Although the heart of the game still revolves around carrying out assassinations, “AC2” learns from the mistakes of the first game and breaks it up with a greater variety of missions, as well as giving Ezio a considerable arsenal and multiple vehicles to play with as he wanders through Italian cities.

Graphically, I have to say that I was at first a little disappointed. At times, the game didn’t look that much better than the Playstation 2’s forgotten gem “Yakuza 2,” especially in cut scenes. Considering “Creed” is one of the so-called fourth-wave of the current console generation, it’s a little disappointing — at least until you realize all that the game is doing.

The cities that you’ll travel are filled to the brim with people who react to your actions in multiple ways. Don’t be surprised to see people stare at you when you start casually climbing a building. Accidentally bump into someone carrying a basket or other item, and they’ll drop it and begin to curse you out. It really helps to sell the immersion factor the game is striving for.

If you can leave the look of the people behind and just take in the sights of the city, it’s a gorgeous game. More than once I found myself leaving the main story behind to simply go leaping along rooftops and taking in all that was available.

Unfortunately, this led to my first major issue with the game. Sandbox games such as this game and the “Grand Theft Auto” series long have struggled with how to handles boundaries, given that it’s impossible to allow a person to go everywhere. In “AC2,” they take the form of white walls that can be breached, but only briefly lest the mission be reset. Unfortunately, the ability to breach these walls makes it easy to wander in when you don’t mean to, especially when you’re running from guards and find yourself having to devise a new escape route.

The game’s other major problem lies in the script. The characters speak a mix of English and Italian but this doesn’t really work, as the shifts really break the sense of disbelief the game is creating.

The game strength’s overcome these shortcomings. There’s still something that’s disturbingly fun about stalking a person, carrying out the perfect kill and then fleeing into the night.

It’s not a perfect game, but in a holiday season surprisingly devoid of major releases (thank you “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2”), it deserves some consideration when spending your gaming dollars.