The Last Maharaja DLC is the last announced add-on content for Assassin’s Creed Syndicate. It includes ten side missions that show up on your map once you complete memory sequence three in the main story. It involves Maharaja Duleep Singh, who is the friend that Henry Green speaks to throughout the main storyline. Henry believes that Singh is being targeted by the templars and the British India Company (BIC). They are out to kill him and, of course, the Assassins must stop the attempt. It’s an interesting DLC pack due to how it is integrated into the main game and storyline, but isn’t too fascinating overall.
Assassin’s Creed can sometimes be its own worst enemy with side missions and DLC. You either get a large, in-depth story like the Jack the Ripper DLC or pointless mini-missions with no real value. The Last Maharaja pack takes the middle ground and provides ten missions, each with substance, without an overarching story. These missions are located on your standard map; they are not available through a separate menu like the Jack the Ripper DLC. Although the missions themselves are not too detailed, they all have multiple locations and stipulations to keep you interested. With no Assassin’s Creed game coming this year and the major Jack the Ripper DLC already released, it would have been easy for Ubisoft to mail it in with a halfhearted final DLC. Fortunately, that didn’t happen and The Last Maharaja pack blends all areas of Assassin’s Creed together quite nicely.
The Jack the Ripper DLC was one of the best DLCs I’ve played to date as it encompassed many things. The Last Maharaja pack blends together active combat, stealth combat, fights on trains and boats, carriage getaway fights, and everything which made the main game so interesting. Each mission is fun to play and brings a different take to something you’re used to with the franchise. Although each mission is entertaining and enjoyable, most do come off a little bland. I appreciate the missions containing multiple different approaches, but it was nothing new to the franchise. As a result, the missions were fun, but not worth remembering. The Last Maharaja packs falls more along the lines of the “old reliable” rather than the “sexy newcomer”.
Just as Jack the Ripper added something new with impaling and fear bombs, The Last Maharaja does the same with new investigation aspects of missions. A few missions task you with gathering clues and interrogating possible suspects. Clues are gathered normally by following your eagle vision. The game also tells you how many clues you need, so you’ll never end up lost in a mission trying to find that last, illusive clue. Once you have everything you need, you can interrogate the suspect you believe responsible. It’s an interesting addition and feels less like end game “fluff” as some other DLC can be. Even with this new aspect of the game, however, The Last Maharaja still ended up feeling like more of the same old thing for me.
It will only take about three hours to play through all ten missions, and I recommend the pack if you’re a big Assassin’s Creed fan. I suggest playing them all at once. You have the ability to play these missions once you complete main memory sequence three, but it’s best to wait until you finish the main story. The core of the Assassin’s Creed franchise is the storyline of the missions. Not only do they evolve as you play, but they also provide back story to the characters involved. As a result, switching back and forth takes you out of the groove so to speak, causing missions to lose part of their luster. The manner in which the main story is organized allows you to earn all your upgrades necessary without any side missions. Therefore, it’s best to wait to play The Last Maharaja pack until you complete the main story so you can fully immerse yourself in its experience. After all, if you switch back and forth from Darwin to Alexander Graham Bell to Queen Victoria to Karl Marx and back again, you’ll get confused and end up simply going through the motions. Although an adventure game, Assassin’s Creed draws its main focus from the lore of history, and is something that can only be fully appreciated all at once.
Summary
The Last Maharaja pack provides a worthwhile experience for fans of the franchise, but I would have liked to see a bit more creativity added to the overall experience. At a price of $6.99, it won’t punish your wallet but also isn’t anything to write home about. As noted above, it ends up being more of “old reliable,” which is fine. After all, “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it,” right? On the other hand, it would have been nice to see more detail added to the missions’ backstory in order to enhance the overall experience. The Last Maharaja DLC pack won’t blow you away, but is still worth a purchase at a price of $6.99. It’s available now as part of the Assassin’s Creed Syndicate season pass or as an individual purchase.
Mike is a games journalist, host of 1080Players Gaming Radio. They contributed 62 articles to ICXM between 2015–2016, focused on opinion pieces, game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news: operates 1080Players Gaming Radio on the Boost Radio Network; ICXM published cross-content from his outlet.