Assassin’s Creed found its way to us way back in 2007, inspired by the Prince of Persia series. Since then, it has come a long, long way with the latest iteration bringing about some of the most extensive changes to date. I have been a fan of the series since the first game. Not all of them have been great, some not even good, but there have been many for me that were a fantastic and memorable experience. So much of what makes these games great for me are the setting they’re in, and I love the architecture, history, the myth and lore of Ancient Greece. Throw that in with a massive open world RPG concept and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it.
Odyssey is a huge step towards the game becoming a fully-fledged RPG, and whether that is for better or for worse is going to depend on the player. I was most excited for this, but what I found is that while it is a large step in the right direction for their first dabbling in these extensive RPG mechanics, they have one foot in the door but never fully enter. Without writing an entire novel, I’ll do my best to touch on all the systems that I feel are important or notable, mostly new things to series, but this is a game of immense scale so it will be impossible to get to everything. I hope you can bear with me as I dig in!
For the first time in the series the player can choose from two protagonists to play, and even though they play exactly the same, it is refreshing to have the choice. After choosing either Alexios or Kassandra, you’re dropped into the big and beautiful world that is Odyssey, where our hero begins their adventure on the island of Kephallonia.
The main quest didn’t quite hook me from the start, but it eventually grabbed my interest about halfway through. It’s not the best story I’ve seen from the series, but it was enough to have fun with. You play as a Spartan long separated from your parents, and after taking a big contract you find yourself attempting to track down your family. That’s basically it with some Assassin’s Creed Universe sprinkled on top.
Our characters role and the timeline are some of the largest departures from normal formula. This time you play as a mercenary for hire, and the events take place nearly 400 years prior to Origins. No, you are not an assassin in Assassin’s Creed, but I didn’t find this to be a big deal. Being a mercenary helps with the implementation of an open dialogue and choice driven narrative, as it allows the kind of freedom that would be the case for a mercenary that is free to do as they please, if the price is right.
And yes, a choice driven narrative! This was another huge new step for the series as they delved into an open world, freedom of choice RPG. This turned out to be a bit of good and bad, but it being their first attempt at it for the series, it was a welcome addition. Odyssey has a total of nine different endings depending on how you make your choices – Nine!
I was rarely interested in diving further into many of the additional dialogue options and found myself only answering the parts that were necessary to move on with the quest.
The optional portions of these conversations usually serve to gather more information about a quest, because in the new exploration mode it requires you to track down quest objectives based on information learned instead of a quest marker that takes you directly there. It’s actually pretty cool, but your eagle can spot your target out for you from a great distance, so ultimately it feels a bit useless.
One of the most immediately impressive things to me was the enormous scale of the world. At nearly 10 hours into the game, I had barely even scratched the surface. Hell, I had barely made it off the first island by then. And while a sizable portion of the map may be water, it helps the feeling of enormousness that you must trek across large bodies of water to discover new locations.
Speaking of which, ships are back! With Black Flag being one of my favorites, I was ecstatic to see the return to an emphasis on ships and naval combat. My excitement fizzled quickly, however, and I found that I didn’t spend much time on my ship other than to get where I needed to go.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s fun! The seas are absolutely gorgeous, it feels solid, the crash of the waves and the shanties are relaxing, but it was missing something. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I think it was largely because arrow/javelin combat are not the same as heavy, loud and impactful cannons that we know from Black Flag.
That probably isn’t a fair comparison, I suppose. Because come on, it’s pirates. You can’t really top that. The ship combat in Odyssey turned out to be redundant and in my opinion, too easy. I don’t recall in all my game time that I ever felt challenged at sea.
The ship can be upgraded in a number of categories. Arrow damage, javelin damage, fire damage, crew ability, crew cosmetics and more. But what I found the most interesting here is the use of recruits to give your ship a decent upgrade through buffs.
Throughout the game, you can knockout and recruit almost anybody, and they will return to your ship where you can equip them into a slot via the ship menu and the buffs will become active as if they were a piece of gear. That NPC will now be on deck, fighting alongside you as you board enemy ships.
Character upgrades are also deeper in Odyssey than they’ve ever been before. Touching more on some of those new RPG features, there are many new abilities to unlock, and an impressive array of equipment to find. The abilities are broken into the three categories: Hunter, Warrior, and Assassin. Many of the buffs on items can be categorized with those three as well, each tailoring more to a specific damage type than another.
Combat, like a few other aspects of the game, can become very repetitive. There are times where fights are more challenging than others, but I found that is usually not for a new variation in an opponent’s abilities or predictability, but only because some enemies absorb more damage than others. This is with exception to a few here and there.
New and powerful abilities make you feel like a force to be reckoned with, and I discovered quickly that one of your best skills is available from the beginning and with no investment: a properly timed dodge.
This made me crazy, it gives the player a ridiculously one-sided edge in a fight because it slows time down substantially, allowing you a moment to reposition, get a flurry of attacks in, or heal. It would have been nice to see a stamina gauge when using that along with a parry and heavy attacks. It’s hard not to exploit it, because it’s only natural that you dodge when being attacked. And it’s not difficult to time it perfectly, either.
The Peloponnesian War across the map has the Spartans and Athenians battling it out for control over territories, and your character will play a vital role in turning the tides of battle in either direction. Every time a controlling power in an area is weakened to a certain point, it enables a conquest battle where your mercenary can choose to fight for one side or the other.
I came running for these. Every time. Yes, they can get repetitive, but they’re always fun and a good way to stack up some XP and new loot. By sneaking around a territory and sabotaging the controlling power in various ways, such as destroying war supplies or even killing that regions leader, you control who holds the area.
Ah but nothing is ever quite perfect, is it? My biggest issue with this system is the lack of impact it really holds. It’s impossible outside the main story to gain notoriety that spills over into any meaningful dialogue. While your mercenary’s reputation spreads far and wide, these controlling powers never hold a grudge against you.
No matter how many times you’ve sabotaged them, slaughtered their soldiers by the hundreds and murdered their leaders in cold blood, they’re just excited that you are fighting for them at that moment. It means nothing if you help one side take a territory, immediately go sabotage it to spark another conquest battle, then fight for that same side again after causing all the trouble in the first place. It makes the whole system feel a bit weightless and lacking purpose outside of being a loot factory (which isn’t so bad).
One of my favorite new things in Odyssey are the other mercenaries. The world is full of them, and I loved picking fights with them whether they were after me or not. When you murder or steal, you can pick up a wanted level. Then the mercenaries start coming, and you can fight them, pay your bounty, or go find and kill the person who is paying for that bounty on your head.
At certain parts of the story you can’t get rid of your wanted level, and this can turn things up a notch when you’re trying to take a fort or complete an objective. I thought it was fun any time a mercenary would come ruin my good time as I rampaged through an encampment, killing anything in my path.
Mercenaries are some of the toughest opponents you can find in the game, and each one of them has different abilities, weapons, damage types, and even animal companions. They help keep it fresh, in my opinion, and bring some variation to the table when you’re trying to get things done. If you find yourself in the path of a mercenary that’s a couple levels ahead of you, you’re really in for a fight!
That brings me to probably one of the more controversial aspects of the game… The micro-transactions. Ubisoft is catching a lot of flak for this, and I think for the first time in the series it’s completely warranted. I’ve never been one to care much about them. I usually look past the fact that they even exist and just play the game with their absence and never think twice about it. But in Odyssey, Ubisoft is starting down a slippery slope.
It is true, that there is more grind to this game than in any other we’ve seen. Granted, it wasn’t to such an extent that I felt it ruined the game, but they are edging ever closer to the dangerous territory. I’m the type of player who gets rolling in the main quest and likes to see it through, with exception to some sides and exploration here and there, then catch up on those things later.
Odyssey breaks that up and makes it impossible for no reason I can see other than to entice players into buying. Several times throughout the story you will suddenly come to a halt and are practically forced to go do other things so you can catch up to the level requirement of the quest. At one point I came to a stop at level 26 and I needed to get to level 31 to be on par with the next quest in line.
Enter micro-transactions. Boy, do those time-savers look good now, eh? What’s the harm in a little XP boost, right? Shame, Ubisoft. Shame. Furthermore, the gear upgrades are insanely expensive. I went through the entire game without selling a single piece of gear that I found. I dismantled absolutely everything, and in order to keep my gear up to pace with the growing difficulty of enemies, I had to either replace or upgrade it.
Sure, you can equip the new stuff you’ve found, but I found loot with a good stat roll pretty early on and found that I’d upgrade it every 4-5 levels instead of replacing it. But the problem was even though I dismantled everything I had for materials, I rarely had enough to upgrade more than maybe two pieces of equipment during those intervals. Throw in the cost of ship upgrades on top of that and I could see how people would be looking more closely at those time-saver packs.
I found myself coming through this game with mixed feelings about the experience. That’s not to say it wasn’t good or entertaining, though. There is a lot to talk about, and I can’t possibly get to it all in one article. I’m hopeful that they take what they’ve learned in this new endeavor and enhance it further, taking that final step through the door into full RPG greatness.
I can be critical of things, but I did enjoy the game. So much so, that I fully intend on running through it again with Kassandra to explore some of the other endings, and I still have so much left to do on my current run with Alexios! Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is definitely one to remember, and I would recommend it to anyone who has been watching with a cautious, but curious eye.
- Massive World
- Huge Variety of Gear
- New Skill Trees
- Loads of Content
- Intentionally Placed Grind
- Boring Ship Combat
- AI is Still Dumb
- Texture Pop-in
Playtime: 74 hours total
Computer Specs: 64-bit Windows 10 OS, i7-4790, 16GB memory, GTX 1080ti, installed on a Samsung 860 EVO SSD.
Side note: Due to the length of the review, I decided to omit my usual personal performance experience. Sorry about that! But HERE is John’s performance analysis!
Father of two and avid gamer, Kyle made his switch to PC gaming about a decade ago. In that time, he developed his obsession with performance, but has no regrets… Yet. In his spare time he is taking his family out on outdoor adventures, exploring the trails in his Jeep, and trying to catch up on playing his over-bloated Steam library.
Here’s a short and concise review: It sucks.
Your statement is concise, but it’s not a review. A review is a formal assessment of something. Your comment is merely a concluding remark. You would need to offer reasons why it sucks in order for your comment to be considered a concise review.
As it stands, your comment is actually communicating more about yourself than the game. What I’m getting from you is that you aren’t willing to openly evaluate this game. Why? Perhaps a poor experience with prior AC games? Yes, that is most likely I feel. 🙂
I enjoyed the review, but I’m sorry Nick; I agree with Oscar. Maybe you are correct with your assessment of his comment being blatantly binary and narrow minded, but dammit if this game isn’t its own worse enemy. I could not ever bring myself to recommend it to people until Ubisoft does what Monolith did with Shadow of war and remove all the microtransactions entirely.
Of course Ubi may not need to do this with its high sales, but it is so disheartening that so many great things about the game and its good fun are all just utterly killed within seconds or minutes during gameplay by the intentionally broken grind and level gating that serve nothing more than as a method to sell microtransactions. Sort of like advertising the microtransactions in your face via gameplay that feels very mindless and triggers frustrations over fun.
And I said in my other comments, the leveling is just a number and serve no purpose than to gate. Level 30 chickens are absurd.
This game is definitely going to have a large divide, and I get it, but I still think it’s a good game. The grind wasn’t too bad, and I didn’t touch any of the micro-transactions. But they’re slowly trying to push them on people and I don’t like that. It can only get worse from here if they don’t receive some backlash, so I think it’s well placed and hopefully they listen.
“but I still think it’s a good game”
Then you must have a pretty low standard… Let me guess, you’re the kind of person who thought Mafia 3 and Mass Effect Andromeda were good games too…
I
Rest
My
Case
No, I haven’t played either of those yet. I did enjoy Mass Effect 2, though (I hope that doesn’t upset you).
It’s ok to have a difference in opinion, I won’t knock you for a game you enjoy that I don’t, because it’s subjective just as an art would be. All in the eye of the beholder.
Just to gain some perspective here as to your opinion, have you played AC Odyssey yet? I was annoyed by several things in it. What was your least favorite part?
Well, It saddens me that you haven’t played those games. One day you might do it. I’m just mocking your low standard, that’s all. We should have a higher expectation of games like these, after all, they’re made by rich triple A developers. We can’t allow lazy developement and copy/paste mentality to become the norm. That’s all I’m saying.
I didn’t play Odyssey, nor will I. It’s just not assassins creed for me anymore. I enjoyed AC 1 & 2. Unity was the last and only game that I played after that. What is my least favorite part about all this?
The answer is that Ubisoft relies so much on current content and technology, they rely so much on their trusty fans who (like you) don’t have too much expectations. They just gapes and swallows without really questioning it too much. The fact that the franchise doesn’t develop into something new and fresh, no new mechanics, more of the same, in a slightly different suit. They copy things from past ubisoft games, like Far Cry franchise etc etc. And just by looking at it, you can see and feel the low quality and rushed development, lacking soul and love. Poor AI, sluggish animations, pop-ins, low-res textures, bad quality assets, sounds brought in from other games, wonky mechanics and, just generally lack of detail and polish. Those are the things that are disappointing.
Publishers tend to listen better when a loss of money is involved. That’s why I advocate using a trainer instead of spending money on microtransactions. If a person is going to cheat anyway to avoid the grind-fest then get a trainer. Spending tens of millions of dollars on microtransactions for this game is only going to encourage more of this foolishness from Ubisoft in future games.
It always was like that, but in these last 10~ years it all got somewhat amplified, mainly because the “gaming” community was invaded by normies and ultra casual gamers, and that’s the only reason garbage sagas like this here were kept alive, because they’re a money machine, thanks to these individuals, and the worse thing is they even invaded niche websites and blogs, which once were only visited from acculturated people, and that’s not only regarding videogames…
There’s a proverb in my country, i’m not sure it’s common in others too, it goes something like this:
“Even sh*t would be gold if people didn’t have their as*holes”
This kinda reminds me of this situation here, only that as*holes would be brains and the rest…Well i guess you can figure it out.
That game was built with microtrnsactions you need to grind alot and get lucky to get high level orcs, this game doesnt need grinding and microtransactions, in fact id argue you progress faster than you do in oldschool rpgs like fallout 2.
Listen pal. The reason my review was so short was because there’s nothing to review really. Just read a review on AC Origins and you get the idea.. Secondly, I don’t need to play this game to know what direction Ubisoft takes this franchise .. Because they take it NOWHERE! That’s the problem. Kudos for trying to review a shi**y game though, but that doesn’t change the fact that is is just that. And I know many will agree with me.
At this point, AC is just a repetitive grindfest saga in a new costume. Nothing to see here people move on with other games that actually deserve your time.
“Why? Perhaps a poor experience with prior AC games?”
Quite the opposite really. I enjoyed the first two AC games, you know, back when AC was actually good and well crafted.
We really shouldn’t allow this kind of lazy copypasta development to be normalized, we should discourage it. Because that would be best for the gaming industry as a whole.
But these kind of things that I just said should be obvious and I shouldn’t have to lay it out like this.
Shape up!
+1.
Jackyies, or should I say kunalsaha (commonsensecomeback was right, you are using multiple accounts). How many accounts do you have, really tell us? 3 for sure, but probably more.
John (or other mods), please check his IP logs and tell us how many accounts he actually have.
Here’s the tard again…
How in the world could you miss this rofl.
Of course I was expecting your response to me :), because you are the biggest AC hater on this site who attack all people (not only me) who will point you out how absurd it is when guy like you play games on YT and base your conclusions just on that. The vast majority of reviews are possitive, the vast majority of gamers who actualy played AC Odyssey like it, yet your opinion based on YT gameplays is more important? Maybe you should write reviews for DSOG, because you know everything about every game without the need of playing it, and very few people have talent like yours.
Yeahyeah blah blah blah, possitive, hater, hating, play game on YT, you’re like a broken record, a retrded broken record. When will you do us the favour of disappearing from this website i wonder…
I only repeat what you wrote multiple times now, and you wrote you see no difference between “playing” games on YT, and playing actual game. It cant go more absurd than that, yet you see nothing wrong with your fake opinions.
You only repeat what your malfunctioning brain can elaborate, which is pretty much bullsh** and bad english.
I said i don’t have to play a game of this caliber (a sh** one) to understand it’s a pile of garbage, i already know it is, a gameplay video is sufficient for me since i have years and years of experience in this (i’ve been doing basically only this for more than half of my life) you on the other hand have fishfood for brains and you need to go through the entire game, and the sad thing is you like it too! You don’t understand we’re at different levels, despite i explained that to you several times, you’re still at kid’s-videogame level, i passed that 10 years ago.
It’s too bad you’re good only at remembering stuff you understood with your incapable brain
Yes, no doubts you have more experience than all DSOG reviewers, not to mention other reviewers from different sites all around the world, who unlike you can see not only negatives, but possitives as well. But of course you know everything better thanks to your experience amd imagination. Good luck with playing games on YT :).
I was actually referring to you, but yeah i’m pretty sure i have more experience than most of them actually.
Come on! Ask what i’m expecting from a chicken brain like yourself, do it.
If you really belive so then do it, you can always ask John for a job, tell him you have more experience than his reviewers (himself included) and I’m sure he will hire you ;). You will write reviews in one sentence and you will not even need to play actual games to write articles about them! Maybe you can review next assassis creed already right now before game is even announced :D. It will be a good game?
What an idiot and a TOXIC kid this “luckynumber8” guy is ! This is the third time he has attacked me, with no absolute reason whatsoever.
He seems to be frustrated from the inside, and tries to find some outlet to vent out his rage/anger. Just because I up-voted some other guy, with whom he disagrees !
He is one of the Worst cancerous human beings I’ve ever met and talked to, at least over the INTERNET. That’s true for sure.
He’s just troubled.
Btw, an update. Why all of his comments have been DELETED ? Did he remove his own comment, or one of MOD/admin did this ?
Kind of strange.
No idea…His parents probably took the pc away from him…
lol….
Your “review” was short because you havent played the actual game, and you cant tell nothing constructive. You hate AC Odyssey just because it’s next AC game. But of course some people will upvote your posts because like you they dont to play real games, they prefer only to watch YT gameplays.
Despite what you might have seen about its grind (d’uh, who the hell doesn’t do secondary missions and just goes for the main story in an RPG?), lots of AC fans WHO HAVE PLAYED IT consider this to be one of the best in the saga and ARE ASKING FOR THE NEXT ONES TO BE LIKE THIS (plus with a great female protagonist like Kassandra), way better than Origins too (and cannot be compared to it directly, just graphically, performance and UI wise), right there with AC II. What you wrote here is called prejudice, as you’re saying them not to do something when you haven’t actually tried it. This game is not a copypaste, AT FIRST it looks so similar to Origins because both were going to form one big game but were split into two at some point.
Yery good review, because you talked about possitves and negatives at the same time, and most importantly compared to the vast majority of AC Odyssey haters you actually really played the actual game and not base your conclusions on YT gameplays alone.
It’s not his review. It was KYLE GREER who wrote this. not nick. lol
Thanks for correcting me :). So KYLE, very good review and I hope to see more articles from you.
Indeed !
Compared to what? Compared to most AAA games released in 2018, id say its the best one, of course that doesnt say much considering how many trash came out in 2018 but this is by far the best open world rpg that came out in 2018. Wait when did kingdom come dliverance came out?
Thank you for the honesty, unlike sites trying to kiss up to AAA. Intentionally Placed Grind is 100% there and used as both padding/filler and as a way to break the game to sell MTXs that fix it all. Also the leveling is not actually leveling but a number used to gate everything.
Level 30 chickens should not exist.
“Level 30 chickens should not exist”
Cant wait for the DLC where they incrase the chickens lvl cap and….
10/10 IGN
If it’s anything like Origins, I can’t wait to play it.
The people saying AC sucks now crack me up. Since Unity they have been beautiful to look at and increasingly more complex and enjoyable. The world crafting and environments alone are incredible and worth every penny.
The only thing I can think is these people must be unable to run at any graphics setting other than minimum, and they are only interested in speed-running the main quest to get it over with.
I kind of enjoyed playing ORIGINS though, but the first 2 games in this entire AC series remain my all time favorite.. 😀
I loved playing Assassin’s Creed II. One of the best the AC franchise had to offer.
Nice to see that “Intentionally Placed Grind”, is still considered a con. So tired of “AAA” games like this (which is to say, almost all of them). I just can’t be bothered with this trash.
Fantastic review buddy!
wow…a site actually mentioning the b.s. grind thusfar it had only been youtubers calling ubisoft out on that crap. honestly most forms of “news” media these days are such trash.
it seems that it`s been cracked today too https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7ff04815073dc6aa2808542b83e18285b42f3fee4ec9e17b882a2c0b9da4e84d.gif
Really ??
Micro-transactions and stupid AI wouldnt necessarily ruin a game for me. I don’t mind the grind and as for stupid AI well i can think of at least one or two AAA in the past few months that suffer from the same.
What really grinds my gears is the way in which life in the Hellenistic Period is depicted.
Who the hell told these people they can portray Greeks as if they just teleported from South of India? Who told them that Athens or any Hellenistic city states were multi-cultural hubs with homosexuals roaming about doing their thing without a care in the world.
I watched the trailer for Troy by Netflix and i was happy to notice the negative reviews and the comments regarding the twisting of history there. Very few sites reported on and very few comments draw attention to the additional “color” added in AC.
Though AC is not some historical documentary it does at the very least draw its influence from history. Even if one was to stretch the idea of the fact that Spartan women were trained for self defense so as to provide female fighting women, one cannot paint whatever color they want an entire race and expect that people wont notice or get pissed. I am actually surprised that it isnt @john papadopoulos (dunno how to tag him in this) that is reviewing this game. I wouldnt buy AC Odyssey if it was for a dollar and i am super happy that it got cracked yesterday. Rant done.