Until their collective dream came true last year, lots of Assassin’s Creed fans kept asking for a game set in Japan. That had been requested for what felt like a long time. However, back in the early days of the now iconic series, many were also hoping for a pirate themed instalment. That was delivered with Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, which is still arguably the long-running franchise’s most beloved entry. In fact, it was so well liked that it spawned spin-offs.
I reviewed all of those games and add-ons, after beating them thoroughly.
Due to Black Flag’s immense popularity, Ubisoft decided to re-release it onto what were then current-gen consoles, early in the XBOX One and PlayStation 4’s lifecycles. After that, it was ported to Switch and Google Stadia. Then, in 2024, the company revealed that it was working on remakes of older series entries, and reports circulated that one would be Black Flag. However, it wasn’t until March of this year that they officially acknowledged and revealed Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced,
Developed from the ground up, as a full fledged remake, Resynced marks the return of one of the most popular games in the series, and of its era. It comes to us from Ubisoft Singapore, and released almost 13 years after the original set sail. However, its menus and streamlined modern day content feature imagery and details from recent games, like Shadows.
If you’re new to the party, Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag is the story of Welsh pirate, Edward Kenway. Set during the golden age of piracy (1715-1722), it chronicles the fictional pirate’s introduction to a world he had no idea existed, with that being the one in which cloaked Assassins target shady Templars, who are after immense power. Kenway stumbles upon this ancient shadow war when he assumes someone else’s identity and fulfills their contract. Afterwards, he finds himself entrenched in the battle between the two.
Having left his wife to sail the open seas in search of fortune, Edward enlists the help of others, and forms a crew in order to both achieve wealth and find the mysterious Observatory that the Templars are after. It’s said that something incredibly powerful resides there.
Of course, given that this is a game about a pirate, one would expect seafaring shenanigans. That is the case with both the original game, and its remake: Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced. This campaign marked a big change for the series, as it introduced the ability to obtain and captain one’s own ship, with that being the Jackdaw. To that extent, a lot of its gameplay involves sailing from one port to another, engaging in ship battles and looking for unexplored locations full of viewpoints, treasure and secrets. There are also sharks and the like to hunt using spears, strongholds to take out, and more.
One of the best things about this game is the freedom it provides players. You’re generally free to go wherever you’d like within the West Indies, including major ports like Nassau, Havana and Kingston, smaller settlements, unexplored islands and more. In doing so, you’ll feel like a pirate. Along the way, one will find secrets, puzzles, side quests and new crew members to hire, as well as music sheets to increase the number of available sea shanties. Speaking of which, you can now choose which one to have your crew sing; kind of like a radio station in Grand Theft Auto.
Within all of the seafaring, adventuring, ship battles and pirating lays a lot of traditional Assassin’s Creed gameplay. While this entry got a lot bigger in scope, it didn’t lose its identity. As such, those who are new to the campaign can expect lots of stealth, quiet assassinations, climbing, jumping into hay, and the like. Edward can equip pistols, which can be fired by aiming or using a helpful quick-fire option, drop smoke bombs to stun enemies, shoot sleep darts and hang enemies from heights. The core combat system has been reworked, though, and is different from what it was before.
In Resynced, combat is more in-depth and better than in the original game. This time around, it’s hitbox focused, and sometimes requires you to break an enemy’s defences with heavy attacks (or bullets), avoid their (red tinted) heavy attacks or perfectly parry. If you hit the block button at the right time — meaning right as a foe attacks using a regular attack — you’ll knock them back and open them up to damage, or even a murderous takedown. One can use rapiers and gun swords, and can also chain takedowns when things go right, and depending on what you have equipped. My favourite things to do were to use smoke bombs to stun groups of bad guys, so that I could easily assassinate them, and to use the pistols’ quick-fire mode to kill multiple enemies quickly.
Of course, it’s still possible to assassinate unaware enemies, though I found that the option to do a double assassination was finicky. I would have to stand behind two guards or pirates and then move the camera until the icon changed from ‘assassinate’ to ‘double assassination.’ After all, this is an Assassin’s Creed game, and stealthily assassinating enemies is the best way to go about things. That’s why it’s now possible to crouch at any time, and dodging away from attacks is too. The latter can create a slowdown effect, while the former lets you be more stealthy.
Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced features different types of weapons and abilities, as mentioned above. It’s possible to purchase or earn better versions of each, and all swords and pistols have their own stats, including how much damage they do. The review code that we were sent gave us access to a gold and black outfit, matching sails for the Jackdaw, and a couple of weapons. This included a more powerful sword, which I resisted using until I was about halfway through the game, because I didn’t want to cheat. Then, I decided to give it a shot. After all, I thoroughly beat (and reviewed) this title back in 2013.
The combat and ship battles do feel more challenging this time around, but the difficulty can be changed and customized. I had everything set to normal, but encountered a really frustrating ship battle around chapter 8, and dropped the ship combat difficulty down after dying several times. It’s hard to defend when you’re being bombarded by cannons and shrapnel from multiple ships, but it is possible to mitigate the damage done by ducking and bracing before impact. That’s why it’s important to find and complete the new quest-line for a young woman who will join your crew and provide the chance to do a perfect brace. Not only is it helpful, but her quest-line is fun. She’s a really good addition, and a deep character too.
The Jackdaw’s main weapons also now have secondary firing modes, which helps, and you can upgrade and customize the ship at harbourmasters. It’s also possible to send conquered enemy ships to your fleet and then send them out on missions from the cabin of the Jackdaw, or the new, customizable and upgradable, homestead that becomes available relatively early on. You can find portraits to hang there, and decorate it to your liking.
In addition to Shipwright Lucy Baldwin, who’s new to the narrative, Resynced also features other new content. In total, there’s several hours’ worth of it, including another new quest-line, added endgame content, new side quests and alternate reality rifts.
The modern day sections — which involved exploring an Abstergo office building, finding things, hacking computers and the like — has thankfully been removed. In its place are the aforementioned rifts, and some optional alternate reality missions that let you make moral choices. There’s an Animus Hub in the menus, too, and it’s honestly kind of confusing. There are challenges to undertake, though, in order to earn rewards. Those who wish to can also buy things from the game’s microtransactions store using real money, such as character packs that cost around $13.50 CAD, but I don’t recommend doing so or supporting such tactics.
Lastly, there are still Templar Hunts and assassination contracts to undertake, as well as reworked tailing missions, the latter of which I’m thankful for. I wish that there were more standard side quests, though.
In the original version, you’d have to slowly stalk NPCs, and stay within range of them as they spoke and revealed important information. Failure to do so would mean a ‘game over’ and an annoying checkpoint or mission restart. Now, the missions adapt if you’re spotted, and you can also just kill the people you’re tailing instead of following them for a little while. Those were, by far, my least favourite thing about the game back in 2013, so I’m glad they have been reworked.
Although Resynced doesn’t tell players this, it’s also possible to change the time of day to suit your liking. Furthermore, Edward can pet cats and dogs, equip a pet cat for the ship, hunt alligators and feed birds. It’s even still possible to drop coins in order to distract enemies, but you can also hire drunks or women to do that.
Needless to say, a big game got even bigger, and it’s better for it. I quite like all of the changes that were made, and feel that the new characters and quest-lines fit in nicely. The Animus Hub and new rifts are overwhelming and kind of confusing, though. Then again, I was never a fan of the modern day segments in these games, although Black Flag’s were far from the worst. I still remember seeing ads and trailers for the first game, and calling that it was a simulation. I was so intrigued, but quickly became bored of the modern day sections in the early games.
Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced isn’t a simple port, just a new coat of paint, or a remaster. It’s a remake that was done from the ground up, using the Anvil Engine. Due to this, it looks like a beautiful, modern game, and plays like one too. The gameplay has been improved, the animations are noticeably better, the parkour is much smoother and almost seamless, and it all looks great. The lighting is fantastic, there are no loading times when you dock at a major port, and it all runs really well. There are also a few different presentation modes on PS5 Pro, including performance and fidelity. My TV said it was maintaining about 59 frames-per-second in fidelity mode.
There is also dynamic weather, which brings about rain, thunderstorms and even tornadoes. These make travelling by sea more dangerous, and can create really choppy and troublesome waters.
It’s been said that some of the cutscenes look better than others, and I agree. I found that some of the ones set in the past, featuring Edward and his wife, and ones shown after assassinating major targets, looked washed out and dated. Otherwise, I thought the game looked great. Sure, there was the odd glitch, like a flag not flying in the wind, or a dead enemy clipping through a box, but oh well. That happens in massive, open world games.
The rest of the presentation found in Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced is also top notch. The music is great, the sea shanties are wonderful, and being able to choose which one to hear is a nice touch. The sound effects are loud and boisterous, the voice acting is pretty great and the writing is good. The new content, and characters, blend in really well, too.
To be completely honest, I was both excited and trepidatious about returning to this game by way of Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced. Although I really enjoyed the original version, I’ve developed some series fatigue over the years, and wasn’t sure if I would truly enjoy all of the stealth and regular series mechanics as much as I used to. The idea kind of overwhelmed me to be honest. However, after a few hours with Resynced, I fell back in love with it and got hooked. I never had problems with anything, and really liked it.
This is a very good remake of a great game.
This review is based on the PlayStation 5 Pro version of the game, which we were provided with.