Honestly one of the most interesting things in vidya politics in the 2010s since the birth of vidya verticals and GamerGate as the first sign that millennial media was going rancid, was Ubisoft going in with Far Cry and Assassin’s Creed on this specifically Canadian vision of the open prairies and English industrialism and French equality

Played through Far Cry:Montana. It was fun, but even as someone who worries about American collapse and has thought about moving to a compound in Montana and/or founding a cult it wasn’t essential

(the online “ARCADE” user-edited levels are a rush of Duke Nukem nostalgia tho)

So taking a mulligan and getting AC:Egypt. I’d asked which of “the two” AC strains it was, based on climbing (one button/two) and fighting (combos/medicine attrition)

But then I do the first fight and visually (and mechanically at a kindergarten level) it’s a Dark Souls reference, but I see damage numbers popping up on hit and I see something about legendary quality weapons and

OHH SHIT, it’s the return of the MMORPG style from AC:France

Getting to the point where I can key off design fads to recognize the staffs cycling across Ubisoft franchises as well as I used to be able with ‘90s-2000s Square