Just now, just finished of a session of ACIII. Also the only part I see as platforming was the Demond's Memries sequences in Revelations. Nothing overrated about them, they were crap. Also, given some of the comments I've seen about ACIII and my own feeling sof the game i would actually say its underrated.

'Most linear open-world game ever' - this opinion has some merit if you have only played ACII (as you said you have), as the countryside aread between cities in basically a single road. However the Kingdom in AC and the Frontier in ACIII, as well as the openess of the cities you are able to explore mean the game is far from linear.

And more AC1, just for the lulz:

I don't dislike GTA, I actually like the series. The initial thread title was "overrated", which I feel that GTA truly is, along with the others I mentioned. Especially GTA IV, which took large steps in the wrong direction in my opinion but still managed incredible (inflated 7th generation hallmark) reviews.

thats what i get for copy and pasting, It was supposed to say "this is really a fun game"

AC franchise has, by far, the worst gameplay/controls in the history of videogames. There have been countless times where the game would not listen to what I was actually pressing and have died from too high of drops because the games doesn't know left from right. I honestly love the series and consider the first one the best and will be buying all of them but in no way is AC a well developed game. Too many glitches for a linear open world game and the only things that make these games considered good are the ideas behind the game, not the game itself.

@ OP
The combat has more than just sitting there and blocking. What I personally do to make things faster is to continuously attack the group of enemies while countering at the same time.
As for the platforming...it sucks to degree that ruins the overall open world tone of the game.
Also, some people are completionists, like myself, and they find pleasure in locating all the hidden things within the game as well as the eagle viewpoints.

I agree it's overrated. But I wouldn't call it terrible either. Imo, it's mediocre or "good" but nothing great or amazing.

What I find interesting is, given it's a yearly franchise which is clearly getting milked; I don't understand how this IP gets away with praise while CoD gets bashed on for being a rehash. (Probably the average gamer who talks as such buys both yearly)

I disagree. Now don't get me wrong, Revelations kinda felt stale (got better towards the end though) and took me much longer to beat. On the other hand AC2 and Brotherhood are amazing imo. I would recommend the mutliplayer as well.

I haven't played AC3, and I will wait for it to go on sale.

These are all hilarious, except for that AC3 one which is the most dudebro thing I have ever heard ("Hey, it's not bad for a console" and "This is meant to be a AAA title").

I don't see how any of those would ruin your experience with the game. I remember one time in Revelations, I killed a guy with a crossbow and his head and neck started spinning around and flew off into the distance. These are just funny glitches, not bugs.

I agree followed with Hitman.

Cod had been a yearly franchise for longer than AC was. and IMHO AC games do much more between them in terms of adding stuff than COD does. Brotherhood added multiplayer, Revelations revamped the Brotherhood gameplay, added a tower defense game, AC 3 got all kinds of new mechanics, settings, characters. Me personally I dont bash COD, hell i bought Blops 2 and both AC 3 games.