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A review by foolishpsychopomp
Assassin's Creed: Underworld by Andrew Holmes, Oliver Bowden
adventurous
medium-paced
2.75
Underworld should of just been a prequel story or more of a retelling of the game, because in attempting to do both the book suffers for it.
The 2/3 of this book that make up the prequel sections had potential but I ultimately found really boring. I liked getting more of Jayadeep and seeing how he gets to become the character from Syndicate. I even quite liked the character work that was done for him. I also thought that that plot was kind of interesting but more so the idea of it then it's actual execution. Other than that I really couldn't get into it. Personally I hated all of Abberline's pov chapters, I felt like they were really unimportant and just rehashing information we already had. I don't mind him being a part of the story but I don't think it was necessary to give him his own chapters. And I know the whole game is about them but I do wish we got to see a little more of the Frye twins during this section of the book.
As for the last handful of the book that actually covers the game, it felt incredibly underdeveloped. I don't know if it was because of the inclusion of the prequel story, because it's only telling Evie's part of the story, or maybe there just wasn't the time to flesh it out more but it was really disappointing. It would of been a great opportunity to flesh out the Frye twins in a way similar to what Jayadeep got in the earlier parts of the book. Instead it cuts over basically everything except anything about the piece of eden and Jacob hardly matters. Compared to the other novelizations of this series, Underworld just feels kind of lazy. The retelling's only saving grace was it's a lot less boring than the prequel sections.
The 2/3 of this book that make up the prequel sections had potential but I ultimately found really boring. I liked getting more of Jayadeep and seeing how he gets to become the character from Syndicate. I even quite liked the character work that was done for him. I also thought that that plot was kind of interesting but more so the idea of it then it's actual execution. Other than that I really couldn't get into it. Personally I hated all of Abberline's pov chapters, I felt like they were really unimportant and just rehashing information we already had. I don't mind him being a part of the story but I don't think it was necessary to give him his own chapters. And I know the whole game is about them but I do wish we got to see a little more of the Frye twins during this section of the book.
As for the last handful of the book that actually covers the game, it felt incredibly underdeveloped. I don't know if it was because of the inclusion of the prequel story, because it's only telling Evie's part of the story, or maybe there just wasn't the time to flesh it out more but it was really disappointing. It would of been a great opportunity to flesh out the Frye twins in a way similar to what Jayadeep got in the earlier parts of the book. Instead it cuts over basically everything except anything about the piece of eden and Jacob hardly matters. Compared to the other novelizations of this series, Underworld just feels kind of lazy. The retelling's only saving grace was it's a lot less boring than the prequel sections.