his beard alone has experienced more than any other man's entire body

 
So I completed Assassin's Creed: Revelations, and the revelation appears to be that there's nothing left to reveal. Ubisoft has the franchise sewn up tighter than an ageing Assassin's increasingly strained doublet strings and I must confess I find my enthusiasm for fanfiction waning. Want to know what happens to Altar post-AC1? Ubisoft has the answers, and it's horribly depressing. What about Ezio? Ubisoft have that one covered as well, and you can read all about it! The only thing left to do is make the characters shag each other-and gratuitous shagging's never been hard to find in any fandom, even one whose protagonists are theoretically warrior monks..

Having said that, I genuinely did enjoy the game. Ezio is and always has been an engaging protagonist, and the missions show a lot more variety than the previous instalments; although I must confess I have a soft spot for the old days when all you had to do was sneak off to one of three interchangeable cities, shank some poor bastard in the throat and then ride back to tell your mentor all about it. The music was so good I bought the soundtrack, and Istanbul was as beautiful as the engine could render it.  I enjoyed the city so much, in fact that I spent half the time on story missions and the rest buying shops, upgrading my armour and searching for fairly mediocre treasure. The scenery was stunning, so stunning that I can only regret that I must have somehow missed the enormous city-filled caverns during the weeks I spent in Cappadocia in real life. So what if I skipped all the boring Desmond Tetris parts because there weren't any hookers or guards in them? Who cares that the only reason the game was called 'Revelations' was because 'Assassin's Creed: Faffing Around in Istanbul.' didn't sound quite as good? I could have quite happily spent another few hours faffing around the bazaars if I hadn't just bought Saladin Ahmed's new book.

The new AC:3 game has just been announced for October and I'm looking forwards to spending a few more hours faffing around whatever historical period the developers have decided to pillage this time. Rumor has it that the sequel (threequel?) is set in the American War of Independence, but then rumor's also had it that it's set in Meiji-era Japan, World War Two, Victorian London and modern-day New York. I must admit that my first reaction was 'what will they find to climb?' because 1776 Amrica wasn't known for its skyscrapers, but I can't wait to take a swan dive off George Washington's nose.

back to the word-mines

So I took the plunge and I signed up to scifibigbang again. I've missed the last couple of years because a 20,000 word fic is one that actually requires work. The last attempt resulted in the 27,000 words of moderately-depressing teenage angst that is The Shadow of the Flame
(Dragon Age: Origins: Alistair doesn't want to be a Templar. His superiors attempt to change his mind. It doesn't end well).  I'm planning a Dragon Age fic again this time, possibly centring on Anders. So many questions to be answered, and number one has to be 'why the hell the clothes?'  

If anybody's thinking of signing up, go for it! I love longer stories and there tend to be a lot of one-shots in most fandoms. Plus the whole thing is really well-organised, and stories aren't due until June 30th. T