The stories found in the Assassin’s Creed franchise are all unique in their own ways. Each once truly helps define the personality of the protagonist and helps players get a better understanding of what motivates them. While most stories are standalone, with the exception of The Ezio Trilogy, there are always common themes or parallels that can be found between them. Assassin’s Creed 2’s Ezio Auditore da Firenze and Assassin’s Creed Unity’s Arno Dorian have quite a bit in common, though they also differ in their own ways too.
Both men were high-ranking Assassins, making it all the way to the title of Master Assassin in their respective Brotherhoods. However, each man also had a very different rise to their title. An unfortunate connective thread between Ezio and Arno also lies in the heartbreak they endured, having lost important people throughout the entirety of their lives. Heartbreak and sacrifice tend to be recurring themes among all Assassin’s Creed protagonists.
So far, Ezio is the only character in the Assassin’s Creed franchise to have more than one game. He was originally introduced in Assassin’s Creed 2, but players also play as him in Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood and Assassin’s Creed: Revelations. Each game builds upon his story and helps players connect with him more, from exploring Italy to branching out to Constantinople and Masyaf.
As a budding teenager, Ezio loses his brothers and father to the Templar Order, never knowing that his father was secretly an Assassin. It’s not until much later in Assassin’s Creed 2 that he learns his quest for revenge is a much larger battle of the Assassins versus the Templars. He chooses to join the Brotherhood, dedicating his life to working in the shadows to serve the light. Eventually, he asks his sister Claudia to join as well after seeing how strong and capable she is on her own.
Ezio experiences heartbreak much like any other Assassin’s Creed protagonist, losing family members he was close with as well as one of his love interests. Players meet Cristina Vespucci in Assassin’s Creed 2, but unfortunately learn of her death in Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood. In Revelations, Ezio mentions her in a letter to Claudia, saying her death caused something within him to wither. It wasn’t until meeting Sofia Sartor that he felt any sort of romantic connection like he had with Cristina.
Arno Dorian is the sole protagonist of Assassin’s Creed Unity and has a similarly sad story to Ezio’s. Arno loses his father at a young age just like the Italian Assassin, though Arno was considerably younger than Ezio at the time of his father’s death. Without knowing it, Arno was taken in and raised by the Templar Grand Master, Francois de la Serre, and his family. Arno was already close with de la Serre’s daughter, Elise, and their bond only grew as years passed.
Despite growing up in the same household as her for much of his life, Arno and Elise still developed romantic feelings towards each other. Their relationship is eventually strained, especially because Elise blames Arno for the death of her father. It’s not until many years later, after Arno has joined the Assassins and Elise has secured her place in the Templars, that they rekindle their friendship and love. Much like Ezio, Arno doesn’t get to stay with his first love for as long as he’d like.
In a final battle against Francois-Thomas Germain, Elise is knocked back into a stone column by a blast from the Sword of Eden, killing her on impact. Arno is devastated by this loss, falling into a deep depression and suffering from alcohol abuse. He almost leaves France entirely, but eventually decides to stay and stop Napoleon’s takeover plot. Though it’s not explored in Unity, Arno does eventually father a child, but the circumstances under which this happens remain unclear.
Ezio and Arno were both Master Assassins, but got there under very different circumstances. Ezio dedicated himself to the Creed at a young age, but eventually wondered if he made the right decision. Part of his journey in Revelations is affirming to himself that he hadn’t made a mistake joining the Assassins. Eventually he resigns as Master Assassin and leaves with Sofia Sartor to start a family and a winery.
Arno faces a similar crisis of faith in the Brotherhood, though it comes off the heels of the death of Elise. His mourning sent him into a depressive, alcoholic spiral that in turn almost made him leave France. Instead, he decided to stay and even rejoined the Assassins later down the line. This decision is never fully explained, though, as it’s hard to track how someone who was kicked out of the Creed was still welcomed back and made it to the Master Assassin status.
In the grand scheme of things, it seems Ezio had a much more standard rise in the Assassin ranks than Arno did. Ezio started young and worked his way up, though he was probably more fast-tracked than other Assassins in the Creed. Arno joined around a similar age to Ezio but had a much rockier path in the Creed. Ezio was never kicked out of the Brotherhood, but Arno was and had to earn his place again.
Arno never seemed to question his place the way Ezio did, either. As Ezio grew older, he started questioning whether or not he’d done the right thing. Meanwhile Arno questioned the Assassin Order from the start, remaining headstrong and stubborn like Altair Ibn-La’Ahad. Though Revelations depicts a time where Ezio is questioning his choices, it doesn’t seem like he ever doubted what the Assassins stood for. It took Arno a good bit of time to understand what it meant to be an Assassin, but his dedication paid off in the end.
Despite their existence in different times, Ezio and Arno have a bit more in common than initially meets the eye. They’ve also got their own philosophies on what it means to be an Assassin, but each earned their rank as Master Assassin in the end.
Assassin’s Creed Unity is available now for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.
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