Here we go!
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| From the E3 Fan Kit Promotional Materials |
Background
The game is an action-RPG mostly set in ancient Greece during the thirty-year Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta. You play as either Alexios or Kassandra and venture on a long journey throughout Greece over the course of the game's story. I'll avoid spoilers, but know that both characters are well-acted, completely voiced, beautifully animated, and just plain fun. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this game, and the protagonist is a large reason why. I chose to play as Kassandra after I found out that she was the "canon" character.
Generally, your character is a misthios, or mercenary. You are a direct descendant (grandchild) of King Leonidas of Sparta, who died heroically at the battle of Thermopylae. In the game's version of events, Leonidas' magical spear was broken in the famed battle, but the spearhead and about a foot of the pole were preserved and returned to his family. This spear was passed down to your character who uses it (practically or not) as a tool for mass-assassination and slaughter. Way to honor grandpa!
New Stuff
Romance
Regardless of which character you play, you will get romance opportunities of both sexes, which although close to historically accurate, can be surprising for its casual dismissal of heteronormative standards. I'm actually okay with that, but there still comes a time when, if you've taken advantage of all of your opportunities, you've romanced so many targets you start to question the choices that led you there. That's less a statement on the open choices around genders of romantic partners and more a statement on the "hook-up culture" appeal that romance has in most modern RPGs. This is actually kind of disappointing. None of the romances are particularly deep, and none of them lead to any impactful in-game consequences in story or gameplay.Dialogue Choices
This is something that bears mentioning. This game has dialogue options. Previous Assassin's Creed games had long dialogues where you were passive observers. In AC Odyssey, you decide what you want your character to say, and your choices actually have consequences.
Are those consequences profoundly different?
Some of them.
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| I promise he's not teabagging. It just looks that way. |
Mercenary System
This is an actually interesting idea. In a nod to the Grand Theft Auto series, as you start to do bad things, the law in a province (or kingdom) begins to escalate their attempts to rein in your behavior. Kill a couple people and a mercenary will start hunting you down. Kill dozens while assaulting an Athenian fortress? You will soon find three or four challenging mercenaries chasing you and interfering in your every move.
This element of gameplay was sold as a comparison the Nemesis system of the Shadow of Mordor games from Warner Brothers.
It's not.
The mercenaries are elite foes that are challenging, yes. That's where the comparison ends. They have nearly zero personality. They never flee and come back later. They never ambush you without warning. They never talk much. They are not particularly deep.
It's neat to see where Kassandra (or Alexios) stacks up against them on the "rankings." It's fun to unlock the next tier on the ladder and open up discounts for weapons, armor, engravings, and ship upgrades.
Overall, this system is pretty shallow. This is an area for growth in the future. Take further cues from Shadow of Mordor/Shadow of War, please.
Greatest Hits
Gear
AC Odyssey brings back some old ideas from AC Origins that you may or may not have enjoyed. Among these is the Action-RPG loot system where random properties are attached to gear that has stats relevant to gameplay.
Gear is not just cosmetic, and the microtransactions element of gear possibilities is both frustrating and interesting in a metagame sense. This game is not "Pay-to-Win." You can't just buy good stuff and be done with it. You can use Ubisoft Club Credits to get some in-game gear, but gear quickly becomes obsolete as you play. Even legendary gear is obsolete within about four levels.
Speaking of cosmetics, the fact that you can change your appearance to show any gear you have ever looted is a nice bonus. I found that having Kassandra run around in Battleplate of Ares or Brawler Armor was fun, despite whatever armor she might have looted. I enjoyed the aesthetic touch. Kudos to the design team for bringing that into the game!
Skills
AC Origins began using skill trees, and they have returned for Odyssey. There were some really amazing skills that I very much enjoyed. The Spartan Kick was amazingly fun. There's something incredibly satisfying about the sound and the animation. It's just a great tool, even though it does not do much damage by itself. It also has a great feeling of "oomph" to it that appeals to my aesthetic appreciation, kind of like God of War's Ax.
There were multiple times while I was playing the game that I snuck up behind an enemy that I might have otherwise ignored solely because I could kick him off a cliff or a ledge. I found myself steering entire battles to cliff edges and high buildings just to use the kick offensively. It's just an extra enjoyable element to the game.
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| Obligatory 300 reference. |
Add in Hero Strike (using assassination attacks during combat), the Second Wind self-healing, and the Shield Break ability that lets you dominate battlefields, and you've got an excellent recipe for slaughtering Greeks throughout the ancient world.
One of the common concerns around Skill Trees is the dueling desires to get everything (which you should largely avoid in AC Odyssey) and the desire to maintain balance. As you power up, the enemies use more abilities as well. Whether it's flaming weapons, multi-shot bowmen, or foes who quickly roll away from your attacks, the challenge scales well throughout the game. The only thing that's frustrating is how weak assassination can become if you don't focus on it. The game is designed for an increased amount of combat compared to the pre-Origins games. If you're entirely avoiding combat, it's just... harder. There are ways to build your character to do more assassination damage, and it's relatively effective to do so, but more challenging enemies like mercenaries and polemarchs are just too tough to count on assassination as the only way to win.
Fast Travel
Due to the ever-present eagle companion of Assassin's Creed games, you can synchronize your animus with the various landmarks in the game and can fast travel back to them when out of combat, outdoors, and not in a security zone. This is incredibly useful. It's also incredibly slow unless you use a solid state drive. Get one. Load times are a bit of a bear.
Ship Combat
Ship-to-ship battles return from Black Flag and Origins, with the interesting element of underwater exploration that's fun and stressful as your breath meter begins to run out, I really enjoyed this. Ubisoft also does water extremely well. Thumbs up to this section.
Review
For most Assassin's Creed games, story quality is a big draw. Good story plus good open-world action gameplay plus fascinating references to historical events are all reasons why people pick up an AC title. Odyssey does not disappoint on all fronts.
Kassandra (and I assume Alexios, but I didn't play through his story), the evil Cultists, Kassandra's journey, her family, her friends, the famous ancient Greeks she encounters... All of the writing is top notch.
The size of the game is intimidating, and travel times and load times were frustrating sometimes. The map is beautiful. The architecture, the art design, the character animations, the visuals are just stellar. It's AAA quality and it shows. It takes a beastly computer to make it run, but doing so is very visually rewarding.
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| Actual screenshot taken by yours truly. |
The voice acting is phenomenal. Bonus: Enjoy this video of the voice actors being goofballs.
Gameplay is fun, but the open-world aspect can be intimidating. As a completionist, I wanted to do everything. At 120 hours, I decided I was done. There were probably another fifty or more places I could have visited with little question marks on my map. There were dozens of places I had visited and not completed all objectives. I completed the entire story, saw the endings I wanted, and earned most of the achievements available on Steam. It was time to set the controller down and move to other things.
I'm pleased with my time and money invested. I enjoyed this game wholeheartedly. I would recommend it to any gamer at $40 or less and any Assassin's Creed fan at full price.
I have heard bad things about the Downloadable Content, however. Take this with a grain of salt, but it appears to utilize different writing staff.
Epilogue: On Kassandra
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| Actress: Melissanthi Mahut |
I also feel like I need to take a moment to talk about Kassandra because she represents a major shift in RPG character design that has played out in the industry over the past handful of years.
Kassandra is a beauty.
But she is not your typical "gamer-girl" beauty.
She is tall, broad-shouldered, athletic, scarred, and muscular. She is proportioned athletically, not seductively. She wears armor that covers her and protects her.
Yes, she's pretty.
Yes, she can even be sensual when she attempts to seduce characters in the game.
Her appearance is not what makes her so amazing. I cannot say enough how much I enjoy the Kassandra character. She is entertaining in her dry wit, completely believable in all her emotions, and just a joy to watch and listen to. She is written as such a great character... It's amazing. I love what the designers did with this character.
Is it historically accurate to portray an Ancient Greek woman in such a way? No. Few Greek women were allowed to participate in most of society. Fewer still were allowed property and rights. A female mercenary who is hired to support the Athenian or Spartan war efforts? Never happen.
Who cares?
Many white male heterosexual gamers are probably turned off by this. I, for one, am overjoyed. The character design, the voice acting, the writing, the realistically body-positive image she represents, the liberating role of a female character who isn't a token or a sex object. All of those things make her one of the best female video game characters that I can ever remember.
She may not be the video game heroine that some gamers wanted, but in 2018/2019, she's the video game heroine we all need.
Hopefully, more studios follow suit.
