Its made by former Ubisoft paris and Montreal people who left Ubisoft and made their own studio. Ubisoft is like we cant fund this stuff. Just make AC rest of your life.

Completed act 1 , that ending seriously hard to believe this is created by a new team, the cutscenes, the voice acting, the story, atmosphere - everything is top notch !

Cool. I am 3 hours into the game till now. Excellent combat. Once you get a hang of dodging and parrying, pretty easy fights till now.

Yes some side stuff got story tied to them but none of the side stuff affects main story. Talk to all your party members multiple times after every big story mission's to increase your relationship with them. Thid will unlock side quests for every character. Go back to camp regularly and exhaust every dialogue options at bonfire and when talking to characters.

Is there any story beats around the side stuff?