So I went to the Gamestop and showed the guy there my nipples, but before you Jeebus lovers out there start thinking I have no sense of morals, understand this: I walked away from there with two cardboard cutouts of Ezio Auditore da Firenze. Hellsya, bitches. Suck my big fat cock. Lohl.

To be perfectly honest, Altair could kick that little fruitcake's ass so hard his colon would fly through his nostrils. I guess it was just the fact that the dirty Arab was a taciturn, ruthless killer as opposed to Ezio, who remains in my eyes a victimized teenager driven by perpetually dramatic hatred and angst. Sure, as the fourteen hours of character exposition would have us believe, (unlike Altair) he has family, a past, and God forbid, a FACE. Still, I was always under the impression (perhaps because I didn't deign to play the fiasco that was Assassin's Creed for DS) that Altair was a Creed member just because, well, he liked killing people. In my book, that's not only a good thing because it leaves blanks for the player's overactive erotic imagination to fill with syrup and bodily fluids of various colours, but it's also unquestionably badass. Perhaps I'm just bitter because I haven't finished AC II yet. Maybe Ezio gets better, but one can only hope.

So far the gameplay is the best steamy, delicious shit I have ever seen. Unlike Altair, who really had nothing to do besides steal and pick fights, Ezio... Uh... Steals and picks fights in a far more heterogeneous manner. The controls are still a wee bit on the unresponsive side, and like in the first game I still found myself yelling at the stupid pillock when he found that he was content to hang from a ledge, smiling vacuously as hoards of angry guards hacked mercilessly at his hamstrings. Regardless of mistakes like this, the gameplay is as guiltily fun as answering the door stark naked when the Mormons come to visit. The first thing I did in the fascinating world of AC II was saunter up to a prostitute, punch her in the face, and promptly run the other way. And there's no way that excellently pleasing first impression will escape my memory. EVER. But still, regardless of how ample the proportions are of Ezio's arsenal of badassery, unfortunately the terribly irredeemable fact remains that HE IS ITALIAN.

I may just have a little prejudice against Italians, but you would too if you had to live in an inhospitable concrete French commune with nineteen of them for a month. Oh Jesus. I am so lame. I'm going to go set up my cardboard cutouts now.