Developer/Publisher: Ubisoft Released: October 2012

Played on: Vita (also available in HD on 360, PS3, PC)

The Aveline DLC mission in Assassin’s Creed IV piqued my interest in the African-French assassin, the series’ only female protagonist, so I nabbed a cheap copy of ACIII: Liberation for the Playstation Vita. This was a huge mistake.

Liberation‘s attempt to be a fully-featured handheld Assassin’s Creed game is hampered by what feels like a rushed production schedule or lack of resources, or perhaps an over-estimation of the Vita’s hardware capabilities. 18th century New Orleans should be a fantastic setting for the series but as Aveline traverses the drab rooftops at a steadily decreasing frame rate, the promise of a fully-featured handheld Assassin’s Creed sinks pathetically into the very swamps the game depicts.

Aveline leads a double life, upstanding lady by day and deadly assassin by night. She uses 3 personas in her pursuit of whatever it is these assassins are pursuing (the plot is unsurprisingly convoluted but involves battling Templars and freeing slaves), the Lady, the Slave and the Assassin. Each persona changes how guards and other NPC’s treat you, and in theory should provide a variety of different gameplay options and approaches to missions. Sadly, the persona you adopt during missions is often prescribed, and the impossible frustration of maintaining a low profile while using the Assassin persona on the streets makes it completely prohibitive. The tightly packed streets make avoiding witnesses an impossibility, which is problematic in a game with supposed stealth elements. This is a missed opportunity, and feels like a balancing problem that could have been solved with more time and playtesting. The same can be said for many of Liberation’s countless rough edges.

Rough edges is being rather polite, actually. NPC’s pop in and out of stationary screens, the on-screen map can’t keep up with your movements, cut-scene actions directly contradict the in-game world, touch screen features are annoying and poorly implemented, and you inexplicably fail missions for reasons that remain a complete mystery. An almost game breaking puzzle in the middle of the game involves rolling a ball through a maze and into a hole using the Vita’s gyroscope feature. Unresponsive and illogical, the sequence had me locking my Vita away for an entire week before calming down enough to try again. Anyone less obsessive than myself would have left the game to rot in the system and save themselves the chore of playing through the rest.

Liberation is not an entirely unmitigated disaster. Aveline remains one of the series’ most interesting characters, and I would LOVE to play as her in a game that actually worked, although the chances of that are fairly infinitesimal. The story is occasionally compelling despite some dreadful vocal performances from the supporting cast, and in its best moments of exploring the plight of slaves in 18th century New Orleans, it feels like a truly missed opportunity. Gameplay moments that work, like the impressive free-running through bayou trees or the satisfying combat system, are fleeting and inevitably marred by enormous frame-rate dips and ugly graphics.

Verdict: I had some serious problems with Assassin’s Creed III, but its handheld cousin fails on a whole other level. A disappointing entry in the increasingly inconsistent Assassin’s Creed series. Even series fans should avoid this one. (Note: I haven’t played the HD version of the game, so don’t know if it is any better. Unless they’ve redesigned large chunks of the game, I suspect it won’t fare much better.)

Should Bradley play this: No. No no no no no.