Assassins Creed Valhalla

[Maryokutai]

I have been playing this here and there over the last couple of weeks. Wanted something a bit superficial but also engrossing in the sense that you don't have to think too much when playing but can also lose yourself in the world while doing so and it seemed a good fit for that. 

 

Didn't really enjoy it at first because I approached it like Odyssey. I played that game pretty much like a sightseeing tour, going on my own and only ever continuing with the story when I stumbled across the next trigger while exploring. There was so much to see in that game, a lot of interesting equipment to find, levelling up felt worthwhile due to an interesting skill tree. Valhalla is almost the opposite and going about exploring sucks the fun out of it after the fifth time you open a chest and only find some materials. It's the first open world game I play in a strictly linear, "only going for the story missions" fashion and ever since I've started doing that I've noticed I've been enjoying it more.

 

That's not to say I'm rushing through it. I barely use fast travel, and going by horseback from story mission to story mission allows me to stop here and there when a sidequest or something interesting should pop up along the way. It feels "right" playing it like this, at least for me. I also had to stop comparing it to Odyssey because outside of the visual fidelity it does everything worse than that game, which is such a weird and unique UbiSoft problem due to their production pipelines (Valhalla was most likely so far ahead in development by the time they got Odyssey feedback that they couldn't veer off-course anymore).

 

Oddly enough, this might also be the most visually impressive game I've played on Series X so far. When the sunlight bounces over fields or the bird's eye view allows you to watch cloud shadows move over the countryside it's just a very pretty sight. UbiSoft gets a lot of crap all the time (often rightfully) but their engineers and art-directors are top notch. I went to see some paintings from John Constable earlier this year and you can see how they took inspiration from the works of that era in terms of colour palette and lighting when going for England's distinct look in this game. 

 

So, yeah, serviceable open world game, nothing more, nothing less. Probably comfortably in the middle between the three RPG-AC titles – far away from Odyssey but also a lot better than Origins.

[DisturbedSwan]

Glad you enjoyed it, I'd disagree that it's merely serviceable though, but then my experience was maybe a bit different than yours. I think I put 120-140 hours into it and never once got bored, I loved exploring so much in this game and getting utterly lost in all the various different systems and activities there is to do. For a long time AC fan like myself the story is absolutely fantastic as well and the biggest payoff for being a long-time fan that you could ever really wish for. 

 

For me, it's by far and away the best of the three games as I found it the easiest to get utterly lost in, I also found the unique regional episodic quest structure one of the most innovative quest systems I've experienced in gaming. How the game shakes off the main plot threads for long periods of time to tell tangentially related tales of lost love or strife at a Pagan festival. 

 

Despite being the longest I've spent with the recent trilogy, it's by far and away my favourite of the three, I'd say Odyssey is probably my least favourite as that's the only time I've really felt there was too much to do and became overwhelmed as a result. Origins and Valhalla felt much more manageable to me.

[Maryokutai]

At the risk of sounding like an ass, but what different systems and activities? There's the usual parkour you rarely need because it's a very flat world, stealth is rather dysfunctional because enemies seem to carry night vision goggles and most missions therefore result in fights, which you can tackle with arrow combat or melee combat, or a mix (like I do). There are some minigames here and there and more platform/puzzle-centric sidequests, but it's hardly showering you with variety.

 

Though that's not the reason why I prefer Odyssey, because those criticisms can be levelled at that game as well. What Valhalla fails at is giving you any kind of tangible progression. I think I'm at Power Level 150 or something along these lines but my available options inside and outside of combat are just a tiny step beyond what Eivor was able to do in the first hour. The main culprit here is the questionably boring skill tree which is littered with inconsequential "melee/ranged/stealth damage + X" nodes and other pointless stuff that should have been an automatic stat boost in the background instead of inflating the skill tree to the point where you really have to fight the urge of using the auto level-up function. Which is a thought, I think, that is rather fatal to a game's progression system.

 

I know that by hiding the major abilities and upgrades as secrets in the world it wants to push me into exploring, but if the majority of things you find are upgrade materials then at some point you start to question whether it's really worth it. Of course you can always pay your cartographer to mark the important bits on the map, but that leads to the same conclusion we had before with the skill tree: if I have to pre-filter what I want to find, why not make everything interesting instead? 

 

For me, that all boils down to "serviceable". Which doesn't mean it's bad or that I find it boring, it's just that I had to look for a certain way of playing it that allows me to ignore certain elements without feeling like I'm rushing through it or missing everything. I guess you could say that's a compliment because it can be somewhat tailored to your preferences, but that would make it too easy to glance over what you be improved here.

[DisturbedSwan]

17 hours ago, Maryokutai said:

At the risk of sounding like an ass, but what different systems and activities?

 

I enjoyed pretty much everything but the Animus puzzles and stone alignment puzzles were my favourites. I loved the flyting, dice battles and drinking battles as well. Hunting down the order was super fun in this game (also in Origins and Odyssey I know) and gradually building up your Village. 

 

The game has just such a magical, ethereal quality to it, it's world isn't as visually impressive as Origins and Odyssey to explore, it's definitely flatter overall and with less waterways but it's just so much easier to get lost in,  

[AndyKurosaki]

I personally preferred Odyssey to Valhalla. The side quests were more interesting, it was more enjoyable to play, and Kassandra was vastly superior. I can’t even remember the main character in this, she was so bloody boring 😄

[Maryokutai]

I don't see those mini games as such an integral part of its overall design. I like them, but in the roughly 50 hours I played the game I most likely only spent 5 hours doing these activities, so I tend to not pay too much attention when looking at the bigger picture of what it could do better.

 

And I agree, the protagonist is kind of uninteresting unfortunately. The writers also didn't really make the relationship between Eivor and Sigurd relatable, she/he's absolutely devoted to him but I find him insufferable and condescending. Which is odd, because in other areas the writing can actually be really good. Some of these sidequests/mysteries tackle some interesting philosophical themes, or at least scratch on their surface.

[DisturbedSwan]

On 27/07/2023 at 15:55, AndyKurosaki said:

I personally preferred Odyssey to Valhalla. The side quests were more interesting, it was more enjoyable to play, and Kassandra was vastly superior. I can’t even remember the main character in this, she was so bloody boring 😄

 

Yeah Kassandra was absolutely amazing in Odyssey for me as well, way better than Eivor in Valhalla for sure, I definitely agree with that.