Josh

I will legit be ignoring this rule, and bringing my own drinks into any restaurant that tries to actually strictly impose it.

Anyway this newly imposed 100% sugary drinks tax is elitist rubbish that only penalises poor people, and ignores the considerably large number of people who avoid aspartame sweetener for health reasons - myself included.

This government is more Tory than some of the dismal Tory ones we had.

Me getting dragged out of Nandos for having two Coca-Cola's

selfie

kerkyra and chill 🇬🇷

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Black Flag showing Edward Kenway on a Caribbean beach with the Jackdaw ship in the background

1st - Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

This is how you revitalise a series, and grow your story in interesting fashion. Getting to look from the outside in at the assassins doesn't make this any less an AC story, and Edward Kenway's exploits of the beautiful Caribbean suit the series brilliantly.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Origins showing Bayek walking through ancient Egypt

2nd - Assassin's Creed VII: Origins

Ancient Egypt makes for the most diverse, interesting, and explorable RPG world in AC. Bayek is a brilliant lead, and his and Aya's story serves as a beautiful motivation for every other story in this series. If only we'd had another game with either of them.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Odyssey showing Kassandra against the backdrop of ancient Greece

3rd - Assassin's Creed VII: Odyssey

Ancient Greece is incredibly vast and fun to explore, and the story engaging. It could just have used some refining, and a less tenuous link to all things Assassin's Creed. But when you're set centuries before 'Origins', you've written yourself into a corner.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Brotherhood showing Ezio in Rome.

4th - Assassin's Creed Brotherhood

Renaissance Rome and the Borgias. This is in many ways the nostalgic AC formula many long for every time a new one releases. It's a remarkably solid game with better story and controls than it's predecessor - benefiting from not having to introduce someone new.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Syndicate showing Jacob and Evie Frye within Big Ben clock tower

5th - Assassin's Creed VI: Syndicate

Whilst a darker grittier London game might have been nicer, this is still a fun subversive romp of a game that's brilliantly designed. The story needed a lot more work though, as by the end it all just feels a little bit stale, considering the potential here.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed II showing Ezio against a backdrop of blurry NPC's

6th - Assassin's Creed II

A game that's both brilliant and also overrated. Nostalgia blinds many to the dated controls of this one, which has some patchy mission design, and a story that loses momentum for long stretches. But exploring Renaissance Italy won't ever not be fun.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Shadows, showing Naoe and Yasuke atop a fiery Japanese temple

7th - Assassin's Creed XI: Shadows

The most beautiful entry, but the story meanders too much to really connect, and the game breaks it's immersive Japanese setting with a poorly designed dual-protagonist setup. Both are compelling, but there needed to be a better approach to incorporating them.

A promotional shot of Assassin's Creed Valhalla depicting protagonist Eivor stood against the Northern Lights

8th - Assassin's Creed IX: Valhalla

Eivor is a brilliant lead of some revised vikings, her brother is annoying as hell, and England is a fun map to traverse but more repetitive than earlier RPG maps, and made to suffer the most bloated, endless game design ever. Completing this one is a real grind.

A promotional shot for Assassin's Creed III, showing Connor running between explosions on an American battlefield.

9th - Assassin's Creed III

A fresh but flawed game that buckles under the pressure to make a relatively dull stretch of American history both interactive and exciting. It isn't bold enough to lean more into the Native American story it teases, whilst the protagonist and modern segments are tedious.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Rogue

10th - Assassin's Creed Rogue

A fresh take, this entry has all the makings of greatness - a unique map, refined Black Flag mechanics, and a compelling story about flawed heroes.

But its DLC origins make it an awkward mix of the sprawling epic it wants to be, and the bonus material it feels like.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Revelations showing Ezio against a Constantinople backdrop and Altair against a Holy Land backdrop

11th - Assassin's Creed Revelations

Ottoman Constantinople is charming, and the story at heart is a brilliant tale about old men who thrived beyond their expected years. But it's a very unfocused narrative, the modern sections are tedious, and the map is less fun to navigate than it is to look at.

A promotional image for Assassin's Creed Mirage with Basim stood in front of Old Baghdad

12th - Assassin's Creed X: Mirage

The 'back to basics' game, but with a dull story and clunky controls. Which is all a shame as the characters are solid, and the recreation of old Baghdad is stunningly beautiful - right down to the Islamic call to prayer being faithfully recreated every game day.

A promotional image of Arlo in Assassin's Creed Unity, stood in front of the French flag and Notre Dame Cathedral

13th - Assassin's Creed V: Unity

Paris is stunning and the story and world here is one of the most beautifully realised in any game ever made. It's sadly let down by countless bugs, English-accent French characters (Napoleon just sounds wrong), and not even having a New Game option on the menu.

A promotional image of Altair in Assassin's Creed, with blurry NPC's wondering around the image

14th - Assassin's Creed

A bit unfair perhaps, though the original was flawed from release. A beautiful and well-rendered Holy Land and fun story idea can't rescue a game with repetitive gameplay, uninspired voice acting, a bland protagonist, and restricting and unrefined controls.

A collage depicting many of the protagonists of Assassin's Creed in diagonal images

My ranking of the mainline Assassin's Creed entries 🎮

Agreed, and preferably one where our data is ours like with Bluesky - or at least not in American hands. Apart from being useless, these companies are also corrupt and can't be trusted with our data. Every time they glitch out like this (all the time) is more reason to end their monopoly.

The new 'Maps' feature rolled out a few days ago in Europe and I bet that's to blame.

How embarrassing for Meta to want a feature that handles yet more user personal data, and to fumble so bad it not only doesn't work properly, but kills the functionality of your entire app for days.

🇺🇸

Kind of embarrassing for Meta that one of their apps can't deliver it's primary function for two whole days and counting.

What's the point in these American corps monopolising the whole social media photography market if you're then just going to be mediocre and useless?

Maria was my first ever cassette tape 😅

Instagram glitch showing no posts having been made and a prompt to "create your first post"

Meta failing the 'make Instagram not shite' challenge yet again.

I found Keeping Up Appearances one day as a teenager on Boxing Day. I had my mum buy me the whole boxset on DVD the following Christmas, I loved it.

I also loved Patricia doing a video a few years ago where she hoped Sheridan was still out there happy with his boyfriend.

She was a gem.

Jane Goodall

Patricia Routledge

Such immensely different people, yet both amazing in their respective worlds. Jane Goodall sits beside Attenborough as one of my biggest inspirations. Patricia Routledge was the kind of brilliant actress who lightens the mood after any sort of bad news.

Genuinely sad about the loss of them both.

Jane Goodall and Patricia Routledge in the same week. My god this is depressing.

A photo showing a view of Athens, including it's Agora, taken at dusk from the Acropolis Hill

A photo on a rocky hilltop with a spear-wielding Spartan looking down into Athens

Hills of the Acropolis 🇬🇷

Street art in Athens

The Academy of Athens

Athens National Park

A guard beside the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Athens

Athens 🇬🇷

I'm not necessarily the person to tell people who to vote for. I'm very likely putting my money down on the Greens, which I've done locally before. Lib Dem is passable if it keeps Labour, Reform, or Tory out wherever you are... but it's a broadly bleak lineup