Year after year, Ubisoft had consistently turned out an ‘Assassin’s Creed’ game. Obviously, this led to the franchise feeling stale, so the company put the game on a year break and made a comeback with 2017’s ‘Assassin’s Creed: Origins’. In many ways, that new entry differentiated itself from the previous ones, adding new RPG mechanics that were appreciated but ultimately weren’t enough. Enter ‘Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey’, the game that took those mechanics and fleshed them out a bit more. Add in a coherent narrative and a more focused RPG system and we have ourselves a solid game, right? Well, not exactly. Although this game was decent for the most part, issues from previous entries and shady business practices held it back from being something good.

What most Ubisoft open-world games suffer from is repetitiveness and a lack of variety. However, the ‘Assassin’s Creed’ franchise has always been the biggest culprit of this. Even though I found ‘Odyssey’ to be no as egregious, it was still plagued with repetitive busy work. Towards the end of my journey XP began to feel less and less abundant. I constantly found myself having to partake in tons of side-activities because many of the main-quests were blocked off due to a level gap. This was my main issue for sure, because if the game never forced me to take up side-quests then I would have found the pacing to be much more fluid and controlled. This grind towards the end screeched the game to a halt, and from there on I wasn’t having much fun. This was disappointing since before this XP wall I found myself having some fun with the side content.

Side-missions were an improvement from ‘Origins’. Some of them were multi-layered and presented me with some fun objectives and challenges. But not all of them were like that. A good chunk of them consisted of fetching an item or talking to people to find someone. However, good or bad, the one aspect that plagued these side-missions was definitely the dialogue and characters. I found a few of the people I met to be interesting and well voice acted. Some of them, though, not so much. Since the game introduced a dialogue system to the franchise, conversations were a bit more dynamic, which was appreciated. Yet this also led to some really awkward or unfocused interactions. They even added romance options for certain NPC’s, and they were by far the most cringe-worthy aspect of the dialogue. Many times I was interacting with someone who had a serious problem they were facing, and one of my dialogue options would be to flirt. I mean I did find this aspect to be pretty terribly funny, but nonetheless it completely sucked me out of the experience.

Side-quests weren’t the only string of activities available, however. Military bases made a comeback with more varying amounts of difficulty and fun to be had. Once you clear out a certain amount of bases in a single region, then the ability to join the sides of either Sparta or Athens to aid them in a battle against each other was unlocked. These battles were pretty underwhelming, sadly. It mostly consisted of killing a certain amount of the enemy team to win, which was a let down since I found them to be a neat concept. But if you’re not partaking in side-quests or large-scale battles, the return of hunting and collectibles were available to check off the list. Hunting was still unengaging and boring since all you did was point and shoot at them with a bow to kill them. From there, selling the pelt for currency was pretty much all you can do with it. And as for collectibles, they were extremely bland and unremarkable, so I never found any incentive to find them. There was a lot more side-content the game had to offer. But I just don’t feel like discussing them since there is nothing to say about them. Like I said, most of the game felt like busy work, like checking stuff off a list, so consistency in fun factor was very rocky for me.

The one element that I did have more consistent fun with, for a while, was the open-world exploration and combat. From a purely visual standpoint, the game was absolutely beautiful drawing me to explore and see the gorgeous vistas and landscapes. However, it wasn’t all flash and no substance. The lands of Ancient Greece were home to many caves, cities, and shipwrecks. On my journey across the islands and through these locations, many combat and stealth scenarios came into play. The stealth system here felt much more fluid as animations were seamless for quick kills. However, getting caught meant combat was a guarantee. Combat, here, was genuinely fun, mostly due to the upgrade system. Using skill-points you could unlock special moves such as the “Spartan Kick”, which is self-explanatory. These special moves added a more strategic approach since you had to conserve your energy bar to execute one. As for the regular sword to sword combat, I found it to be decent. Nothing great, but a solid combat system that did feel a bit clunky from time to time. Ship combat even made a return, with more customizable options and the ability to manage your crew, which was a welcomed edition. All this sounds great, and it was, for the first ten or so hours. After that point, it was the same game-play loop for the rest of it. Just like the XP grinding and side-content, this aspect started to become pretty stale by the end. This mostly had to do with the enemies being complete tanks, often soaking up thousands of damage points. This effectively made many of the encounters towards the end of the game to feel tiresome and even boring.

The one aspect that stayed, mostly, interesting throughout was the narrative. ‘Odyssey’ chose to put a larger focus on a multi-pathed narrative. This new “choose your path” narrative element was a welcomed addition, but one that came with some clunky and messy story beats. A couple of times the plot tried to focus on too many things at once. One moment I’m dealing with a cult searching for a powerful item and the next moment I’m fighting a war for Sparta. I found that aspect to be the most jarring, however, as a whole I found the story-line this time around to be much more interesting and less formulaic than the previous games. I’d say the biggest thing holding it back was the dialogue once again, but it didn’t drag the narrative that much except when it came to missions centered around it. I was happy that the game didn’t follow the basic revenge plot that almost every ‘Assassin’s Creed’ game followed. This time it was a bit more complicated and open-ended which had a lot to do with the dialogue system. The system, here, was better than how it worked in the side-missions. Since some of the options actually affected the outcome of some of the story. Some of the time there was no drastic change, but when it came to certain decisions, they had quite a bit of effect on the over-arching narrative. That was the biggest pleasant surprise, and it really helped make the story less linear, which effectively made it more interesting for me, even if it was convoluted at times.

By the end of my thirty-hour adventure through Ancient Greece, I was exhausted. The game had overstayed its welcome, and all in all, my journey felt forgettable. I never felt as if I needed to go back and keep on exploring because I had already experienced everything there was in the first ten hours. Potential was clearly visible, but the Ubisoft open-world formula bogged it down to where the game, in the end, was pretty generic.

Conclusion: I enjoyed the first 10 hours or so for the most part. But it dragged on and felt more like a grind as I continued to play. More of a disappointment for me.

Year after year, Ubisoft had consistently turned out an ‘Assassin’s Creed’ game. Obviously, this led to the franchise feeling stale, so the company put the game on a year break and made a comeback with 2017’s ‘Assassin’s Creed Origins’. In many ways, that new entry differentiated itself from the previous entries, adding new RPG mechanics that were appreciated but ultimately weren’t enough. Enter ‘Assassin’s Creed Odyssey’, the game that took those mechanics and fleshed them out more. Add in a decent narrative and a more focused RPG system and we have ourselves a solid game…mostly. Although this game was solid, issues from previous entries and shady business practices held it back from being something great.

What most Ubisoft open-world games suffer from is repetitiveness and a lack of variety. However, the ‘Assassin’s Creed’ franchise was always the biggest culprit of this. Luckily, ‘Odyssey put a larger focus on multi-layered side-quests, open-world exploration, and combat. As for the side-quests, although not brilliantly written, most of them brought upon semi-interesting stories with fun objectives and worth-while rewards in terms of weaponry. As for the other reward, XP, I found it to be lacking in the amount that was given. It always took a lot of XP to level up, and it was important for using new weapons and fighting certain enemies. But the quests never rewarded much, artificially adding play time. As I said, I enjoyed most of the side-quests, but there were also some quests that weren’t enjoyable but provided with a lot more XP. And even then, it wasn’t enough to get me to further levels at a reasonable rate. Like I mentioned before, I enjoyed the side-quests, but for people who don’t enjoy them, I found it a cheap way to squeeze money out of them with XP boosts.

The one element that I had more consistent fun with was the open-world exploration and combat. From a purely visual standpoint, the game was absolutely beautiful drawing me to explore and see the gorgeous vistas and landscapes. However, it wasn’t all flash and no substance. The lands of Ancient Greece were home to many caves, cities, shipwrecks, and military bases. All of which contained valuable loot and weapons that could be sold or used to aid you in combat. Military bases usually contained the most useful items, more specifically weapons. But, obtaining these items usually meant you had to engage in stealth or combat. The stealth system here felt much more fluid as animations were seamless for quick kills. However, getting caught meant combat was about to break out. Combat, here, was genuinely fun, mostly due to the upgrade system. Using skill-points you can unlock special moves such as the “Spartan Kick”, which is self-explanatory. These special moves added a more strategic approach since you had to conserve your energy bar to execute a single move. As for the regular sword to sword combat, I found it to be decent. Nothing great, but a solid combat system that did feel a bit clunky from time to time.

Combat was not the only thing that was affected by clunkiness. ‘Odyssey’ chose to put a larger focus on a multi-pathed narrative. This new “choose your path” narrative element was a welcomed addition, but one that came with some clunky story beats. A couple of times the plot tried to focus on too many things. One moment you’re dealing with a cult and the next your fighting a war with Sparta. I found that aspect to be the most jarring, however, as a whole I found the story-line this time around to be much more interesting and less formulaic than the previous games. I’d say the biggest thing holding it back was the dialogue, but it didn’t drag it that much. I was happy that the game didn’t follow the basic revenge plot that almost every ‘Assassin’s Creed’ game followed. This time it was more complicated and open-ended which had a lot to do with the dialogue tree system. What was surprising, though, was how the dialogue options actually affected the story. Some of the time there was no drastic change, but when it came to certain decisions, they had quite a bit of effect on the over-arching narrative. That was the biggest pleasant surprise, and it really helped make the story less linear, which effectively made it more interesting for me.

I’ve never been a huge fan of the ‘Assassin’s Creed’ franchise before this one. But after ‘Origins’ I found the series had potential to make a comeback. Although I wouldn’t call this game amazing it had the potential to be. The foundation is clearly here, I just wished Ubisoft would have let this game breath instead of forcing XP grinding as a ploy to sell microtransactions. In the future I hope this team of developers get to make their game, because they have the potential to make ‘Assassin’s Creed’ game of the year material.

I’ve been playing this game since around midnight when it was officially released. Although I wanted to do a “24 hours in” review, I can’t wait another two and a half hours to gush about this game!

When Origins came out a year ago, it was immediately my favourite Assassin’s Creed game. Prior to that, Black Flag was the one I preferred. Well, Odyssey did the impossible and beat out Origins. I was expecting it to be good at the very least, but I was sure all the extreme praise was just overhyping the game. I’ve heard everyone talking about how every action you do has consequences and how your involvement in the world really matters. Yeah, I’ve heard that before. Heck, Life is Strange has a message at the start of the game that says something to that effect. But really it only means certain things you do at specific times matter, and you always know when that is. “Oh, this is one of Those Moments. Better decide carefully”.

Not with Odyssey. Every choice you make, big or small, effects the world around you. That’s not exaggeration. This game might even be more replayable than Skyrim, in terms of outcomes. At least, that’s my opinion as of writing this, having played the game less than 24 hours. I’m already planning on playing it again once I’ve completed it and done everything I can, only so I can go through and make different choices.

Speaking of Skyrim, in that game you can choose which faction you want to join, and you’re stuck with that choice the rest of your playthrough. I thought that’d be the case in this game when I heard you’d be able choose to join the Spartans or the Athenians. Well, turns out you can play both sides. You’re a mercenary! Personally, I want to join the Athenians, but I don’t want the Spartans to hate me because I MEAN HAVE YOU SEEN 300?!?! So I’m making them think I am helping them, while letting their enemies escape. So it actually feels like I’m a double agent. And it’s not what Ubisoft intended the story to be. I CHOSE to do that, and the game let me. When they said you control your destiny, they really meant it.

Sailing is back! And it feels like it did in Black Flag! Granted, a little less technologically advanced because it’s Ancient Greece, but that was the easiest part for me to jump into.

This map is huge! seriously, Kephallonia (the “Siwa” of this title) is large enough that I actually thought that was the main area. Once I set out to see, I found out that I was very wrong, I could see the map, but it wasn’t until I set sail that I realise I could zoom out, and when I did my jaw dropped. I cannot wait to explore all of it!

The game also looks better than Origins does, as you’d expect with it being newer and all. I’ve already taken several awesome photos with the photo mode. Wish I could post them here, but by the time I thought of it the screenshots had already been maxed out.

There’s a new optional system here you can choose to use at the beginning. You can either use the traditional guided system where you get a quest and it tells you where it is, or you can use the new “exploration” system, where you use dialogue clues to figure out where the objective location is. That probably sounds awful, and I thought so at first, but once you use it you’ll see it actually adds to the immersion. Like, when someone gives you a quest, you can ask them where to find the bandit leader (for example), and they’ll say something like, “I’m not sure, but I hear he’s east of the statue of Zeus”. You pull up the map and see a “?” to the east of where the statue of Zeus is and head there. Or maybe you’ve already discovered the bandit camp and it shows there’s a bandit camp to the east of the statue. (this was just an example. I don’t think there’s a bandit camp to the east of the statue).

I do have a few complaints, though they’re not very big. In fact, one of the biggest complaints just happens to be with the directions given. Sometimes they’ll say something like, “It’s to the east of the coast of Greek-name-I-forgot”, and I look and it’s actually to the west of that coast. It does throw me off occasionally, but it doesn’t happen often enough that it’s that big of an issue.

Some of the new mechanics are a little confusing at first, but I’m sure with use it’ll become second nature. Like, the ability skills are LT+A, B, Y, and X, or LB+A, B, Y, and X. You can map the ability skills to whichever one you want, and in the heat of a fight it’s confusing and I keep pressing the wrong buttons. But again, new mechanic I’ve only used for less than 24 hours. If I update this review in a couple months I’ll probably be laughing that I was struggling so much with it. Skyrim’s controls baffled me at first, and I ended up trying to jump with Y in other games for awhile.

All in all, I think this game is definitely worth a buy. It takes the best parts of the entire series and adds it’s own thing.