an extended period of time. If you get into combat with an enemy that’s marked red, you can’t see when it’s attacks that can’t be parried. Typically they flash red when doing so, but now you can’t see, due to them already glowing red. I’d be lying if I said this didn’t result in a handful of deaths. Eventually, I learned to just wait for the mark to fall off before engaging, which probably isn’t intended.
You think you do
I have to admit that Assassin’s Creed Mirage is a challenging title to review and score. It’s almost as if it needs two separate scores: one for its ability to be an assassin game, and one for how enjoyable it is. But unfortunately, that’s not how things work.
When Assassin’s Creed Mirage is at its best, it’s an entertaining experience. But in between those moments, the repetitiveness really starts to weigh it down. The middle part of the game is a bit hard to get through just because of how boring it gets. For those looking for a pure return of form to the original Assassin’s Creed, you’re going to love Mirage. After all, the stealth, parkour, and accompanying systems are the best they’ve been. And Baghdad is one of the best cities we’ve explored in the series yet. But for me, I can’t help but wonder if the true mirage was thinking this return to the old formula was the right direction to take.
[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]
