Assassin's Creed II Review (Ghost)
Caveat emptor, buyer beware!
Let it be known that Ubisoft was going to REMOVE access to GAMES (not just DLC) that people had already paid for:
At one point, these games were also de-listed from the store, and no longer available for purchase. This was done after they went on sale during the Steam summer sale.
Now Ubisoft has backtracked (probably due to negative PR) and will only be "decommissioning online services" for these old titles.
https://www.ubisoft.com/en-us/help/gameplay/article/decommissioning-of-online-services-for-older-ubisoft-games-october-2022-update/000102396
Even though the online services have been shut down, they *still* want you to sign up for a "Ubisoft Connect" account, and log in to Ubisoft's servers. I tried launching the game with "-playoffline", which worked for Brotherhood, but unfortunately it didn't help.
Due to Ubisoft and their terrible practices, I cannot recommend this game or any other Ubisoft title, nor will I purchase future Ubisoft products.
Ubisoft, if you want to shut down online services for old games, fine, but remove your crappy DRM as well. I'm not going to make a new account to play a game I purchased 10 years ago, especially when I already made a Uplay (more like "U-Don't-Play" am I right?) account back then. Between this fiasco, and that Ubisoft dev trying to criticize Elden Ring (which is better than anything Ubisoft ever put out) I am done with Ubisoft.
Requiescat in pace.
This should serve as a reminder to us. We don't actually own these games, we are merely granted a "license" to use them under certain terms and conditions. By installing and playing these games we automatically accept their privacy policies, terms, and EULAs.
PS: What I said about proprietary games and not really owning them also applies to your operating system if you use Windows or Mac. I highly recommend using Linux because it's free and open source, doesn't include spyware, adware, or make you agree to unethical terms.