Trick and Tips

Review:
(The ugly portmanteau in the title is because damnable Uplay’s damnable cloud saves system destroyed and rewound over three hours of my progress, which has kept me from getting quite as far into Black Flag as I’d hoped. It also meant I lost a bunch of sea shanties, which was what upset me the most. Is this is Wot I Think? Is it mere Impressions? It’s both and neither. Isn’t that helpful? PS: in the name of all that’s holy, turn off cloud saves in Uplay before you start playing AC4).

It’s the best Assassin’s Creed yet! Which is 90% because Black Flag, a a third-person action adventure about pirates in the Caribbean, isn’t really an Assassin’s Creed game in the traditional sense, and 10% because the lead character is from Swansea.

I went to university in Swansea, you see. It’s a crap town if ever there was one, but I can’t help but be fond of it. Also it’s where I played Half-Life. AC4′s piratey protagonist Edward Kenway has an accent that appears to be on a cycling tour of the British isles, but when it does settle on a Welsh lilt it fits – it fits the rogueish, laddy character, and it fits this much more playful AssCreed. It’s a relief, after the dour AC3. I had thought that game’s joyless hero Connor (Kenway’s grandson, chronologically-speaking) wasn’t going to make any appearance in AC4, but then I realised that the ship’s plank was surely an homage.

Anyway, pirates. I suppose you could argue that they can loosely come under the definition of ‘assassin’, what with all the killing, but let’s not pretend this series has ever had much interest in what that word implies. The secret society and ancestor race bollocks which has made what should have been a light-footed tale tediously heavy is still in some evidence, but the vast majority of it has been downplayed in favour of Just Doing Some Piracy. This also entails an admission, of sorts, of what Assassin’s Creed games are really about – the pursuit of wealth and power, rather than justice and subtlety. This is a game about blowing up every ship that moves for its loot, finding every icon on ever island for its loot and hunting every animal, both on land and at sea, for its skin (i.e. loot). It is greed, it is the celebration of greed, and it is refreshingly unabashed about it. There is a redemptive narrative thread for good ole boy Kenway, whose jack the lad nature decreases somewhat as the game wears on, but really we’re all in it for the yo-ho-ho and the Master and Commander-lite naval battles and blowing up island forts and air-assassinating ocelots (that last is a real in-game mission objective, delivered with an impressively straight face).

While the controls are characteristically convoluted and in some cases discordant (for instance, the run button for on-foot mode becomes the fire cannons! button in ship-captaining mode, which causes no end of trouble), generally it’s a pleasure to take the wheel of Kenway’s ship, the Jackdaw. The naval component is clearly as much like steering a real boat as drinking vodka is like exercising, but even in its cartoonish ease there’s a satisfying weight to turning against the wind, a heft and chaos to unleashing a volley of cannonfire, and a ‘we’re the kings of the world!’ rapture to leading a boarding party onto a defeated enemy craft. When you’re out on the seas, it’s wall to wall destructive celebration. Rad more

System requirements:
Operating System: Windows Vista SP2 or Windows 7 SP1 or Windows 8 (both 32/64bit versions)
Processor: Intel Core2Quad Q8400 @ 2.6 GHz or AMD Athlon II X4 620 @ 2.6 GHz
RAM: 2 GB (4 GB recommended)
Video Card: Nvidia Geforce GTX 260 or AMD Radeon HD 4870 (512MB VRAM with shader Model 4.0 or higher)
DirectX 11: DirectX June 2010 Redistributable 
Disk Space: 30 GB available space
Sound Card: DirectX Compatible Sound Card with latest drivers
Peripherals: Windows-Compatible keyboard and mouse required, optional controller (Xbox 360 Controller for Windows recommended)
Multiplayer: 256 Kbps or faster broadband connection

Screen Shots: Click on the image to view large screen

Info:
Nero Burning ROM is a comprehensive CD, DVD and Blu-ray disc burning application.

Creating audio and data discs with the program is a matter of drag and drop simplicity. Youre able to build video discs from video folders (if youre looking to build these from video files then youll need Nero Vision Xtra). And you can also copy discs, erase rewriteable discs or work with disk images (.NRG, .CUE, .ISO and .IMG formats are supported) in a couple of clicks.

Thats just the start, though. Nero Burning ROM also includes SecurDisc 2.0 technology, which can be used on any disc burner, and any disc type - CD, DVD or Blu-ray. This automatically adds error recovery information to your discs, so if they become damaged or corrupted in years to come then you may be able to recover the contents. SecurDisc also supports password and copy protection, an integrity check that alerts you to impending disc failure, and more.

A useful new DiscSpan project type makes it easy to archive data across multiple discs. If youre backing up your music collection, say, theres no longer any need to manually arrange the files into single disc-sized groups. Just create a DiscSpan project, drag and drop all the files and folders youd like to archive, and the program will organise them itself to use the minimum number of discs.

Theres also a new AVCHD project type, that archives your high definition footage without spending hours transcoding it. And enhanced Windows support included a new right-click "Burn with Nero" entry, useful Windows 8 jump list options, and more.


The latest version of the app, Nero Burning ROM does not include a huge number of updates, but there is a new SecurDisc Surface Scan feature that can check Blu-ray, DVD and CD discs and provide greater reliability. It is now also possible to import files from the Nero MediaBrowser. Read more

System rquiremtns:
Windows® XP SP3 (32 bit), Windows Vista® SP2 (32/64 bit), Windows® 7 SP1 Home Premium, Professional or Ultimate (32/64 bit), Windows® 8 (32/64 bit), Windows® 8.1 (32/64 bit)
2 GHz AMD or Intel® processor
512 MB RAM (1 GB RAM for Windows Vista® , Windows® 7 or Windows® 8)
500 MB hard drive space for a typical installation of all components (including temporary disk space)
CD, DVD, or Blu-ray Disc recordable or rewritable drive for burning
Third party components such as Microsoft Windows® Installer 4.5 are shipped with the product or automated download if not included in the package
For some services an Internet connection is required
Internet connection charges are the users responsibility

For further requirements please check www.nero.com

Screen Shots: Click on the image to view large screen