With Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag reeling ever closer, it seems to be time to look back at what the previous games delivered.

Assassin’s Creed III was advertised as a huge step forward within the Assassin’s Creed world, and people assumed this would mean a conclusion of the protagonist’s -Desmond-, storyline, and for this ending to storm alongside an explanation about the mysteries surrounding ‘those who came before us‘.

Unfortunately, however, whilst Desmond’s storyline did conclude in October, actual answers were scarce and more questions were raised by the ending, seemingly taunting those who had eagerly awaited the game. This frustrated a vast amount of players who had spent the release date weekend giddy on the possibility of finally holding an answer to the main question in the Assassin’s Creed series: What the heck is going on?!

My advice? Replay the first game in the series. The incredible mobility and intensely fast pace of Connor in Assassin’s Creed III makes you feel amazingly restricted when playing as Altaïr. Does Assassin’s Creed III offer the option of stealth killing your main target to the extent that the first game did? No. But the magnitude of the game’s world, the involvement of well-known historical figures and the dynamic of the entire game makes up for all of its shortcomings when you compare it to the earlier instalments.

The series is continuously berated for its glitches and awkward movement system, but by returning to the games that came prior to III we can see that it is in fact improving. Ubisoft has arguably revolutionised plot based gaming with the Assassin’s Creed series. Video game writers have commented many times that there’s a certain sadness to the fact that if gamers want to skip the story part of a game, they can. Assassin’s Creed almost makes this impossible. Everything you do, and everyone you meet, enriches a story that is near enough inescapable, but not in a way that hinders the gameplay.

Ubisoft  has made it possible to give gamers a story, even if they don’t realise it, and if Black Flag can grasp this winning formula and continue developing the sometimes grimace-worthy movement and combat system, then the future of the Assasssin’s Creed series could be one of the most promising aspects of the gaming world to come.