What was wrong with Assassin’s Creed Black Flag?

The game touted as the one having the best gameplay in the Assassin’s Creed franchise had something wrong it. The story mainly never worked for most players and there were two major reasons behind that.

FANTASY and PLAYER MOTIVATION

A well executed pirate fantasy and the mechanics bound to it are what make AC4 a treat, especially the ship combat experience. While the fantasy made the mechanics work, it was what ruined the story. The main motivation behind the protagonist’s action in the game was GREED.

Creating a protagonist that the players can relate to is essential for such games. This is where “GREED” as the main motivation for the protagonist creates a problem. Not a lot of people have thought about killing others because of their own greed. It is not something that players can easily relate to.

So then why do the players like the game at all? It was because the mechanics make a fun toy. Players plunder ships and explore towns because it is fun and it is their fantasy to visit this era and the setting. Sadly, this “fun” does not connect to the protagonist’s motivation which creates a huge divide between what the player is feeling and what the protagonist is feeling.

THE TARGETS

The targets of the game had similar personalities and character to them, as far as Edward is concerned. Most of Edward’s targets spout out the same lines when they were near death and it felt like they never really cared too much for Edward. The relationship between Edward and his targets was under developed most of the time which detached players from Edward’s motivation of killing most of his targets.

A good example of this would be the Templars- Burgess and Cockram, who Edward kills even though he has never met them before and when asked why did he kill them, Edward replies- “Cuz you stood in the way of my prize. Not a thing a man should do.” This again stems back to player motivation and it is difficult for most players to relate to this. It just isn’t personal enough. So the second major reason was that the players never wanted to kill most of their targets. They found no good reason to, emotionally at least.

On the other hand, this is where Assassin’s Creed 2 succeeded. Most of the targets had a well formed relationship will Ezio. It was easy to understand his motivation because it stemmed from one of the most basic human emotions — revenge. Most of the players have some time or the other in their life, thought of revenge and they can potentially extrapolate that to murder for revenge based on the protagonist’s circumstances and motivation. Players wanted to kill most of their targets in the game, just like the protagonist.

Then again, AC4 was not all bad. There were characters like Bartholomew Roberts that developed quite a relationship with the protagonist and who players thoroughly enjoyed killing.

There we have it, two major reasons why Black Flag’s story did not work- player motivation and the protagonist’s relationship with his targets.