Assassin's Creed Valhalla (2020)

My long Viking journey has come to an end since I started it on the prompt of my girlfriend (who is fascinated with historical cultures). I must give it the devs for accomplishing another world that has its richness in world building (IMO) along with maintaining standards in writing. The action RPG trend has been carried on since Origins and Odyssey, is less than half of what Assassin's Creed has been known for. Still, the gameplay style is up for variety between melee, ranged and stealth, thanks to the skill tree system that allows you to adapt your preferred playstyle.

For what it's worth of the Viking saga part, I took for what the AC franchise offers, merely in the sensationalized setup to make the adventure extra interesting, if yet ridiculous at times. While I am bearing with some pretentious dialogues and characters, the stories in the mainline and on the side are mostly engaging. Even many side quests gives a plentiful treat of cultural easter eggs.

Yet, after over 160 hours of playtime, Valhalla is also riddled with collectibles that make little sense other than giving minor challenges with rewards that are of little to no significance (curses and chasing tattoo designs barely mean anything to me). Even money is hardly a thing to worry about, even when finding countless junks that I haven't bothered to sell on a regular basis.

If Valhalla had its fluff of fat trimmed to save at least half the hours I spent on it, it would have earned at least 4 stars. Still enjoyable for the action and the stories, overall.

All the sieging and pillaging is not what I would consider an AC "thing". I mostly did not like this.

My problem is this is a great outside-the-animus story (probably the best). But it is a minuscule part hidden(lol) in a fucking 100 action RPG!

It is a strong narrative so diluted in CONTENT that to finish this sentence as a tea metaphor, by the end you are just drinking murky room temp water. Just wrung of any and all flavour potential!

There is such a thing as too much game. Also, because I did not (pay to) play any DLC it feels like I am missing out on any closure. I just ended up looking up YouTube videos to fill all the monetised gaps in an ending.

It took a long time for me to come to this review. Ten days, to be exact. I had to mull over what I wanted to say. I think I'm not really going to be able to say everything I want, or rather, I don't want to say everything I am able. So let me try to paint with broad strokes and stick to my "a few paragraphs at most" limit I've imposed on myself as best I can.

I wavered between two stars ("Didn't like it") and three stars ("It's ok"). I rounded up to three becuse I can't give a half star. And you know, it's even weird to say that. There were times I absolutely loathed this game, and other times I liked it. It feels so weird to feel so all over the place with a game. But then, with AC: Valhalla, that makes sense. The game is too damn much. It is at least three games in one, four if you include all of the DLC, not just in terms of its length, but in terms of what it's delivering on.

And what, anyway, does that series mean anymore? There seems to be a new story that was initiated with the coming of Origins, but it's kind of boring, or at least, not quite as unique and cutting-edge as the story of AC 1 - 3 was. It wants to be a realistic depiction of England (and Norway?) in the tenth century, but also have you visit the nine realms from Norse mythology. The characters are plentiful, but bland and intechangable; the game lacks the primary anchor characters of the early games (I'll never forget Leonardo from AC2). And I like this time period and location.

I spent over one hundred hours with this game, collecting all of the treasure and doing all the "mysteries" (sort of one-note sidequests, most of the time), and without touching the DLC I'm apparently sitting at 45% trophies. That could be just a sign of how ridiculous the trophy system is as anything other than an attempt to sell more games, but I do think it's kind of curious just how much time it took me to affect so little and to see only a portion of this game, and how it overstayed its welcome.

I guess I want to end this by saying that this game, weirdly detailed and beautiful and boring as it was, left me with one thought that continued to badger me: I really don't want to play any massively single-player AAA titles or niche indie games, which seems to be your two options in 2022. What I wouldn't give for the B-tier, 35-40 hour games that populated the PS1 & PS2 era. More focused, more respectful, and more memorable.

Vikings, am I right?? Yeah, no. This one was a bust for me. And I LOVE the Assassin's Creed games. But it just feels like we're further and further away from the original stuff that we fell in love with with the last few.

Origins was decent, and Odyssey was okay also, but I just could not get into this one for whatever reason.

I hope the next one is better, and maybe we can get back to feeling like an actual Assassin's Creed game.

I've been hooked on the AC games since the beginning, so I can't say honestly that I'd rate it as highly if it weren't for a certain nostalgia bias. But I've come to expect beautiful historical fiction environments to explore, and AC Valhalla didn't disappoint. The world is MASSIVE, with the opportunities to discover becoming almost excessive. The biggest problem, really, is that the protagonist power level outstrips the progressive difficulty of enemies, such that by the time you've reached pretty much peak power you've still got half or more of the game to go (if you are considering all of the side content and DLC episodes) but even with the difficulty settings on maximum, even the toughest enemy encounters are so laughably trivial to be rendered boring. Enjoying the game at that point relies entirely on interesting traversal challenges/puzzles and a compelling narrative with entertaining dialogue. Fortunately it delivers the latter very well, because the former, while interesting at points, aren't quite fulfilling enough to keep the player engaged on their own.

I wasn't sure about Eivor as a protagonist at first, though her backstory was interesting enough. But she's the kind of character one grows to love and feel for, because one gets to experience their real growth as a person. The kind of character growth that says something important about the world writ large, exactly the kind of thing I look for in any game.

As usual, the over-arcing metastory (outside the animus) is a steaming pile of hot trash. It has been since the end of the Desmond arc, so while I'm not surprised by this, I still find myself disappointed.

Estas son notas que iba tomando del juego a medida que jugaba. Assassins creed es una saga muy importante para mi, de ahí la parrafada. Pido perdón.

15/4/2021

• Bueno, a ver. Ayer me compré Valhalla para la One X y, tras haber jugado ya más de 6 horas y llegar a Inglaterra (donde transcurre el juego realmente), ya tengo un par de cosas que decir. Iré escribiendo notas a tiempo real mientras lo voy jugando a modo de ejercicio para entrenar la mecanografía y un poco de la escritura en general. Lo primero que quiero decir que este juego no me lo iba a comprar, o al menos no tan rápido. La experiencia que tuve con los últimos juegos de la saga ha sido un poco mixta. Con Origins acepté que la saga que una vez ame con locura había muerto y se había convertido en una parodia de sí misma. Habiendo sabido esto miré Origins como lo que realmente es; un juego precioso ambientado en un mundo prácticamente inexplorado por los videojuegos triple AAA como lo es el Egipto antiguo. Un juego que tiene más similitudes con sus contemporáneos como (The Witcher 3, Horizon, Dark Souls, etc.) que con la saga que supuestamente da origen. Lo disfruté mucho (de hecho lo platiné hace unas semanas) a pesar de sus cambios, que no son pocos. Con Odyssey... no pude. Me superó. Al principio me estaba gustando. La historia parecía interesante, el mundo era precioso, la musica una pasada, pero, mientras más jugaba más olor a mierda sentía al rededor del juego. Recuerdo que lo primero que me chocó fue el combate. Origins no tenía un sistema de combate perfecto, pero al menos trataba de emular un poco el combate de Dark Souls (la importancia del posicionamiento, etc.) y quedó algo muy divertido. Sin embargo, Odyssey de repente es un hack and slash con poderes mágicos… Bueno… que me voy de madre. El punto es que Origins lo acepte porque, dentro de los cambios que hace, mantiene cierto respecto a la saga. Odyssey se folla la saga y saca un juego que lo mismo se pudo haber llamado Assassin’s Creed que -inserte juego de móvil RPG genérico-. Ahora empecemos con Valhalla. Como dije al inicio, este juego no pensaba comprarlo tan pronto por culpa del sabor a mierda que me dejó Odyssey. Lo compré básicamente por el mono que tenía de un Assassin’s. Me acababa de pasar el primero (otra vez) y tenía que seguir con otro. Además había escuchado que este sí que trae cambios sustanciales y no superficiales y que hace el intento de acercarse a la esencia de la saga a la que pertenece. Habiendo jugado casi 8 horas… me está gustando bastante. Sé que es pronto para emitir un juicio (ya que estos juegos son de más de 50 horas) pero me gustaría ir recalcando varios cambios (para bien) que he visto. Aquí comienza la lista de notas:

• Lo primero que fijé que este juego sigue el camino que empezó AC Origins. (gracias al señor)

• La exploración cambió radicalmente. El águila (aquí es un cuervo) ya no es el dron del Watchdogs. No te revela todo cuando pulsas su botón. Ahora más bien funciona como un segundo personaje jugable. Con ella solamente puedes ver el mundo desde las alturas sin revelar demasiado. El juego por fin da opción de dejar el HUB totalmente libre de iconos de mierda y ayuda un montón a la inmersión. La vista águila por fin vuelve a ser la vista de águila y no dejaba esa función al dron (águila) de los juegos anteriores.

19/4/2021

• Llevo ya unas veinte y pocas horas. Se puede decir que he completado el primer arco de la historia del juego en Inglaterra. Por ahora tengo más cosas buenas que malas para decir (de hecho, diría que solo tengo una cosa que realmente me molesta, pero no viene de este juego sino desde el anterior) Let’s begins:

• La exploración parece que no, pero ha pegado un cambio radical en esta entrega. Siguiendo los pasos de Zelda Breath of the Wild y de Red Dead Redemption, el mundo está diseñado para explotar la curiosidad del jugador. En las entregas anteriores (véase Odyssey y Origins); el mapa estaba lleno de tareas muy específicas entre sí, con una única resolución y con unas recompensa bastante pobre. Ejemplos podrían ser los cuarteles de enemigos tanto en Origins como en Odyssey donde la mayoría de las veces era repetir el mismo patrón (entrar y matar a todo dios, ya que el sigilo estaba bastante desaprovechado). Los “tesoros” marítimos y terrestres del Origins que, cuando más, daban era un arma clónica al resto que ya tenías. En Valhalla parece que se dieron cuenta de que esto, más que ayudar, a la larga hacía que el juego se volviese repetitivo, predecible y aburrido. Ojo; tampoco es que no hallan este tipo de misiones en Valhalla. Los asaltos a cuarteles enemigos (aquí serían los asaltos a monasterios) siguen estando presente. La diferencia es que mientras en los juegos anteriores estos eran aburridos, en Valhalla no solo tienen una coherencia narrativa, que la tiene, sino que son más entretenidos. La recompensa de estos asaltos también tiene mucha más importancia. En este juego, al introducir un campamento que hay que ir a hacer crecer con materias primas y otros objetos; mataron dos pájaros de un tiro y dieron como recompensa de estos asaltos dichos materiales; volviéndolos divertidos y hasta necesarios (al menos hasta que el campamento llegue al máximo nivel). Y esto es solo uno de los cambios de los que me he percatado. El águila (aquí un cuervo) pasó de ser un dron que jodía toda la magia de explorar terreno desconocido en las dos entregas anteriores, a ser un segundo personaje que ayuda a visualizar el terreno desde la altura y así movidos por la curiosidad (y no por un icono) ir a donde nos apetezca. Que el juego sea 100% jugable sin interfaz es un puntazo. El año pasado me pasé la saga entera e intenté jugar los juegos antiguos sin interfaz. Obviamente no lo conseguí. En los 5 primeros juegos de la saga(AC 1, 2, Brotherhood, Revelations y 3) los mundos abiertos aún estaban dando sus primeros pasos en la industria, por lo que el buen diseño visual para ir guiando al jugador de manera inconsciente por el escenario (como lo haría en 2017 Zelda BoTW) aún no hacia su aparición, así que era imposible jugar sin el minimapa a los primeros juegos.

22/4/2021

• Narrativamente parece que Ubisoft quiso despegarse de los Asesinos en esta entrega. Parece que ya se dieron cuenta de que, en un juego que demanda más de 100 horas, que le da mucha libertad al jugador y que donde es imposible crear una narrativa progresivamente, los intentos por hacer volver la gloria de los juegos antiguos se ha desvanecido. Es imposible que un juego donde tienes tanta libertad de acción, te sientas como un asesino perteneciente a un credo tan sumiso. No digo esto por algo malo, ni mucho menos. Agradezco mucho más que los desarrolladores quisieran cortar lazos e intentar crear algo nuevo sin dejar de lado las viejas costumbres mostrar respeto por las tradiciones, que verlos intentar emular glorias pasas (que es lo que están haciendo con la saga desde Unity). El juego se ambienta en los saqueos a Inglaterra por los daneses en el siglo IX y se centra en eso. Los saqueos son divertidos, los combates son brutales y permite la personalización de diferentes para perfiles de armas (arma a dos manos, arma corta y escudo, arma en cada mano, etc), hay un asentamiento que mejorar, hay una tripulación que mantener y hay territorios con los que aliarse y otros que conquistar, no hay batallas navales metidas porque sí (ehh Odyssey).

• Siguiendo con el punto anterior. Me gustaría decir algo al respecto de como introduce este juego la Orden tanto de Asesinos y Templarios. Me parece brutal. Empezamos el juego con una de las mejores intros que recuerdo en la saga; un pequeño trozo de Gameplay en el que caminamos con Eivor hasta nuestro padre, atravesando una sala con pequeños scripts y conversaciones para ambientar la escena. Todo esto sin interfaces ni mierdas, luego salta a una cinemática que dura bastante y grabada en plano seguimiento a través de Eivor mientras matan a sus padres y a la mayoría de gente de su clan. Esta escena es brutalísima. Me recordó un poco a la escena de “La Batalla de los Bastardos” en Juego de Tronos porque hay una parte en la que aparece un caballo de manera imponente y porque al personaje que está siguiendo la cámara está absorto en un caos total a su alrededor. Luego de ver morir a sus padres, Eivor logra escapar a duras penas para después caer por un barranco y ser atacada por unos lobos. De una forma muy rara logra matarlos (ahora caigo que es por eso le dicen La matalobos) y tenemos una elipsis espacio temporal en donde nos movemos a 17 años después. Con una Eivor mayor y buscando venganza por la catástrofe ocurrida con su pueblo da comienzo nuestra aventura. Hasta este momento no hay alguna mención hacia las tradiciones de la saga más allá de las mecánicas; está la visión de águila (aquí es llamada visión de Odín) y tenemos las atalayas pero sin su salto de fe, ya que lo introducirán de una forma muy inteligente posteriormente, además, tendría 0 sentido y sería un gran fallo de narrativa que Eivor pudiera realizar un salto de fe sin siquiera sabe que es eso (ehh Edward). No es hasta más adelante en el juego cuando se introducen los conceptos principales del credo con los personajes Basim e Hytham representando a los asesinos de la forma más ortodoxa posible. Con estos personajes se introducen al juego los elementos de la saga a nivel mecánico (con la hoja oculta y posteriormente el salto de fe) y narrativo, ya que hasta ahora la historia iba sobre la venganza de Eivor por lo que le hicieron a su clan. Uno pensaría que a partir de aquí la historia iría de como Eivor conoce al credo y va aprendiendo las costumbres a través de las enseñanzas de Basim o Hytham y como va evolucionando su personaje a raíz de esto.(siendo un claro paralelismo con AC 2)... pero no. Estos juegos ya tienen una base sobre la que trabajar en sus cortos 2 años de desarrollo así que es imposible que se centren en contar una historia con personajes memorables cuando el juego dura más que los 5 primeros juegos de la saga juntos. Al final esto quedó en un quiero y ni puedo, al menos así me lo pareció a mí. Demostraron que son capaces de presentar las motivaciones del protagonista de una forma memorable y demostraron que son capaces de traer conceptos clásicos y mezclarlo con su filosofía de diseño actual. La pena es que al final se van por lo seguro y se vuelve un AC Odyssey / Origins pero en Inglaterra. Llevo ya unas 30 horas de juego y el conflicto de asesinos y templarios que tanto prometía al inicio fue reducido a una lista de ramdoms que hay que matar porque sí(al igual que Odyssey, ya que al menos en Origins tenía sentido por la venganza de Bayeck), arrastrando de esa forma todo el misticismo que caracterizaba a la orden de los templarios en los primeros juegos. Al menos en la exploración y en el contenido secundario sí que hicieron verdaderos cambio para bien (en mi opinión). Incentibando la exploracion y la narrativa emergente con diferentes eventos por el mundo que, a pesar de no estar al nivel de los de Red Dead Redemption 2, le dan vida al juego y sin duda son mejores que todas las misiones secundarias de Origins y Odyssey. Así que eso, lo que le faltó en narrativa a mí me lo está dando en gameplay (al menos por ahora). Me lo estoy pasando realmente bien.

• Bueno... La longitud del juego ya está pasando factura. Llevo unas 50 horas y mentiría si no dijera que no me lo he pasado de puta madre, pero, ya me empieza a dar pereza tanto la historia, como las mecánicas. La progresión se ha frenado. El árbol de habilidades me parece un chiste así que lo tengo en modo automático. Fue lo mismo que me pasó con Odyssey. No creo que deje este a medias pq al menos la exploración me sigue pareciendo disfrutable pero esto es ya un problema de la saga. No es necesario que el jueguo dure 800 horas. Si la historia principal hubiera sido las 50 horas que ya llevo jugada, me hubiera parecido un putísimo juegazo, pero con solo imaginarme que aún me falta la mitad de la campaña principal, se me quitan las ganas de seguir jugando.

• Con 70 horas de juego, un cabreo de la ostia y mucha desilusión; mis andaduras por este juego y esta saga se han terminado. Muy diferente tiene que ser el próximo juego para que me vuelva a ilusionar otra vez con la que, antaño era mi saga favorita de la historia. Creo realmente que el principal problema de esta IP actualmente es Ubisoft queriendo mercantilizar al máximo una experiencia para UN JUGADOR. Alargando como si fuera un chicle un juego para tener a los jugadores entretenidos hasta la próxima entrega recién salida de la fábrica de montaje. Es una pena que una saga tan vanguardista en su día se halla convertido en un chiste y en una burda copia de sus contemporáneos. Es una pena que una saga que antes buscaba emocionar al jugador con las historias de redención de Altair o de venganza con Ezio, se conforme solo con contentar a la mayoría de “fans” (nuevos y viejos) posibles, quedando un juego sin sustancia, alargado porque sí, sin personalidad propia que pasará desapercibido al año de haber salido a la venta. Con pesar en mi corazón le digo adiós a esta saga. Requiescat in Pace.

Viking history was never something I really got into. I know the basics, but not much else. I do enjoy the Nordic aesthetic though that shows up in Skyrim or Skelliege, or the such, so I was willing to give Valhalla a try and experience the actual Viking Era.

I realize a 10+ year old series needs to innovate gameplay wise or risk being stale, and there are some changes I don’t mind, but overall I’m not a fan of the direction Assassin’s Creed is heading. The combat just doesn’t feel as smooth and fun as it did when the game was a rhythmic combat series. You just wail on enemies, they wail on you and hope your numbers are bigger than theirs. You can gain certain traits and learn enemies’ fighting styles to best combat them. Though the boss battles are a bit crap. Instead of them being a challenge to use all your skills you’ve learned, they are sword sponges that are immune to most all your tactics, like staggers. One option AC Valhall gives you that I love is the ability to make all stealth assassinations a one hit kill from minute one, like the classic games. The game discourages you from selecting this option, but forget that. This way you can assassinate a target without it ending in a all-out fight every time.

The grinding for level is not as bad in Valhalla is it was in Odyssey. The different regions are soft gated by levels, but the enemies don’t get too OP and there’s never a moment where I had to grind to complete the next story mission. Of course, in a bit of clever marketing, they don’t call them levels, but instead “power” and you increase power much quicker than you would usually increase levels, but they are practically the same. Your bird companion returns, but has been nerfed a bit. It can help to find a certain areas, but has lost the ability to mark enemies, which was the bird's best feature in previous titles. I guess I could see the argument that it was an overpowered ability.

Another big improvement was made in the side missions. Instead of having full-on side missions like Origins and Odyssey that usually involved helping some poor townsfolk save their family from that fort down the road, Valhalla has little vignette stories. These are more like Stranger missions from Red Dead. You come across a weird little event that may take only a few minutes to complete. They are more varied, some are funny, others are sad, and others are just cool. The fact these were little stories that could see you doing a variety of things made me seek them out more often than in those previous titles.

As a Viking, you do have a longship to your name, but there’s no real naval combat. Instead your river horse is more for travelling and landing your raiders on the shores of monasteries. I’m fine with the subdued use of your ship in this game, as Odyssey’s naval combat wasn’t great. You can customize your ship as well, but most all the good cosmetics are locked behind paywalls. Using your ship to raid is a pretty straightforward affair, just land on the shore and your viking bros will assist you in battle, that’s about it.

One of my favorite aspects of Assassin’s Creed 3 returns in Valhalla, the Homestead system. You have a village, Raventhrope, that you can invest resources into to build a hunter’s shack, tavern, chicken farm, etc. Some of these buildings bring in new settlers that have little missions for you, but most later buildings just add buffs to you and your village. Still I like having a little community to come home to.

One of the dangers of buying a game when it’s released is dealing with the bugs, and Valhalla was filthy with them. The biggest issue I had was losing the ability to talk to half of my citizens who offered services such as ship customization & not being able to complete the Order of Ancients questline. This game took me longer to complete, because I would stop playing until an update arrived that fixed my issues. They weren’t game breaking bugs, but definitely a large nuisance.

The story of Valhalla, like Odyssey, is very long. Unlike Odyssey, I stayed engaged with the story for most it’s run time. I didn’t have a moment where I was bored or just rushing to see the conclusion. I think part of that is Valhalla took a more vignette approach to their story. You play as Eivor, adopted brother to Sigurd, the prince of a Norwegian kingdom. His father gives up his land to Harald Fairhair, so Sigurd heads to England with you and some others to stake a claim and gain glory. The bulk of the game is befriending neighboring Viking and Saxon kingdoms, or installing a new, Viking friendly, puppet king. While most the stories are “Help this dude become king” there are different ways you go about that. Eivor is a likable protagonist, sort of a warrior poet who has just the right amount of bravado. He’s also wise beyond his years, but no one seems to listen to him.

You meet all sorts of characters in England, some more memorable than others. Sigurd and Eivor have a good relationship, but Sigurd is a little high on his own supply. Later on his character does do a bit of a 180 where he goes from lofty, but realistic ideas who confides in his brother, to a bit of a loon with dreams of being a god that he never straightly explains to Eivor. This is mostly the fault of our resident assassin, Basim. He’s filled Sigurd’s head with nonsense and while he is a good guy, you feel like you can’t trust him as far as you could throw him. During assassination scenes, Eivor is mentored by the spirit of Odin. He’s the devil on Eivor’s shoulder. “Sure, the guy you killed was evil, but he was also all that was holding this community together.” Eivor tries to be all about freedom and doing what’s right, but Odin is there to make you questions your ideas of right and wrong. It’s a fun dichotomy. The fight you have with Odin when you finally tire of him is a unique puzzle fight that I really enjoyed. Your lead raider and friend Dag is an annoying character. He keeps commenting that Eivor is trying to take Sigurd’s place and is irrationally angry. Randvi is Sigurd’s politically arranged wife who very obviously wants to jump Eivor’s bones. She mostly serves as the quest giver outside of big cutscenes. You meet a few historic characters along the way like Ubba & Ivar Ragnarson, and King Alfred serves as the main big bad.

From what I know of viking history, this games seems a little more Hollywood than historic. There’s no horned helmets, but Eivor and crew look like they walked off the set of History’s Vikings. Lots of tattos and hipster style shaved hairdos. The armors look fashionable more than functional, but the Saxon army looks much more historically authentic. Of course, this is the Dark Ages, which got that name for a reason, a lot of the history is spotty and sometimes mixed with legend. This is post-Roman times, but England seems to be littered with castles and towers that have a much more medieval design, yet they are abandoned and crumbling. I feel like at this time the only destitute ruins should be the Roman ones. Also, Eivor is apparently a nice viking. One of the big gameplay mechanics is raiding monasteries and villages for loot. Like other AC games, you get in trouble for killing non-enemy NPCs. Now, I’m not saying Ubisoft should’ve included the raping part of rape & pillage, but I’m sure the vikings killed more than just the soldiers guarding these places. Maybe Eivor doesn’t kill the monks, but his raiding party will. It’s an ugly piece of history, but it happened. Valhalla seems to gloss over that since we’re playing from the viking perspective. Also, the encyclopedia seems much more dumbed down. Instead of long, detailed entries, we just get a quick overview. This could be due again to the lack of surviving records of the Dark Age. And I could be way off base, again, not an era of history I’m well versed in.

I say it every time, but the one thing Ubisoft always does well is creating worlds. Dark Age England is beautiful from the White Cliffs of Dover to the haunting Epping forest to the town of London situated in the Roman ruins to the snowy hills near Hadrian’s Wall, and all the weirdly spelled and pronounced places in between. It’s a joy just to explore this world and find these unique places and the people that inhabit them. The rolling glens of England just called to me more than the Mediterranean Isles. The music is typical Nordic style tunes and that wispy ethereal music that’s associated with Scandinavian places.

All in all, Valhalla kept my attention better than Odyssey and I liked that Ubisoft tried to adjust to the issues raised in that previous title by giving us more options to customize our playstyle. It’s spurred me to look more into the history of the time and I am a little more hopeful for whatever AC game comes next, fingers crossed we can still get that Ancient Rome.

I have very few pleasant words for Assassin's Creed Valhalla. I simply disliked the game.

There are many reasons why I think this game is mediocre, but I'll start with what I liked about it.

First, the story. Eivor's tale was what kept me going through the game. If it wasn't for this story filled with good characters, well-written dialogues, action-packed moments, twists and turns, I would've abandoned this game. The ending is pretty lackluster and the credits doesn't even roll, but the journey told here was incredible.

One other thing that impressed me was the combat. At first, I found it very stiff and basic, but as the game progresses it gets better, more visceral and entertaining. Also, the boss battles make up for some really fun fights.

Other than those two key points that made me stay withstand this game for 80 hours, I also want to give praise to the STUNNING graphics, the very unique and quite original sidequests that made me laugh or got me invested and the soundtrack, which isn't anything special, but did a good job nonetheless.

As for Valhalla's missteps, well... It's everything else!

What bothered me the most in this game was the sheer amount of bugs. Game-breaking bugs, quest-hindering bugs, immersion-shattering bug... you name it. I had to restart the game several times due to some gruesome experiences. It was not good.

The fact that the game is bloated as hell also does not help at all. The maps are beautiful, sure (especially Asgard), but it's unnecessarily big, filled with unrewarding treasure hunting and some annoying mini-games like stacking up rocks on top of each other. Most of the puzzles revolved around getting inside a house locked by a hidden key or blocked from the inside and that got old VERY QUICK! Also, the "Find and Speak" quests made little sense to me. If everything else points me in a direction in this game, why would you waste my time with petty chasing??

There were many other reasons why I had a hard time having fun here, like the aforementioned tasteless ending to a fantastic story, the movement being EXTREMELY unyielding, tiresome level grinding, repetitive environments, useless abilities and etc.

Valhalla isn't bad, it's just overly unexceptional. Few and far between were my moments of fun.

I do not recommend this game at all. Maybe if you're a fan of the series, since the story and its combat are the only two things that matters here.

Assassin's Creed Valhalla is a treat for those who love exploring in search of curiosities. The game has taken the best lessons from mammoth RPGs such as The Witcher 3 and have clearly worked out for the game.

The little throwbacks to the older games are much appreciated too.

Coming to the real deal - once you chance upon Orlog, a game similar to Witcher's Gwent, there's no turning back.

A few issues on the base PS4, nothing game breaking, but otherwise a must play!

Clocked over a 100 hours, yet to unveil the 'true' ending hidden behind a side quest.

This was a major step up from Odyssey which I quit out of frustration with how long it was. This game is also really long, but it has a much better story that I wanted to see through to completion. This game follows Eivor who is a member of a group of Vikings called the Raven Clan. They move to England to find a new home. In order to secure their place, they have to create alliances with the people that already live in England. This game takes place after the Romans left England and Saxons and Danes have moved in. This has led to clashes of culture and religion between the Saxons and Danes. Forming alliances usually means Eivor has to resolve these conflicts. Eivor is also worried about these strange visions that she's been having the foretell she will betray her brother Segurd who is the leader of her clan. And her brother Segurd is going down a strange path where he believes he might be a God. It's such a unique story for the franchise and in general. I was hooked.

The one issue I have with this game is that it's the buggiest Assassin's Creed since Unity. I've had the game freeze on me multiple times. I had a problem where a cut scene wasn't triggering which was preventing me from progressing through the game. Luckily closing the game and starting it up again fixed the issue. I played on the Xbox Series X version and there was a lot of screen tearing. The issue was resolved when I got a 120hz TV with Variable Refresh Rate.

In combat, players can stun enemies now. This can be done by landing hits on enemies or parrying their attacks. There's a meter above the enemy's health bar that will tell me how close I am to stunning them. Once the enemy is stunned, I can do a stun attack which plays a brutal attack animation. It's really satisfying. I can also use my bow and arrow to attack highlighted weak points on the enemy to knock down their stun meter.

Non-spoiler part of the review:

I just got to 93% completion of this game, with 64 hours played, and finished the main quest. What's weird is that the game doesn't have any credits, unless I skipped them somehow. So I guess I am finished since I completed the challenge for it.

This here review is coming from someone who's first AC game was AC3, played all after that one and also played AC2. This last trilogy, Origins, Odyssey and Valhalla started a bit low but I think Valhalla takes the cake as the best of them. I rated Odyssey 7/10, there were a lot of things to be improved upon and Valhalla improves upon some of these things.

Where do I begin? The game is massive. It's long and it's huge, for both good and bad. The story probably took 60 hours to complete, and it took me from Norway to every part of England to a bunch of other places. Norway looks great, it probably is one of the most gorgeous locations we've had in AC. The sound and music is alright, except when it bugs and you're forced to exit to the main menu because some sound is being replayed at a high pitch.

This leads me to the bugs, the game has quite many I believe. Some say it's not bugged at all but I probably encountered at least 10 today when I played. From the aforementioned sound bugs to freezing to getting stuck in objects and in places, to animations not working to side quest bugs where things don't progress. It's a lot. Now, I'm not one to quit playing just because of this, but I will give it a lower score.

Let's get to the main part here, the story. The story is much improved upon from the last two games and it has many many more likeable characters that you also get to spend time with to get to know. Partly due to the settlement part of the game, which is a good part! I feel like the Assassin's Creed part of the games is back and also modern day is getting more interesting. Modern day only intruded on me once throughout the entire game, which also is better than before where it would happen several times. The story is very long though, as I've mentioned before. It could easily skip many parts so that you don't get bored and wonder when is the ending going to come, as I did. You can take big decisions with dialogue options but there are also times where you're just choosing the dialogue to say first, as Eivor will say the other options afterward anyway, which isn't as good. Still have much to improve upon with it! I've mentioned side quests before, how are they? Well, I think some are really good, but most of them just try to outweird the others. Like, you just thought you found the most insane person in England when really half the sidequests have insane characters.

Gameplay has been improved in some aspects, stayed the same in most, and gotten worse in others. Stealth is bigger in this game than the previous two, but so is forced combats. You'll very often be in a forced fight where you can't be stealthy. An all around build is probably good. Skill tree is nice, so is leveling. Mercenaries, or Zealots in this game, are now nerfed a lot. They only patrol a small area each and never come after you if you're not close to them. Love this change. Combat is fine, much of the same as previous games. One thing that annoys me though is the long ass animations. Sometimes people are dying around you and Eivor is busy screaming at a guy because it looks cool. Doesn't look as cool the next 400 times. Collectibles have been changed a lot, almost all of them (99%) require you to solve some puzzle or find a key to get it. Which is fine, if the collectibles weren't so god damn many. It just seems they are designed to take as much of your time as possible, hiding keys in weird places and locking all windows and doors of a house so you have to find another way in.

All in all, enjoyed my time with this game and I rate it 8/10. Here comes the spoiler part.

Some spoilers in this part of the review:

Asgard and Jotunheim were gorgeous places, even if the story dragged on a bit in there. I would never imagine these places would be in the game, it came as a total surprise to me. Also Vinland. I hated how, in the story, sometimes characters would do things just to cause some fight with another character. Dag, who we are introduced to as one of our friends, spends the rest of the game hating Eivor for some reason. Eivor is weirdly aggressive toward Sigurd and Basim when Sigurd says he's had visions, when Eivor himself had them!! Like, just trust your brother dude. No need for this conflict. Also, the game ends very abruptly. You conquer England, and seemingly nothing is different. All that happens is a funeral and a wedding. There are no credits, and there is nothing that tells me what my decisions in each shire led to. I think this would have been a great addition since I shaped these shires futures. I am interested in seeing where the modern day goes after this, now that we're playing more of an anti-hero.