The cutscenes from Assassin's Creed were boring about 75% of the time and usually involved me running around in small circles to amuse myself while a character prattled on for 5 minutes.

Hopefully, they've improved.

Somebody's a Kojima fan... Wouldn't it be funny if the total cutscenes time is longer than the actual gameplay time?

Isn't player interaction the whole freaking point of a video game?

Hmmm.... Interesting, the cutscenes will be half of what the last game was.

Is that really necessary? No one played the first game for the cut scenes or the story. There definitely should be more playing than watching - watching should be less than 5% of cumulative playtime in a game like this. Even if you create a lousy, incomplete movie, cut it up and put a fun game in between the scenes, a game isn't a movie and a movie isn't a game.

I enjoyed the cut scenes in the first AC. But only because a lot of the time you had just enough freedom of movement to make Altair look like a right twat by spinning around and trying to dry hump people.

That coupled with my own commentary is about the only time my wife has been entertained whilst watching me play a game.

Three hours is nothing, babies. Half of MGS4 is cutscenes. But they're awesome cutscenes

If the story was good, I wouldn't mind. 3 hours is still long though, considering the game will probably only be 10 hours long.

How did they manage to pull that off without the "magic" of Blu Ray??

Calling people "uneducated fags" makes you sound intelligent and isn't offensive to anyone. It is a proper way to comment on something in a civil manner!

Yeah, don't you know you're an uneducated homosexual if you don't know everything there is to know about Assassin's Creed 2? Geez, guys. I mean, come on.

I beat MGS4 5 times, I think I can handle a measly 3 hours of cutscenes. I'm pretty sure MGS ranged between 4 and 5 hours of them. Hell, one alone lasted an hour and a half. As long as they are well done.

Yeah, what agentgray said. AC1 is impossible to replay because it's impossible to skip the cutscenes that come at the beginning of everything. Oh, you just want to run around stabbing people in Acre? Too bad, you have to sit and watch this cutscene for ten minutes, then run all the way to the horse, then ride the horse to the Kingdom, then skip to Acre, then make your way inside before you can have any real fun.

I remember the day when people would complain that a game had no story or very little in the way of cutscenes, and merely an ending that just said "You win" or "Congraturations" (misspell intended). Now everyone lets out a big groan whenever there's a cutscene over 2 minutes.

There's no pleasing anyone.

I know some people are going to disagree with me here, but I enjoyed the original Assassin's Creed primarily for the gameplay. Actually, I only enjoyed the original because of the gameplay.

I have a lifelong interest in the Crusades and happen to know a fair bit about the time-period in the region. I enjoyed wandering around the architectural reconstructions and, of course, carefully planning and executing missions. I did not enjoy the flimsy plot or the cut-scenes.

Now, maybe Assassin's Creed II will be a completely different game and I will be far more drawn to the core storyline. Either way, I hope they at least have enough sense to make the cut-scenes skippable.

On a side note, I am someone who very much enjoys strong storytelling and a well-written script. This is why I find myself skipping through almost all rendered cut-scenes ever created, since they have neither. In-game cut-scenes, on the other hand, tend to have a higher chance of remaining relevant and interesting (just my opinion).

Holy shit, that rivals MSG4!

@kingtobo
Sometimes you just have to let those hard to reach achievement points go my friend.