Assassin's Creed II: Difference between revisions

{{tropelist}}

* [[Absurdly Spacious Sewer]]: There are a number of catacombs and Assassin tombs to navigate.

* [[After the End]]: {{spoiler|The ending reveals that the current civilization, ours, is actually the world's second civilization. The first was destroyed by what is implied to be a massive solar flare that reversed the earth's magnetic poles, unleashing massive earthquakes.}}

* [[Alternate History]]: By this game, the developers have outright proclaimed it to be [[Alternate History]]. Somewhat justified by Abstergo's deliberate muddying of the waters.

* [[Altum Videtur]]: Ezio says "Requiescat in pace", but "requiescat" is the active third-person singular present tense that means "he/she/it may/must/should rest". Since the active second-person singular present tense is "requiescas", meaning "may you rest", the term should be "''Requiescas'' in pace" ("May you rest in peace").

* [[Ambiguously Gay]]: The profile for [[Leonardo da Vinci]] outright states that he was most likely homosexual. Despite this, he does admit to spending some time at the local, er, "convent" for some quality time with ladies of the evening, so he's bisexual if anything. There's also the fact that this was probably true about the real Leonardo.

* [[An Aesop]]: If the series itself does have an aesop to teach, it is that people should not allow others to choose their path and what they believe, but to decide it for themselves.

* [[An Axe to Grind]]: Ezio can disarm Brutes and use their axes against them.

** On the Assassin side we've got: [[Divine Comedy|Dante Alighieri]], [[The Prince|Niccolò Machiavelli]], possibly Gandhi and [[Joan of Arc]]. ''Brotherhood'' indicates that Brutus and the forty Senators who killed Caesar were also Assassins, which means that Altair's musings on the possibility of the Assassin Order predating Mu'alim are true: the Assassin Order has evidently been around for at ''least'' two millenia, probably much, much longer. [[Nikola Tesla]] wasn't an Assassin himself, but after the Templars had ruined him the Assassins contacted him to recommend that he assist in [[The Tunguska Event|Tunguska]]. Marco Polo either was an Assassin or was associated with them, and the same holds true for Kublai Khan.

** On the schmucks/Those Who Came Before side, we've got [[Jesus]], [[King Arthur]], [[Harry Houdini|Houdini]], [[John F. Kennedy]], and maybe Gandhi and John the Baptist. Oh and Cleopatra, [[Emperor Caligula|Caligula]], [[Genghis Khan]], [[Alexander the Great]], the First Emperor of China and King Xerxes? All killed by Assassins. However, those are just the ones famous by Ezio's time; Subject 16 mentions additional people. ''Brotherhood'' adds [[Gaius Julius Caesar]] to the list of people killed through influence by the Pieces of Eden.

* [[And Your Reward Is Interior Decorating]]: The house in Monteriggioni becomes decorated with portraits of Ezio's assassination victims and with art objects that Ezio is encouraged to purchase. The appearance of the rest of Monteriggioni also improves as Ezio's actions cause the town to become more prosperous.

* [[Animal Motifs]]:

** Both games have a thing for birds. Both protagonists are named after them, the presence of birds marks important/useful spots in the world, and bird feathers play a prominent background role in both games. Also, both Ezio's and Altaïr's assassin's garbs feature a beak-like peak in the front of the hood and a wing-like split in the back of the lower 'cape', thus emulating birds, especially when diving off of rooftops.

** The art book for the first one explicitly compares Altaïr to a bird-of-prey, saying that it was a big part of the inspiration for the character's design. Side-by-side art pieces show artists emulating the shape of an eagle mid-flight with Altaïr.

* [[Anti-Villain]]: Dante Moro. His master [[Manipulative Bastard|Marco Barbarigo]] tried to have him killed so he could steal his wife. His plan failed, but since Moro was left brain-damaged, Marco fooled him into divorcing his true love, and then hired him to be his personal bodyguard. [[Kick the Dog|And then married his ex-wife.]]

* [[Apocalypse How]]: {{spoiler|Somewhere between Class 2 and 3b in the distant past. And it's about to happen again in [[Twenty Minutes Into the Future|Desmond's time]]...}}

* [[Armor of Invincibility]]: The Armour of Altair, which you receive for completing all the Assassin Tomb free-run missions. It offers the best protection in the game and is literally invincible (but unlike the Missaglias armour, which offers the same amount of protection and is breakable, doesn't allow you to dye your clothes).

* [[Artificial Brilliance]]: Civilians and Guards both act a lot more realistically than they did in the previous games. The later will even start searching nearby hiding spots if you try to hide too soon, and seekers will pick and poke every hiding place they can find if you're notorious.

** Speaking of theives, there's a spot in Florence where a bunch of thieves are located a little too close to a roof guard. They won't as so much react while the guard injures and picks them off one by one.

** Guards still have next to [[No Peripheral Vision]], you can sneak up behind them rather easily even from the side. You can even shoot them with an extremely loud pistol and they won't find you if you're shooting from a rooftop.

** Somehow the Corrupt Officials are ''so'' known to be such that passing crowds won't even pause when you publicly put a blade through the guy's torso (though guards will attack on sight of this). Rather conveniently though, these guys who "bear false witness against you" (Paola's words) ''only'' appear once you have quite a lot of Notoriety...

* [[Badass]]: All the Assassins for a start, Caterina Sforza is probably the best example since she is the only woman in Italy to rule over a city state. Also in the Battle of Forlì when her daughter {{spoiler|is kidnapped}} if you listen to the chatter at a certain point it turns out that it runs in the [[Little Miss Badass|family]].

* [[Badass Boast]]: Bartolomeo yells at least one of these per conversation.

* [[Badass Creed]]: The Assassin order adopted the creed of "Nothing is true. Everything is permitted" when Altair took over as the order's Grand Master. While seemingly simple, the Codex reveals that many recruits [[Go Mad from the Revelation|could not deal with the wide-reaching implications of the creed when they finally started to realize exactly what it meant]].

* [[Beethoven Was an Alien Spy]]: According to the glyph puzzles, almost every prominent historical figure, from Thomas Edison to [[Adolf Hitler]], were far more than they seemed to be.

* [[Benevolent Architecture]]: Lots and lots and lots of conveniently placed grab points.

** You can explore the Palazzo di Medici using the "Templar Locations" variant of the Bonfires of the Vanity DLC; it's pretty damn impressive too (though it's a little bit messy since you visit it during a Templar attack).

** The Palazzo Ducale in Venice. It ''is'' the home of the Doge, after all. Notable in that it lacks the [[Benevolent Architecture]] that many other buildings have, making it impossible to enter. {{spoiler|Except in Memory 5 of Sequence 8. Or if you use a [[Good Bad Bug|glitch]] to climb it.}}

* [[Bilingual Bonus]]: Naturally. The game takes place in Italy, and though the game is mainly english throughout characters will talk some Italian from time to time. One that stands out is Ezio's uncle Mario saying "Casa, dolce casa" (quite literally home, sweet home) when you get to the Auditore Mansion. The Gratuitous Italian is explained in the ''Brotherhood'' as a bug in the Animus 2.0. It ''should'' flawlessly translate everything spoken, but it has some translation errors that simply mess things up. According to Rebecca, it's not too bad in Italian, but if you encounter French or German, look out.

* [[Bittersweet Ending]]: Ezio spends twenty years hunting down the conspirators and searching for answers, only to at the end be {{spoiler|told to keep quiet while the grown-ups are talking, and he leaves with absolutely no understanding of what transpired in the Vault}}. ''Brotherhood'' picks up literally at the end of this.

* [[Body Armor as Hit Points]]: Better armor = more health.

* [[Boisterous Bruiser]]: Bartolomeo.

* [[Book Ends]]: Once Ezio's story properly starts, the first scene is a fist fight with his biggest rival. His story ends with a fist fist against his mortal enemy.

* [[Breakable Weapons]]: Some kill moves involve Ezio breaking the polearms.

* [[Breaking the Fourth Wall]]: Subverted. {{spoiler|During Minerva's exposition, she looks directly at the camera and actually tells Ezio to shut up so she can speak to the one controlling him. Then it turns out she's talking to Desmond.}}

* [[Bus Crash]]: {{spoiler|Lorenzo de' Medici}} disappears after Ezio goes to Venice and dies offscreen.

* [[Call Back]]: The 3-episode miniseries ''Lineage'', which takes place before the events of the game, contains many plot points that are later mentioned in the game. Some of these include: the assassination of the Duke of Milan, Giovanni being an Assassin, and the Pope's approval for the destruction of the Medici family.

* [[Camera Screw]]: Thankfully it's at least possible to set the action camera frequency, but it's still not possible to disable it completely.

* [[Charged Attack]]: When bare-handed, Ezio can pick up a handful on sand and blind enemies with it. He can charge his throwing knives during a fight and toss up to three at once. Heavy Weapons can be charged to guard crush enemies and potentially disarm them. Spears can be charged to sweep enemies off of the ground.

* [[Chekhov's Gun]]: there's a sign in the Abstergo parking garage: "[[Bilingual Bonus|Altezza Massima]]." this foreshadows Desmond's location: Italy, as shown in ''[[Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood|Assassin's Creed Brotherhood]]''.

** The only obvious physical change Ezio undergoes between the ages of 17 and 40 is that he grows his beard a bit. He doesn't become any less physically fit over time, either.

* [[Command and Conquer Economy]]: With enough ''florin''s saved up, you can order your Architect to renovate your village back into the thriving economy it used to be.

** The main role of ''mercenari'' is to provide a fighting distraction for guards so that you can assassinate them while they're distracted. If you try to assassinate from the front even a 'distracted' guard is likely to block your attempt... but then he'll just turn back to the mercenaries he was fighting, as if you were never there. If the mercenaries started fighting with the guards and you just perform [[In the Back|one-hit kills]], it doesn't count as combat (this is an important note when trying to get "no-hitter", especially with the 10-Brutes-in-60-seconds mission, as you have to initiate combat by detection or non-fatally attacking the guard yourself before letting the mercenaries take over, for subsequent kills to count).

* [[Contract on the Hitman]]: The subject of at least one of the assassination side missions.

* [[Contractual Boss Immunity]]: When you finally get to fight Rodrigo, he cannot be disarmed or [[One-Hit Kill|One Hit Killed]] with the Hidden Blade's counter.

* [[Cool Old Guy]]: You ''wish'' you had an uncle as cool as Mario Auditore. Funny, smart, and a pretty good mentor.

* [[Counter Attack]]: Significantly revamped, but the basic function is still present. Some timing windows have changed, and the ability to steal weapons by countering when unarmed has been added.

* [[Coup De Grace]]: Attacking downed enemies while armed is a [[One-Hit Kill]].

* [[Critical Annoyance]]: Same as in the first game, except this time it doesn't make a lick of sense as the health meter now represents actual health.

* [[Curb Stomp Battle]]: The last boss can become this. Kind of an [[I'm Going to Hell For This]] moment, since it's ''[[The Pope|the freakin' Pope]]!''

** Possibly literal, if you resort to simply throwing him about and using [[Mixed Martial Arts|PRIDE-style]] [[Kick Them While They Are Down|grounded stomps and soccer kicks]].

* [[Cutscene Drop]]: It doesn't matter if you kill your target by shooting him from afar, throwing him off a roof and/or into the instantly-fatal-to-[[NPC|NPCs]] water, or slashing him with your sword as you gallop past him on a horse, somehow Ezio always instantly ends up kneeling on the ground with the target dying in his arms. This even happens when an ally specifically tells you to shoot the target.

* [[Cutscene Power to the Max]]: Averted in the [[Attract Mode]] video, where the moves shown are indeed usable in gameplay.

* [[Dangerously Genre Savvy]]: The Seeker variety of Elite Guard is a step up from [[The Guards Must Be Crazy]], to the point of actually ''overturning hiding spots''.

** Regular guards may also stab hiding spots that are in areas under investigation, but the Seeker tends to do so even when there's no disturbance.

** [[Big Bad|Rodrigo Borgia]] isn't lacking either, guessing that Ezio is watching him on the mission you are formally introduced to him, and cutting off a typical "we aren't failures like your last minions" speech (trope?) by pointing out that the Pazzis were brought down by one Assassin.

* [[Dashed Plotline]]: Going from one memory to the next involves jumps of several years.

* [[Dating Catwoman]]: Desmond briefly experiences one of Altaïr's memories as a result of the "bleeding effect" that shows both Altaïr and the Templar Maria having fallen in love. You can even find a portrait of Maria drawn by Altaïr as one of the Codex pages.

* [[Dead Guy on Display]]: Francesco de Pazzi's body is hung from the Palazzo della Signoria... [[Fan Disservice|in his underwear.]]

* [[Death Is a Slap on The Wrist]]: Justified in the sense that you never die, you just "desynchronize". Nonetheless, there is literally ''no penalty'' for desynching. Just that you have to restart whatever memory you may have been playing when it happened.

** Subverted in ''Brotherhood''. When quizzed by Mario, Ezio claims that {{spoiler|the armor of Altaïr blunted Rodrigo's attack. The armor, by the way, is a superstrong, superlight spacemetal forged by the Gods.}}

* [[Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?]]: The final boss of ''Assassin's Creed II'' is Pope Alexander VI, who by this point has both keys to the Vault, the Apple of Eden and the papal staff -- aka the Staff of Eden -- and is virtually unstoppable. So, what does Ezio say to him? [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|"Go fuck yourself."]]

* [[Downloadable Content]]: Two pieces have been revealed: one named "The Battle of Forlì", the other "Bonfire of the Vanities". It was widely speculated that these two events were the missing Sequences 12 and 13, which has been confirmed by Ubisoft.

** There are also several bonus downloadable items depending on what retailer you preordered the game from. This is also Ubisoft's first game to integrate its community-based Uplay system, which lets you gain points ("Units") redeemable towards DLC for certain Uplay-enabled games.

* [[Dual-Wielding]]: Ezio has two hidden blades. Most of the time, they don't operate too differently from Altaïr, but they do allow you to shank two guards at once.

* [[Duel Boss]]: Vieri and Borgia.

** Can be averted in Vieri's case by throwing knives (if you find the right position to throw them from) or [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJHYeaWwFow&t=1m01s by surprising him (possibly by bumping into him)] (at 1:01), but with Borgia the only way to do so is a game-breaking bug (in the sense that you won't be able to complete the memory).

** Wait one minute on the first menu (before pressing enter to start) and a short video will play where you use {{spoiler|a gun for an assassination}}.

* [[Eleventh-Hour Superpower]]: {{spoiler|1=In a [[Shout-Out]] to AC1's final battle, Ezio's learned a few tricks from that Golden Apple, too.}}

* [[Elite Mooks]]: Brutes, Agiles and Seekers.

** The Agiles have a habit of dodging most attacks that you make, but if you can force them to block they'll eventually tire, opening them up for a [[One-Hit Kill]], and as with the beret-wearing regular guards [[One-Hit Kill|all counter attacks are fatal to them]]. There's also several "degrees" of regular sword/bludgeon-wielding guard, proportional to the amount of armor they're wearing and the coverage of their helmets.

* [[Enemy Civil War]]: Archers will attack pickpockets and Borgia Couriers if they get onto roofs near enough, even though the Couriers will try to call for the guards to help them. In Bonfire of the Vanities you will see guards fighting each other even though they all appear red in Eagle Vision.

* [[Even the Guys Want Him]]: Come on; ''listen'' to some of the things the rooftop thieves say about Ezio when he goes past.

** How about the Mercenary who presides over the Practice Ring in Monterrggioni?

* [[The Guards Must Be Crazy]]: Different kinds of guards react differently to Ezio when searching for him; polearm-carrying guards ("Seekers") will ''poke their weapons into stacks of hay'' looking for him. However, Ezio will relatively early on learn to make kills from hiding spots.

* [[Guide Dang It]]: The answers of Subject 16's glyph puzzles can sometimes cross into this, as Shaun's advice becomes less and less helpful throughout, climaxing with Puzzle 20 where he outright admits to having no clue, even though ''it's explicitly declared on-screen''. Another [[Guide Dang It]] comes from the fact that while you get helpful maps showing every one of the hundreds of treasure chests in the city, updated in real-time (each opened treasure chest's icon disappears from the map), there's no such option for the ultimately more important feathers, considering what you get out of collecting them all.

* [[Hammerspace Hideaway]]: The haystacks can apparently hold an unlimited number of corpses, their weapons, and ''still'' have room for Ezio to hide in.

* [[Highly-Visible Ninja]]: Ezio is possibly a bigger offender when it come to this than Altaïr. In Altaïr's time, the bright white assassin robe at least had the perk that it was reminiscent of the one the local scholars wore, which made masquerading as one or hiding amongst a group of them possible. Ezio on the other hand has no such excuse, but unlike Altaïr, he has the option of changing the robe's color to a more camouflage-friendly one. Interestingly, his father, Giovanni, apparently kept the robe in its white default color, making him qualify for the trope as well. Note that this ''does'' tie into gameplay: if Ezio passes into line of sight of a guard in an area he shouldn't be in, they spot him right away. If the guards are on high alert, they'll also spot Ezio if he's walking down the street without using crowds, picking him out based on his flashy clothes.

* [[Historical Hero Upgrade]]: Lorenzo de'Medici was a lot more ambiguous in reality. It says a lot about [[Deadly Decadent Court|Renaissance]] [[Chronic Backstabbing Disorder|Italy]] that Lorenzo can be the good guy partly by virtue of only hiring ''one'' contract killer. One of the reasons for the [[Encyclopedia Exposita|in-game database]] may be to let players know how [[Truth in Television|historically accurate]] that is.

** Savonarola in the ''Bonfire of the Vanities'' DLC. Granted, having countless Renaissance paintings and sculptures thrown into a fire because you find them indecent is a bit of a dick move. But people forget that Savonarola's denouncements of such priceless artworks were ''very popular at the time'', mainly because the continued patronage of fancy artwork by wealthy Italian families began to seem like a mocking gesture as poverty, plague, and other miseries continued to climb in Italy. He's definitely extreme, but probably had [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|good intentions]], and he certainly wasn't the conniving maniacal bastard he is in the game. (In fairness, the ''AC'' team aren't the first ones to portray him that way.)

* [[Hoist by His Own Petard]]: Ezio can disarm guards and kill them with their own weapons immediately afterwards.

** Meanwhile with the Assassins, Rebecca refers to the Animus 2.0 as Baby.

* [[I Know Mortal Kombat]]: Desmond obtains all the skills of Ezio by playing through a simulation of his memories, leading to a 'bleeding effect' that causes them to be assimilated into his own mind... along with other things.

* [[Impossibly Cool Clothes]]: Assassin's robes became [[Memetic Outfit|memetic]] for [[Badass|badassness]].

* [[Improvised Weapon]]: When Ezio busts Bartolomeo out of jail, the latter initially uses a broom as a weapon [[Badass|and beats the hell out of a bunch of guards in the process]]. Ezio himself can pick up brooms, farming implements, fishing poles etc. and use them like bludgeons.

* [[Inevitable Tournament]]: Venice's Carnivale, featuring an unarmed-fighting event, stealing ribbons from pretty ladies, and...um... [[Capture the Flag]]. Played with in two ways: first, Ezio willingly enters the tournament as part of a [[Batman Gambit]] arranged by the local [[Hooker with a Heart of Gold]] to get a pass to a party arranged by his target; and secondly, although Ezio wins the contests the Carnivale organizers are paid off to rig the final results anyway in favor of a guy that Ezio ''had beaten in public'' as part of the fighting tournament ''and'' defeating a bunch of guards who'd entered with weapons. Fortunately, afterward you're then given a mission to steal the golden mask from the "winner" while he's distracted.

* [[Inexplicable Treasure Chests]]: Loads of them. You can even buy maps that lead to these treasure chests. In addition, there are guards scattered around with nothing better to do than to protect a chest by a hay pile outside of town all day.

* [[Infant Immortality]]: Averted. Ezio's kid brother Petruccio, who has to be only ten or eleven years old, is hanged alongside his father in the mission "Last Man Standing".

** Shaun, whilst informing you about one of your assassination targets, recounts the time that the man, in order to stop a prominent family's plot against him, invited the entire family, including their children, to an Easter celebration, then had the children shot whilst their parents watched.

** Altaïr's armor is also the best in ''AC2'', with only the Missaglias Vambraces having any advantage (3 Health to the Vambraces of Altaïr's 2 Health). While all four pieces have to be worn together, at 8 Resistance they ''never'' break (hence saving ''florin''s) and grant a whopping 15 Health, three times what Ezio started with.

** The Hidden Blade is effectively one solely for the guaranteed [[One-Hit Kill|fatal]] [[Counter Attack|Counter Kills]] irrespective of enemy Health.

* [[Ink Suit Actor]]: Thanks to ''Lineage'', which uses some of the VAs to live act their game roles, you can see that a lot of characters are modeled after their live-action actors.

* [[Instant Expert]]: The purpose of letting Desmond relive Ezio's life is to gain the latter's skills. Ezio himself takes to the Hidden Blade very quickly, though he could possibly have had weapons training in the past for the other weapon types and the training with Paola and Mario has a montage flavor to it that ''Renaissance'' confirms.

** While ''Assassin's Creed II'' is incredibly open world, there will be areas rendered unavailable during certain memories such as missions, and at points in the story certain districts won't be available to reach yet; staying too long in them will cause desynchronization with Ezio.

** In the countryside areas of the game - there are hills surrounding all the edges of the map that act as literal versions of this.

** If Ezio uses the Poison Blade on a target from behind, he lightly stabs the target in the back, injecting the poison. The advantage over the Hidden Blade is that ''no one will notice'', and the target's subsequent descent into madness followed by death is a complete mystery to everyone else, who will only watch helplessly.

* [[In the Past Everyone Will Be Famous]]: Taken [[Up to Eleven]]. Seriously. Ezio can't go for more than ten minutes without coming face-to-face with some important historical figure.

* [[It's Always Mardi Gras in New Orleans]]: After participating in the [[Inevitable Tournament]] missions, a section of Venetia will be constantly celebrating Carnivale for the rest of the game. Even ''ten years'' after the plot begins.

** A straighter version of this trope is when you get the DLC pack that allows you to play through the Bonfire of the Vanities. After you kill the major villain, you can still go into that new section of Florence and people will still be burning stuff.

* [[It Will Never Catch On]]: Ezio suggests to Antonio that he add milk or sugar to his ''café''. Antonio scoffs, suggesting that coffee is simply an acquired taste. In another mission, dock workers complain about the ruling class importing an expensive powder from China, for fireworks.

* [[Jerkass]]: Shaun Hastings, one of your handlers in the sequel.

* [[Justified Tutorial]]: The first third of the game is one big long one for Ezio. We're introduced to him during a street fight; right after we're introduced to looting enemies for pocket change, with which to pay doctors for medicine (another new gameplay mechanic). Climbing rooftops and delivery missions for Ezio's family flesh out Ezio's life as well as refamiliarizing the players with his free-running and climbing abilities. Screwing up at the gallows scene introduces us to the concept of "hide or die," and is shortly afterwards supplanted with the courtesans teaching Ezio and the player with how to hide in plain sight by blending in with the crowd. Killing the Pazzi thugs near Leonardo's studio teaches us how to hide bodies by moving them around. Finally, getting our hidden blade shows us how we can use it to actually perform an assassination mission.

* [[Karma Houdini]]: Neither the guard who {{spoiler|pulled the lever at the gallows}} nor those who {{spoiler|assaulted Ezio's mother}} are ever shown as suffering any negative consequences, nor does Ezio target them personally for those acts -- though those guards may have been among those he killed along the way.

* [[Kick Them While They Are Down]]

* [[Knight Templar]]: [[The Knights Templar|Guess who.]]

** Also, in the instruction manual, above the control scheme for swimming is this: ''Lucy - Make sure to fix that annoying bug in the Animus 1.0 software which prevents ancestors from swimming!''

** There's also the aforementioned conversation with Rebecca where Desmond notes his appreciation for the subtitles - the first game lacked subtitles completely.

{{quote|''(I swear when I get out of here I will SEVER ALL of your FUCKING heads and [[Ass Shove|SHOVE them up your asses]])! And do not think I will be matching heads to asses! It will be glorious, and they will sing of it for YEARS to come!''}}

** Also Caterina Sforza in the DLC. Try listening to her complete tirade, it involves tempting enemy soldiers to come over to her and try to grab her breasts so she can kick them in their balls so hard they'll fly out of their nostrils.

** There's also a riff that could be considered the "Assassin's leitmotif". Remember the choir that sang in the Masyaf background music for the first game? You hear that same choir singing in the San Gimignano bgm and when Ezio is officially branded.

** Not to mention the tune sung by the female singer in a lot of the background music. This same tune is played on a cello in the main section of Rome in Brotherhood.

* [[Le Parkour]]: Strangely, the Assassin technique seems to have spread among the young men of Italy -- the heralds warn against the Italian youth engaging in [[Roof Hopping]], implying that they're proficient at this to an extent. The thieves are even better.

* [[Lethal Joke Item]]: You see those brooms citizens might occasionally sweep the floor with? Those are apparently made with metal wires, because they animate, sound, and hit to just like reskinned maces. It becomes hilarious when Ezio walks away from a group of dead guardsmen holding only a bloody broom in one hand.

* [[Limited Wardrobe]]: Ezio wears the same robes for ''over twenty years'', though you can dye it different colors by visiting tailor shops.

* [[Living Legend]]: By the end of the game, Ezio is famous among the assassins, and terrifying to the templars.

* [[Lost in a Crowd]]: Ezio being able to hide in ''any'' sufficiently large crowd of people (sufficiently large being about 4 or so). In place of the priests ("Scholars") from ''AC'', Ezio can hire some... Courtesans to follow him as a mobile safepoint directed by him. People not noticing Ezio in that particular crowd is [[Distracted by the Sexy|easier explained]].

* [[Lovable Rogue]]: Ezio. Especially in his younger years, though he never completely loses the charm.

* [[Manipulative Bastard]]: Rodrigo Borgia.

* [[Marked Bullet]]: The bullets Ezio uses for his hidden gun are marked with the Assassin symbol.

* [[Meaningful Name]]: Aside from many of the characters, the mission names themselves are mostly modern (or at least, younger than the Renaissance) slang that reflect the theme of each mission - for example, "Boys Will Be Boys" for a gang fight between the Auditores and the Pazzis; a mission where you ferry letters from one man to two courtesans is called "Casanova"; a fight against a large group of enemies is called "Last Man Standing"; and another letter-delivery mission is called "Paperboy". And that's just in the first hour or so of the game!

** "Ezio" is an Italian name that comes from the Greek word for "eagle". Ezio's last name is "Auditore"; an auditor is a bookkeeper; the Auditores are bankers.

* [[Mighty Glacier]]: Brutes and mercenaries.

* [[Mind Screw]]: There's a reason why Desmond's last words in the game are "What... the... fuck?" In addition, the ''[[Dream Sequence]]'' mentioned in Narm, below, sees you {{spoiler|apparently playing as one of Altaïr's sperm.}}

* [[More Than Mind Control]]: Experienced by most of Savonarola's lieutenants.

* [[Motive Decay]]: Compared to the Templars of the previous games who (with only a couple of exceptions) were for the most part people who demonstrated (or satisfactorily explained) their intent of working towards the greater good of the people ala transforming the Holy Land into a state straight out of Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan, with many a reference to the "state of nature" and what not, the Templars in ACII for most part tend to come off as selfish dicks who are more interested in their twisted vices than the overall Templar goal of bringing about peace by stripping humanity of their free will and only see allegiance to the Templar order as a means of getting what they want. This is likely intentional on the part of the writers, who probably wanted to show the decaying effect an excess of power has on an organization, even one that has such reputably lofty goals as the Templars. It is worth noting that in the first game, there were also Templars who also used their power primarily for personal gain, i.e. Tamir, Majd Uddin, and Abun Nakoud. A couple of the Templars in the second game are also decent people; Ulberto Umberti comes off as a scheming killer out for revenge in Shaun's notes, but his letter to his wife indicates he only betrayed Giovanni because of fears for his family's safety. Dante Moro was little more than a victim of circumstance and the scheming of his superior.

*** Also, one should consider that most of the game goes from [[Protagonist-Centered Morality|Ezio's point of view]] in his [[Revenge Before Reason|quest for vengeance]]. That said, anyone who opposes the Templars are good in his books, in spite of the flaws of character and moral. The game sugarcoats it to make Lorenzo and Caterina to look nobler and more likeable, but in [[Real Life]], they were no better than Francesco de Pazzi, Rodrigo or Cesare Borgia, seeking as much power and influence as possible. When Lucrezia points out that Lorenzo killed every single member of the Pazzi family, even the ones who weren't aware of the plot, and called Ezio out on how the Assassins put events in motion, but never see them to the end, his [[Shut UP, Hannibal]] was rather poor, prompting Lucrezia to call him hypocrite. And unlike the Templars, who eventually turned back to their [[Utopia Justifies the Means]] ways, the Assassins remained static and not meddling in politics for so long that Abstergo became quickly more powerful than the Assassin Order, which regressed to Al Mualim's Assassins' ways of hiding from society and indoctrinating children born into the Order right from childhood, but also keeping a shroud of secrecy and conspiracy, which is exactly why Desmond ran away from his home. They degraded so that their Mentor's death and the revelation of all their bases in the comics was enough to make the Modern Assassins to fall into chaos and ruin very quickly.

**** The Dev's acknowledge this. One guy said in an interview that the Ezio trilogy kinda strayed away from Templars vs. Assassins and kinda turned into Ezio vs. Everyone Ezio doesn't like. They say they will be going back to the big conflict in [[AC 3]].

* [[Munchkin]]: As noted on that page's quote. Ezio lives in Renaissance Italy, and by the end of the game is armed with: a dozen unblockable throwing knives, two wrist blades that can deflect almost any close-range attack or (with good timing) counter-[[One-Hit Kill]] any [[Mook]], a pistol, several doses of poison, armor made of a very light and strong metal that humans wouldn't have invented on our own, and at one point he ends up flying around on a hang glider, punting guards off of rooftops. Also, he can jump some six feet straight up while hanging from walls... while wearing armor and carrying weapons and coins.

* [[My God, What Have I Done?]]: Some of Savonarola's lieutenants say things to this effect when Ezio gets to them.

* [[Nice Hat]]: Lots of Italians wear hats. The lowest-ranking guards have berets.

* [[No-Gear Level]]: After the execution of Giovanni, Frederico and Petruccio, a Brute disarms Ezio, forcing him to run for it. You don't get the Hidden Blade for a while, and a permanent sword even later.

* [[No Such Thing as Wizard Jesus]]: Averted. It's heavily implied that numerous prophets throughout history, Jesus included, were in fact the survivors of an advanced race similar or [[Precursors]] to humans. Altaïr speculates that such prophets wielded real power, not just illusions from pieces of Eden. It's also explicitly shown that humanity was created as a servant race for these [[Precursors]], forming the basis for most of the world's creation myths, including [[The Bible|the Book of Genesis]].

* [[Not Even Bothering with the Accent]]: Subverted with the Assassins' improved Animus 2.0, as everyone has an Italian accent.