I didn't finish 3 but it didn't strike me as dramatically different from the others?

And counterpoint: being a pirate is funny. The climbing is worse but it also hadn't ever been good to that point; it was kind of okay in AC1 and it declined in quality over the next few games as it moved toward a "just hold right trigger to climb" philosophy. I understand that climbing needed to change from the Prince of Persia method because that kind of system was designed for linear levels and AC needed open worlds, but they started badly and fucked it up worse lol.

The boats are kind of grindy but I liked them anyway, it was way more interesting than the mandatory side mission bs in the first couple AC games or having to run/horseride across the world to get to it. AC4 was goofy but I was in full support of AC not being its usual dogshit self, tbh.