Assassin's Creed

[Bread]

Started Valhalla today. I have no doubts that this will probably take me the best part of all summer to finish (providing I don't drop it which I won't rule out) but I was a huge fan of Origins and enjoyed Odyssey too, so I'm looking forward to playing it despite it seemingly being considered as the worst of the RPG-adjacent trilogy.

[Solid Spartan]

Odyssey or bust. Would have preferred a more cohesive narrative without the dialogue tree stuff, but the setting won me over from the first announcement.

[Bread]

Started Valhalla today. I have no doubts that this will probably take me the best part of all summer to finish (providing I don't drop it which I won't rule out) but I was a huge fan of Origins and enjoyed Odyssey too, so I'm looking forward to playing it despite it seemingly being considered as the worst of the RPG-adjacent trilogy.

So my save file on this game now is 28 hours, and my god, this game is so incredibly dull. The story has not moved along at all, I'm literally spending all of my time creating alliances with random NPCs across every county in England, and whilst I'm sure there will be some sort of payoff, I'm finding it all so very boring. They've made vikings boring.

Also super not arsed about the side content in Asgard, nor the notion that these characters are descended from Norse gods. Norse mythology is dope, but I'm not sure what it's place is in a war between the Assassins and the Templars. God of War 2018/Ragnarok did it much better.

Will probably drop this at some point, because I'm not confident this is worth another 40 hours of my time.

[Dirty Duck]

Interesting that you’re a big fan of the other RPGesque ones. Is it mainly because their story is better? I own Origins but never started it. Kind of didn’t like the idea of them taking AC in that direction and I still had “classic” ones I was yet to play.

[Bread]

Interesting that you’re a big fan of the other RPGesque ones. Is it mainly because their story is better? I own Origins but never started it. Kind of didn’t like the idea of them taking AC in that direction and I still had “classic” ones I was yet to play.

I don't know whether the stories are necessarily "better" in regards to content, but they're certainly better paced and have more interesting characters that sort of gloss over some of the shortcomings. Might also be because of how much more interesting the maps were. Ancient Egypt/Greece were good fun to explore, whereas here it's 9th century England, so it's an enormous map full of muddy fields, cliffs and small hamlets with about a million bloody rivers to cross, so trekking across it is an absolute chore at the best of times.

[Jassassino]

Interesting that you’re a big fan of the other RPGesque ones. Is it mainly because their story is better? I own Origins but never started it. Kind of didn’t like the idea of them taking AC in that direction and I still had “classic” ones I was yet to play.

full of muddy fields, cliffs and small hamlets with about a million bloody rivers to cross

Alright alright, you can stop. I'm sold on it. 🥵🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

Of that trilogy, I've only played Origins and I didn't finish it. I really didn't vibe with how much of a grind everything felt, and to get any good gear it was just a nonstop slog of quests. The combat also felt really hard to adjust to with how much of a sponge some enemies suddenly were, but it was an absolutely beautiful game, probably one of the nicest, alongside SWBF(2015) on that generation. Do wanna polish that one off properly after Shadows.

[Suede]

I loved Odyssey, the most I had enjoyed AC since AC2. I was really looking forward to Valhalla, I love Vikings and all that, but the game was pretty boring so I didn't get too far into it.

[Bread]

Decided to call it quits after 28 hours and 34 minutes. If I was still an acne-faced teenager with all the time in the world and no responsibilities to entertain then I probably would've enjoyed it enough to see it through to completion but sadly I do not have the free time to finish this, even out of spite. Sorry Eivor, you were cool, but your game was bland.

[Silent Assassin]

Man, I REALLY wish I still cared about this series as I once did. I watched every single trailer a dozen times in anticipation. I dropped off after AC3, when BF was announced to be a pirate game. I already had some issues with the story of AC3 and I felt BF would just go farther away from that Templar-Assassin conflict I loved so much.

I stopped then but came back to the series when Origins was announced. Since the story was the major reason I abandoned the series, I figured Origins was an excellent shot to get me interested again. So leading up to it, I bought 4 and Unity. And while I enjoyed them, they just reminded me of why I stopped playing the series.

And then Origins, while a great game, just didn't feel right. And it's even the small things, like the hidden blade. It's such a tiny little thing. The blade was established in the lore as needing a finger sacrifice to work, because of the way it was designed. That cut finger was a symbol of an Assassin. The Origins comes along and claims that Bayek just used it wrong and the blade does not require sacrifice at all. Despite the lore establishing that it was Altair who fixed the blade centuries later so that it no longer required a sacrifice. Most people don't care but those little details like that really put me off of the lore even more.

That was the last AC game I played until 2 years ago when I tried Valhalla just to see where they took the series. Needless to say, I only played a little.

And really, It's such a shame they couldn't keep the quality up. Last year I replayed the Ezio Collection and the charm is still there. janky gameplay, sure, but the story and lore was still there.

[Jassassino]

Despite the lore establishing that it was Altair who fixed the blade centuries later so that it no longer required a sacrifice. Most people don't care but those little details like that really put me off of the lore even more.

Yeah I think this particularly being forgotten and/or purposefully discarded does a lot to illustrate how they've misunderstood, with later teams and their takes on Assassin's Creed, what some of the symbolism and imagery meant.

It feels like that ritual sacrifice of a finger was meant to demonstrate how the Assassins, despite having a doctrine which valued truth and freedom, were still cyclical and restricted within their very nature and because of their doctrine, representing a mirror to the Templars and their adherence to holy doctrine. The Assassin's adherence to their tradition could potentially manifest to be just as harmful, and we see that in the first game, culminating in the crazed betrayal and fall from grace of Al Mualim, and it's only when Revelations comes around that we realise Altair's modification and removal of that ritual sacrifice which we first learn about in ACII was essentially as a result of a deeper realisation and understanding of reality which comes about from his revolution and leadership of the Assassins.

I'm looking forward to getting around to playing Shadows - my partner bought me it for my birthday and I've thought it does look really fun, but honestly? Less so as an Assassin's Creed game, but another Edo Period Japanese epic.