Unremarkable and odd places in Assassin's Creed 

I know this game is a little out of my wheelhouse, but there was just a ton I wanted to show you and talk to you about in it. I'm hoping to gradually expand my repertoire beyond just Skyrim, Pokémon, and Zelda to include other games and game series-- what others should I start to work in?

He claims these are unremarkable places...but I just _know_ he's going to make some remarks.

*standing in the final boss arena* “I’m sure this will be used for something.”

I usually tell people to think of the first game as a sort of tech demo for the other games in the series. 90% of stuff in AC1 falls into the category of "things you're supposed to run past and never look at again." It gets a little weird if you camp out in populated areas for a while and just let the NPC scripts run. For example, the top of the hill as you enter Jerusalem (I think, it's been a minute), where you can see the walls but you haven't actually approached the city yet. There's a constant supply of people leaving the city, which normally you'd gallop past on your horse and forget about. But if you just camp there for a while, the NPCs build up and eventually you have this absolute river of identical people marching up the hill toward you, which is probably not supposed to happen because you're not supposed to just sit there staring at them for an hour. The other games are slightly better about this.

The concept of "the noises of someone doing something somewhere that you'll never find" just hits different

I love how Austin's take on the themes of the game is: "there's a lot of religion and shit"

The garden in the back is a reference to the actual legend surrounding the Assassins IRL. Supposedly the leader would drug new members, have them wake up in the garden surrounded by beautiful women to convince them he had the power to send them and bring them back from heaven. IIRC this get alluded to when Al Mualim punishes Altair for the botched mission at the beginning of the game.

What I love about the first Assassin's Creed in particular is the atmosphere. What I notice about it, that I believe was intentional and makes it perfect for one of these videos is that a lot of the game feels like a dream. When you think about the nature of the Animus, it makes total sense. Desmond is effectively in a forced coma and what he's experiencing is a cross between a dream and a highly immersive video game. It's reconstructing a memory locked in his DNA from an ancestor. Memories often have an etheral nature to them - imagine how a memory from a thousand years ago would be to think back on. Then there's the nature of the Animus creating an aproximation of things according to its programming and it can glitch out at times. The more games that come out in the series, the more they dilute that orginal concept and atmosphere. Later games also seemed to focus more on the technological nature of the animus. That orginal game is so unique.

"I like when stuff is in a place" Preach brother.

AC 1 is a very odd game. There's so many elements in it that seem relics of an earlier development period or that seem out of place. One thing that always fascinated/frustrated me in the game was that during the mission to kill the Merchant-King, you can learn a piece of intel that there's an easy path up to where he is, but if you actually spend time looking for the path, it doesn't seem to exist. So much of the game seems to just exist without a real purpose; like most of the Kingdom is just empty space full of enemies with some busywork collectibles. I would really love to see a remake of this game.

I was really into these early assassins creed games, and AC1 really does just have that FEEL to doesn't it?

If you ended up looking at AC2, places in that game that give me this same kind of vibe: - uninhabited houses in the Apennine Mountains - some parts of the Assassin tombs - places in the final mission in Rome (not meant to be explored until the sequel) - Ezio's very odd bedroom/study/gallery in the attic of the villa

This is my second favorite series on youtube please never stop nobody does like you

The silence is deafening. I had no idea it was possible in AC1.

The stagnant black moat around the abandoned mansion might be my favorite odd and remarkable place yet. Wow. What an absolute seam of a place. It would've been really consistent with AC1 design philosophy to throw some guards in there or lower a gate so that you couldn't re-access the area, and I'm so glad they didn't.

I'm so glad someone is talking about this! The original game was so dreamy, so liminal and just so melancholic.. There's something about the vast emptiness of it's world and it's washed out colors, but also the constant awareness of being in a video game. These kinds of spaces in video games are so fascinating. I have many memories of being ill, staying home and spending the whole day wandering around in games like this. Great video!

While these places may be unremarkable, this series sure is remarkable to me. Great stuff.

as a game designer myself, I must say that the unique joy you're able to find in the worlds we create is absolutely delightful. it is a breath of fresh air how you choose to find the good even in the "useless" experiences

Grand Theft Auto 4 would be great for this sort of video format. So many lovely little hidden alleys and courtyards in Liberty City and Alderney...

That garden in the back of the castle is based off an old legend about the real life Nizari Assassins. As relayed by Marco Polo, the assassin headquarters contained a secret garden. During the final part of their training, assassin initiates were drugged with hashish and brought to the garden unconscious. Beautiful young women would greet the initiate when he awoke, before eventually being confronted by the assassin leader, Rashid ad-Din Sinan, the Old Man of the Mountain (who the in-game character of Al Mualim is based off of). The Old Man would inform the initiate that this was a glimpse of the Islamic afterlife, and their only hope to return here was to assassinate the enemies of the Nizari. Obviously, modern scholars have refuted this as anti-Nizari propaganda. The garden was also said to be at Alamut, not Masyaf where the game takes place. But it's a popular part of the image of the historical Assassin Order, so of course Ubisoft was going to include it regardless.

You somehow awakened a feeling that I used to have when exploring these worlds as a kid. I remember watching and analyzing different environments on games and imagining how people would use this places and just “roleplay”. Those were good times

I suggested this video when I first found your channel a year ago or something, I don't know if you got the idea directly from me, but I'd love to see more AC videos like this, in AC2 there's a whole area that's basically an unremarkable and odd place that connects Florence to Monteriggioni, you only ever really use it during a chase sequence on the story and has no reason at all to go back there, as well as the few houses and farms around the fort of Monteriggioni.

Your burnt log monologue is timeless.

Yeah Ac 1 and 2 always sorta had that weird feeling to me that like we’re not supposed to be playing this. Also since the developers were sorta constrained with how much they could do and since the missions are repetitive it makes it feel like a simulation where not everything is perfect. Which is what it is story wise. Then you have the whole holy land aspect in 1 and the glyph puzzles in 2 which reveal the whole thing with adam and eve which isn’t explained until later games. Makes me feel like we were never supposed to see it.

This is so interesting, reminds me of how I used to play games. Just go anywhere, random nooks and dead ends and places in the world. Before I understood how games lead you around and how games expect you to interact. Just wandering aimlessly, down side being I'd get stuck and not know what to do but I'd at least absorb everything in these weird little worlds. I play way more efficiently now so I have time to experience the main bits of games but man I miss being able to just wander and wonder in these worlds. I'd drop like 3 hours driving around free mode in Mx vs ATV untamed(might be cool for this series) doing nothing just going around the map

That last place ironically illustrates a primary theme in this entry of the series (the philosophy of the Creed). Is Altair just a pawn? Is it alright that he is just a pawn? What value did the Creed bring in eliminating this particular target? Altair returning to the place that was once a party and is now lifeless reflects that maybe assassinating his target did not bring about the solution that he thought would happen. The Creed has blinded him, and he has yet to learn.

It sort of reminds me how Shadow of the Colossus basically makes an entire game world of these transitional spaces, save for a few collectibles you'd only know of from experimentation or outside trivia, and somehow turns that eerie feeling of not-quite-belonging into the entire atmosphere of the Forbidden Lands. Meanwhile here in Assassin's Creed it's like... they just didn't think you wouldn't have a horse sometimes? Bizarre game.

6:49 Dude that is so true. This made me reminisce about that one time I played RDR2. That game gave that feeling of "this totally unreal patch of land made out of polygons feels like a real place because it was lived in by many sorts of humans" when I revisit the old camp sites. It gave me this nostalgic feeling that I don't even own.

I never knew I needed this in my life but I loved it. The Kingdom is full of great places for a sequel video. My favorites are the roman ruins and the village next to a lake. I love all the villages though, they're fully built out for parkour like the big cities but you never have to go to any of them and they might as well not exist unless you love collecting flags. They always make me think what it would've been like if they added gameplay to those villages, maybe have a target or two in the Kingdom as well.

One of my fav bits of environmental storytelling ever in a videogame was in the original AC - discovering Altair's left hand ring finger is missing. As I remember it is never mentioned in the game, and you wouldn't even notice unless you looked really closely, and by accident. We learn in AC2 assassins have that finger cut off to accommodate the hidden blade and commitment to the creed (not to marry), but, and correct me if I'm wrong, there is never any allusion to it in the first AC. Such a cool discovery as a player, to not be told this, then to piece it together yourself. Will always remember that moment.

Literally find peace watching these

I've always loved the earlier games in this series for this reason, sure the assassin stuff is fun and all but they just have such an interesting and kind of ethereal feeling to them in certain places, like the world is full of mysteries and secrets hidden just out of sight. I think it's most prominent in the first 2 games and then it gradually faded away as they got more refined and less creative.

God I always love this series but especially this one. "When was the last time you just sat in your backyard" got me way too good. Something I used to do often before work and "life" consumed any waking free time. Even being out there with other people or doing gardening is a "task" of some sort.

4:17 the NPC pop-in in the window behind Austin was awesome

Need For Speed Most Wanted (2005) has some really beautiful New England looking environments. And being a racing game, players almost never stop to just look around even though there are some beautiful autumn tree lines, mountains, harbors with moving ships, stadiums you can drive in, ect. And it has this weird combination of being really detailed at a glance, yet not detailed at all once you really look at it. (Since you'll only spend a second or two there.) It's surreal, like somebody trying to recreate the world but their only perspective of the world was looking at it for a split second through a car window.

Super excited to see this - you could honestly do an entire series of these for the bulk of the AC games

I don't know which assassin's creed it was, but the thumbnail made me remember a time I got stuck inside a wall next to a river and I found no way out other than closing and reopening the game Edit: I just realised it's not the first AC because Altair can't swim so it was probably the ezio trilogy

I was literally just doing this for fun on my own time the other day (walking around AC1 after beating it, looking at the world building) and visited some of these places myself. Love this commentary, love this idea. Also totally fascinated and mildly obsessed with the idea of standing in places outside of any point or reward structure in games. Instant subscribe.

More assassin's creed would be a treat for sure. I think that a lot of places in these games count for this series and a lot of it is because, like you mentioned, you go through an area in a linear way and never need to return.

I really liked your note on how we treat spaces in video games that look nice but dont have direct purposes, because i think these places are still important to people, my favorite example is Final Fantasy XIV, where a sizable comunity of people will put on their nicest/cutest/silliest outfit and stand in a nice place, theyre a pillar of the community!

Happy monday to you too Mr. Unremarkable and Odd places in Assassin's Creed

I forgot how gray this game is. A stylistic choice, certainly, but it does remind me of how a lot of games (particularly open world games) in this era just looked really bland because they were all going for some sort of gritty realism as though this gritty, real world we actually live in doesn't have color. 9:32 I like that tree just chilling at the top of that cliff in the background. Another example of something that really doesn't need to be there, but it makes it feel a bit more natural.

The odd singsong voices in the travel areas have been in my head forever, I LOVE them, I love the mood they create. The in-between maps and travelling between the cities was always some of my favourite gameplay, I used to just walk the horse all the way from one city to another, just for the atmosphere. To me it really captured a sense of living history, even with the random American accent in the middle 😂

I'm kinda new to your channel but your vibes are right up my ally. If there was a game that I thought deserved your attention, It's elder scrolls 3: morrowind. If youre thinking "ok, so old Skyrim?" kinda. but also not even close. And I can't explain it. But I promise, It's got the goods in ways that are almost...alien?

Woah that washing machine analogy is fascinatingly relatable. I love hearing about very specific feelings/vibes that I’ve experienced, but hadn’t put into words before. It’s always comforting to me to be reminded how fundamentally similar all of our brains are. We’re not alone. Jeffrey Lewis said: “Everyone you meet is you divided by what they’ve been through.” (Check out his music, he’s great)

"Come here, I want to show you some peace and quiet." *Murder*

9:30 I would've literally never thought of something like that until you pointed it out, that's crazy hahaha thank u austin Most of the time I do run through areas like that, thinking "wow it's really sick playing this assassin dude, I really do be feeling like an assassin rn." Or "dude wow I feel like mario" without actually thinking how much small details like that completely shift that feeling

10:55-12:02 is why I watch your vids, very thoughtful commentary spurred by an otherwise mundane setting in an aged game

I'd also love to see an Elden Ring episode. I bet there at least SOME places in that game that you weren't meant to hang around in

Having no connection to this series, I find the video superb. Austin can keep me glued and introspective despite no experience playing these titles. Exemplary and fascinating.

"Here, I'm gonna show you some peace and quite" *accidentally makes the peace and quire eternal*

I found the dude dying on the way to the quiet place as oddly poetic. As if their existences are fundamentally incompatible, and he couldn’t get there alive. As a NPC, he’s destined to be loud, in a loud place. Mildly saddening.

Always enjoy this series. I feel like most people don't appreciate enough the amount of little details and personality that goes into some video games.

Thrilled this series is still on-going and shockingly this is a great pick for it

been like 10+ years since i played but when you mentioned that courtyard area that hasn't been used yet, it got my brain goin until suddenly OH I REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENS THERE. and i love remembering random things so thanks for that.

Any chance you’d do an unremarkable and odd places for Quest 64? They had to abandon a lot of ideas during development so I feel like there’s a lot of interesting people/places being designed for something but ending up not getting used.

I feel like many of the unremarkable places would be good as ambience content. Like, for us viewers to chill out in ourselves. Have you ever considered uploading clips like that (1 hour ambience i.e.)? Perhaps have a second "Unremarkable ambience" channel to refer to for people wanting more of the odd place in question, I dunno, just an idea.

I would really like to see you cover rain world. It is full of these "not exactly environmental storytelling" landmarks you mentioned in the video and i really think you'd enjoy it!

I am so hooked on these Unremarkable and Odd Places videos. I would love to see you try to do a "one place per level" format, possibly in installments. Like for Mario 64, do 3 videos with 5 places in each video, covering all 15 levels. As for game suggestions, you could easily do a lot more for the games you've already covered, but I'd love to see Metroid Prime (1, 2, and/or 3), Wind Waker, Eternal Darkness, pretty much all the core GameCube games, the Turok 64 games (mostly just 1 for me), Bomberman 64, Pilotwings 64, and Diddy Kong Racing.

You make some good points. You're riding that line between rambling inanely and high-level philosophy.

This video could be extended by so many more places. I collected all the flags that were in this game, for absolutely no purpose, and a lot of them really show how big the empty part of this world is. The entire kingdom that you usually skip by fast travelling is pretty much empty apart from a few guards that have no apparent meaning. To my knowledge, there is also no explanation of the red-helmet knights that stand around at completely random places. Also noteworthy: The kingdom has a surprising amount of lakes. Assassins Creed usually tries to be historically correct with its cities, but the kingdom seems completely fictional.

Based on the interactive load screens of the AC franchise and the empty weird area in the beginning, it makes me assume they wanted that area to mask a load screen while the next area loads, but they couldn't figure out the tech and left it as is. Like how they often use elevators in games. I have no evidence for this, but it's what it makes me feel like ,growing up with video games.

that one horse road in Masyaf is also just a perfect transition from your home village to the unforgiving openworld known as Kingdom, so i really like the way it's designed

I have always loved these sort of areas in video games. Though I've always found it hard to put into words the weird blend of nostalgic, peaceful, yet slightly disturbing and uncanny vibe that they have. But videos like this one bring me joy that others also understand this unique feeling, you are totally right about things like the feeling of being watched, the 'residual energy' and the 'sound of someone, somewhere doing something that you'll never find'

would love to see this with more assassins creed games! something remarkable about unremarkable spots like this in a world that isn’t meant to just evoke a place that could exist, but to really try to BE a place that plausibly DID exist… man

really great pick for the series, and that last spot is amazing. its crazy to see how monotonous the color palettes of this era of AAA were. but beyond that theres actually some really gorgeous environments in here, so much handcrafted detail

wow this is just a good RU-vid video. no ads, minimal post-production, a completely random but interesting topic and just a regular dude narrating it with. feels like sitting in your room at 8 pm and watching random videos, when you should be doing your homework.

There is something oddly beautiful about these videos, AC1 was a really gorgeous game

I remember really enjoying the feeling of places like these in Jak2/3, maybe you should check them out. Lots of funny little environmental details like this that are kinda in that compelling area between realism, imagination, and uncanny valley.

I haven't played assassin's creed but the courtyard of women is likely related to the original story of the assassins in real life, where a guy was kidnapped, taken to a resort of hot women, and the grandmaster said if you complete an assassination then you can come back here and hook up with the ladies.

I remember when AC Brotherhood came out, I went back and beat all the older ACs and I've always had a soft spot for AC1. It's just its own vibe

I know you said that Super Mario Galaxy is the kind of game that would cut corners in terms of level design to make sure that everything is compressed into small "planets", but I think that an unremarkable and odd places video for Galaxy would be pretty cool because I think there are definitely still places in this game that would fit that category. Personally, some examples include: - The Kitchen observatory dome. It's a lot more detailed than all of the other dome interiors so there is definitely much more environmental storytelling in the sense that you can tell that it is a lived-in space and not just a level selector. - On that note, the Garden "dome", where when you enter the door you just find yourself in an expansive grassy land with no music. For a place that you kinda just enter and then leave quickly to go to other galaxies, it can be an eerie yet simultaneously calming place. - That one place in Space Junk Galaxy where you are on a snowy planet in a giant glass ball. It's designed to be a maze, yet it is given an oddly tranquil design with bushes, natural-looking rocky formations, and even orange street lamps. It doesn't even look like it SHOULD be in this galaxy, and they certainly didn't have to design it this way, and yet they did. - In Beach Bowl Galaxy, pretty much the entire right corner of the main planet, so basically if you are facing the two waterfalls, everything to the right of that. It's strange because compared to the rest of the galaxy, it feels very lonely and disconnected. There are no enemies and npcs as far as I can tell, and you only really go there for two reasons - to swing on one of the vines and to go to the secret star, but besides that it pretty much just... exists. - In Deep Dark Galaxy, when you start off on the beach, go to face the gate that leads into the middle of the planet, but instead of going in turn right all the way until you are in the water and keep swimming close to the rock wall. At some point the music should change from the lonely yet pretty sounding "Interlude" ost to the much more outwardly eerie "Deep Dark Galaxy" ost. From a meta standpoint, it's just a mistake on the designers that the area where this music kicks in overlaps with the starting area, but at face value, you just get a very isolated and foreboding feeling while you are floating in the middle of this dead "ocean". This is heightened by the fact that the beach, while slightly strange feeling, at least has Toads to talk to, crabs walking around, palm trees, and a beach with an umbrella, so it feels like a inhabited area, but then you just walk a few paces away and enter the water and suddenly you feel completely cut off from all of it. I don't know - in general I get REALLY spooked when I am in an area with other people, and then I walk a short distance away and suddenly I feel completely disconnected from the world even though I didn't go that far - think of being at a party in a ballroom and walking into the empty halls, swimming a little too far from the shore, or going down a staircase of a building and entering a completely empty basement. Of course, this is all up to you if you want to do it, and you definitely don't have to do the ones I pointed out, but I kinda wanted to give you an idea for a video as well as contribute to the conversation.

About the whole kinda balance with Realism and Game, I think AC2 is one of the best ones at that, cuz a lot of the games try to go for mostly real architecture, but in AC2 there's a lot of level design in the cities that aren't really realistic at all, but make it really fun to just run around in

Man, you really forget just how monotone, grey, beige, green-ish games from this era were. Like dang, there really is no color in the original Assassin's Creed.

My freshmen year of college was 2007. AC 1 was a going-away gift from my mom, so I've always kind of cherished this game, warts and all, and still follow the series to this day.

My first Any Austin video and i love it. This is so unlike many other gaming videos because this is so chill, you're not trying to add hype crazy edits, just enjoying the vibe. Even the little music sting when you transition from scene to scene! Love it. Good series to relax to

I would love to see one of these "unremarkable and odd places" videos done for Looney Tunes: Sheep Raider (also called "Sheep Dog 'n' Wolf" outside of America). I used to play the demo of it all the time as a kid (and later finishing the full game) and I remember having some similar feelings about some of the places in that game. Has a bopping soundtrack as well

Oh yeah all the asscreeds did this particularly well. Despite being widely panned as an actual game, Unity was my favorite for this. You can just park yourself in a spot and just enjoy the ambiance like you're having a coffee in a time machine

I just wanna say, thanks to your videos I find myself actually paying attention more to skyboxes in games like I was replaying Max Payne 1 and 2 and I was finding myself stopping and trying to really get a good look at the buildings in the background and the sky. I love your stuff.

9:30 I think that platform is used to hide a Masyaf flag collectible, so it's not entirely pointless 10:24 That garden is a reference to the book, the assassin grandmaster would promise his warriors an afterlife of beatiful gardens and women, something like Elysium, Valhalla, Jannah etc. Real life hashashin assassinations were told to be near suicide missions, so they needed some incentive.

I know every single inch of this game Every single inch I have played it to 100% completion over 15 times and have spent countless weeks just goofing off in the game Thank you so much for finally giving AC1's world the attention it truly deserves. There are so, so many places like these in game. PS: The reason the women are in the courtyard behind the Assassin's Stronghold is actually historical and kinda extremely messed up: The hashashim (assassins) would historically take young boys, kidnap and drug them, and when they would wake back up, they would find themselves in a beautiful garden full of women. When the assassin leader arrived, they would believe themselves to be in heaven with Allah, and would swear loyalty to the leader, thinking it was Allah. Well, of course later on they would realize that the assassin leader was in fact not Allah, but the swear of loyalty had already been made and they were then held to that oath for life. Oh, and there should still be guards on the roof of the rich guy's palace, but you'll never see or hear them from the ground.

I appreciate that you're making a video about assassin's creed! I'm a big fan of the series, they're all really phenomenal games except for Assassin's Creed 1, Assassin's Creed: Altaïr's Chronicles, Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines, Assassin's Creed 2, Assassin's Creed 2: Discovery, Assassin's Creed: Project Legacy, Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Assassin's Creed: Multiplayer Rearmed, Assassin's Creed: Recollection, Assassin's Creed 3, Assassin's Creed 3: Liberation, Assassin's Creed: Pirates, Assassin's Creed: Memories, Assassin's Creed: Rogue, Assassin's Creed Unity, Assassin's Creed Chronicles: China, Assassin's Creed Syndicate, Assassin's Creed Chronicles: India, Assassin's Creed Chronicles: Russia, Assassin's Creed Identity, Assassin's Creed Unity: Arno's Chronicles, Assassin's Creed Origins, Assassin's Creed Odyssey, Assassin's Creed Rebellion, Assassin's Creed Valhalla, Assassin's Creed Mirage, and Assassin's Creed Nexus VR. Other than that it's a great series! I like the idea of being in my backyard not doing anything.

This series definitely gets me thinking of all the strange liminal places I wandered into in games from my childhood, brings back some interesting memories. But also the liminal spaces in some of the bigger budget/super polished games today-- like I have a bonkers amount of hours in Cyberpunk, and it's relatively harder to find odd and unremarkable spaces due to the sheer amount of activities/etc. But the places that do feel like the cracks in between have a unique staying power compared to all of the incredibly minor side content I've somehow managed to memorize. I feel like I could write an essay on the spaces that feel vacant in that game

Currently watching this in my backyard for absolutely no reason. Like you said, it's a multi sensory experience that I can't get in my bedroom.

love this series. Makes me nostalgic for the times before the internet ruined everything were I'd just wander around Skyrim talking to myself, enjoying the world and the isolation.

A game I always thought would be really good for this series was dark souls 2, there’s a lot of just stagnant shit in that game. It’s also one of the newest games I can think of that still did like painted still skyboxes, actual n64 level technology on a game that came out in 2013

I cannot describe how much I love this series and all the others where you look at some specific details. Reminds me of all the moments when I decide to stop in a random place and just stare at the skybox or landscape. An amazing feeling really.

Games I get these vibes from. - Golden eye 64 - Return to Castle Wolfenstein - Stalker - Irongrip Warlord: Winter Offensive - Mass Effect 1 - Fallout 3 - Deus Ex (1999) - Counter Strike 1.6 & Source - Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets PS2 Any game that usually has people in it, like a city or office building, which is now empty. Personally, some of these games are among my favorites, especially Irongrip Warlord.

Liked this video. Ive always had a specific love for this game over any of the other ACs because its kind of weird how its clearly just a dev demo they tried making into a whole game real quick.

You should play just cause 1. It definitely has many of those unremarkable places. The cities feels empty as hell, really gives you that early 2000 game creepy feel.

i was so pleasantly surprised to see this video, AC1 is one of the first few games i ever played but the nostalgia hasn’t been diluted like skyrim because AC1 is nowhere as easy to play nowadays. they’re very different games and it’s a pleasant coincidence to hear your particular style of commentary over two games that were formative to me. I think the uncanny flatness and empty scale of AC1 is what sold me originally, the lush visual detail and technical “open world” despite how short and simple all your interactions with the world are, at least compared to a bethesda rpg. I’ll watch the next video on this channel about AC1, and I would gladly watch half a dozen more, but I want to say that second to this game, AC3 has by far the most “unremarkable and odd” places and moments and feelings in the whole main series. Everything else is either too polished to have such big swathes of un-places, or too new to have that particular 360/ps3-era feel to them. I’ve personally thought a lot about how free and empty i would feel looking around the naval mission levels if there was ever a freecam mod.

Damn you unlocked a 15 year old childhood memory of mine going to that weird water area behind the palace and climbing around.

There is something to being in an area with no perceived purpose and just enjoying it. Psychonauts 2 has an area in "Green Needle Gulch" with a little hot tub and the lighting there makes me feel very happy.

13:59 this is so profound?! And i never thought to put it that way but yes opening the washing machine halfway through and staring into the dark water is unsettling

I never knew I needed this kind of content until I found it, and now I know it’s perfect. The eerie liminality of virtual worlds. Exquisite.

this game was a great fit in the series! Loved that little useless platform at 9:15. Games have so much unintended beauty

9:48 I get where you are coming from, but I think a counterpoint that has developed since those times, is that nowadays people would check that platform expecting to find a collectible item of some kind, and when they don't find one, they will be slightly disappointed, and that's fine, but as these things add up over the course of the whole game, it can lead to players forming the opinion that there isn't much to find in the game's world, because every corner they turn expecting to find a little trinket is empty, it only exists for the sake of having a sense of location, when usually in modern games they exist as hiding spot for an item. There is also the question of whether collectible items even add much of substance to a game, it can be fun to hunt them down, but is that really the focus of your game or is it just a distraction? That's up to the developer to decide and the answer may vary, I've seen games where collectibles added to the experience, and I've seen other games where it was just some vapid pursuit that existed because that's what every game does, like an artificial inflation of play time. Maybe that's a problem, when spaces exist only as a context to contain a hidden collectible item, maybe for a more story-focused game it's better to not have those collectibles, and to not have these environments where there is nothing to be found... or maybe some game devs need to reasses how they intend for players to interact with the setting, and what it even means to be in these places, so that these "pointless" locations can exist just for the sake of existing, for the sake of giving the player the chance of being in that place, in that moment, experiencing the world of the game. 13:23 Honestly this seems kind of a waste of a location, look at this place, so much work must have gone into it, and they have only used it once? This would be a good place to have a minigame or side-quest or anything really, look at all of these assets and all of the effort that has gone into this level design, we only really see it once and that's a shame. This was a very cool video, I enjoyed being taken to these places, thank you.

7:59 This is the weirdest and funniest way he could have phrased what he was getting at here, and I love him for it.

some of your best work, really makes you feel the soft intention behind the crafters of these places

I need more of these. I’ve binged them all. Even games I’ve never played before. These videos are one of a kind and I need more. One vote I’d like to cast is, Tony Hawk games. Would be wild to see what weird little spots you find.