It’s telling that even after three games of Assassin’s Creed’s unique brand of clambering, we’re still not tired of it. The joy of sprinting up the side of a building, grabbing a ledge, and scrabbling up until you’re hopping across rooftops is still gaming gold.

At the start of Brotherhood, Ezio learns the price for not offing the villainous Rodrigo Borgia: Cesare, Borgia’s murderous son, turns your sprawling Monteriggioni villa into a steaming pile of ashes. Oh, and he’s also snagged the coveted Apple of Eden to boot. Time to hit Rome to exact revenge.

Though not immediately obvious, Brotherhood’s story is much smaller in scale than the epic, sprawling plot of the previous game. Oftentimes during Ezio’s portion of the journey (early on, you’ll wander as current-day protag Desmond for a spell), it feels as if the game is treading water: you actually end up visiting the same location twice in two separate sequences during the main quest. It’s also considerably shorter too, a mere nine sequences long.

Usually this would be a problem, but Brotherhood is structured differently from ACII. Setting it in a single city affords a beefed up ecosystem, and there are now hundreds of distractions vying for your attention. The meat of the experience isn’t the story missions — it’s the side quests that dot the map.

The good news is that these smaller quests showcase some of the best missions in the series, like hunting and destroying the war machines that your buddy, Leonardo Da Vinci, has been strong-armed into building for the Borgia. Also interesting are the repressed memories that unlock when you achieve Full Synchronization in enough missions. We don’t want to spoil the surprise, but they’re a cool reward for playing with precision.

Even without them, Full Sync genuinely changes the way you approach missions. Essentially, it’s an extra condition added to the task — like using a specific method to murder your target, remaining undetected, or even the avoidance of touching terra firma. If you’re used to muddling through missions, Full Sync forces you to mix things up. Unfortunately, if you screw up, and even if you restart the portion of the mission where you biffed, it still counts as partial sync unless you restart the whole mission from the beginning. It’s fiddly, and given that gaining Full Sync is harder than just freewheeling through, we could really have used better checkpoints. At least there’s the option of returning to completed memory sequences and giving them another try.

But the real newness is, of course, the recruitment of Assassins. Micromanaging your growing list of cohorts is a blast, as is watching them go from hapless comedy buffoons to frighteningly efficient weapons of death. Best of all, using them leaves you completely undetected — a bonus for most missions. You’re also able to clean up various districts of Rome and buy up stores and landmarks — a cool though somewhat inconsequential aside to the main story push.

The only problem with having all these upgrades and trinkets is that there aren’t enough rewards for all of them. There’s zero benefit to owning any of the landmarks other than the faintest twinge of satisfaction. Some kind of extra incentive for these elements would have made them more worthwhile.

While single-player will keep you busy for a good 20-plus hours, the game’s unique (and appropriate) multiplayer offerings add serious value. The same team behind Splinter Cell: Double Agent’s methodical Spies vs. Mercs online mode are at the helm for Brotherhood’s four stealthy multiplayer modes (Manhunt, Wanted, Advanced Wanted, and Alliance) — and it shows.

Rather than rewarding split-second reactions and surgical aim, multiplayer is all about stalking. There’s a system of upgrades and perks, a colorful cast of characters, and game-changing variety in the levels. The satisfaction of successfully tailing your quarry, then executing is far greater than clumsily spraying someone with an M16. If you’re tired of getting spanked in Black Ops, consider Brotherhood the perfect tonic.

We really wanted to be able to say that Brotherhood is Assassin’s Creed III in all but name, but in reality, it doesn’t sing quite as loudly as the spectacular second game. We were slightly disappointed by the main plot — it feels flimsy compared to ACII’s, and the only truly memorable storytelling occurs when you leave Ezio behind. Yet despite these foibles, we still find ourselves lured back into Brotherhood’s lovely, complicated sandbox. There’s more to do here than in its predecessors and it packs some truly, great missions. Approach Brotherhood’s retooled, scaled-down adventure wisely and you’ll find great reward.

On Xbox 360

+ Tons of stuff to do; some truly awesome missions.

+ Assassinating still rocks; brilliant multiplayer.

- Ezio’s story is insubstantial; needs more incentive and reward for completing some quests.

? How is it possible for Lucy to make crazy jumps in those heeled boots?!

8.0