The second surprise was that Ubisoft would stop in the middle of their numbered trilogy to give Ezio his own trilogy. Most surprising to me at least is that at no point has it felt like they're playing for time. I've grown to really love Ezio as a character and his own trilogy-within-a-trilogy has done a lot to flesh out both his and Altair's characters and really set us up for a great finale.
I just finished Assassin's Creed: Revelations. I took it down to the wire, of course. I'm now prepped and ready for Assassin's Creed III to drop on Tuesday. I ended up really enjoying Revelations, despite some issues. The first issue is the fact that Ezio is like 60 and running around on rooftops and parachuting from towers to save damsels in distress. The second, is that by the end of the game you're doing all of this in damn-near full plate armor. The effect is so jarring that I ended up switching back to one of the early-game armors that was much lighter just so I could continue to suspend disbelief. It's not even believable for a man in his prime to lug that much weight across rooftops, let alone one of Ezio's...experience. The revolutionary setting gives me hope that Connor won't be swinging through the trees in full plate by the end of Assassin's Creed III.
The last problem I had with AC:R was that it moves a little slow for awhile. But boy howdy does the finish make up for it. The back third of the game is a treat. Some of the best sequences the series has offered up so far, including turning a carriage chase, generally one of my least favorite parts of the Assassin's Creed series, into one of the most fun AC moments to date.
I'm even more excited for ACIII now that I'm caught up. Tuesday can't come soon enough.
Some Notes: Ezio will probably go down as one of my favorite all time video game characters, and Connor has some serious work to do if he hopes to displace him as my favorite AC protagonist. Not bad for a guy that I didn't even like in his debut game.