4. Side Missions
Side mission are a good way to make a world feel bigger by forcing the player to explore, the problem I have with Assassins Creeds side mission (and mostly all side missions) is the lack of variety. I know it is hard to think of missions other than assassinate X, Y and Z, but if its that hard to create these mission dont have so many. I would have no problem playing through ten side mission rather than twenty because sods law is out of that twenty, there is going to be some overlap. The problem is developers understandably want their games to have some longevity rather than fan speeding through it and throwing it away. This too is the same for the fans because no-one wants to spend forty pounds on something that can be completed in six hours, but there has to be a happy medium where we can have some fat on the bones and not become obese. Cut down the number of side mission and you could put more effort into each one which will make the game all the better and if you are so desperate to create side missions, release them as DLC so the hard-core fans who dont mind repetition can be content.