It's finally here. Who wants to kick some balls, and who am I kidding, the legendary spartan kick THIS IS SPARTAAAAAAAA, or the good old sailing days in AC : Black Flag . Yes, am talking about the latest installment Assassin's Creed: Odyssey in the AC series by Ubisoft. Ubisoft have been working on this since origins, no doubts their efforts have paid off. AC Origins was itself a pleasant refresh to the entire series, it brought in the new RPG, combat system that was well received. AC Odyssey is an update down the same line.
AC Odyssey takes just 100 years before Origins during the Peloponnesian war between Sparta and Athens( For more information on the war, please refer the following link for a quick headstart - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peloponnesian_War" ). At this point you may be like its same as Origins. Let me state that it's not the case. Let's see what's new in this edition, there are quite many new additions.
Your Choices
At the beginning of the game, you get to decide your character, either the female lead, Kassandra, or the male, Alexios. This is because of two possible combinations from the available DNA at the start of game. My Personal favorite is Kassandra, admit it I want to see her kick some big balls :p . Your choice as a gender won't affect the main story line. Gone are those days when we used to skip discussion with an NPC. You even get to choose your next response and it will have its own consequences. Lying, falling in love, betraying are some of the actions with NPC, which makes every conversation or so important as it has its consequences. I have read about one bizarre side quest, where you get to kill one person and then mate with his son. It's completely up to you on how you wanna portray yourself either as a ruthless killer or a good Samaritan. Keep in mind if your goal is to be a good Samaritan, it's not easy to please everyone, there will always be people who are pissed at your decisions.
The main story is itself branched, and based on your choices the story takes its course- Personally, I will definitely play out all the branches. Ubisoft team has really considered all the historical events and well knitted the story around it. This means a potential for a lot of contents for the gamers.
Conquest Battle
You heard it right. This time we are going to have large scale between Athens, Sparta forces. Your task is to side with one and help them vanquish the others. To initiate the war you need to lower the nations power, this can be done by killing leaders/soldiers, burning supplies and looting the nation treasure. As you do all this, the nation power reduces and when it hits 0 you unlock the conquest battle. Depending on the side you choose, the rewards will vary. You start with few soldiers, once you have killed quite a few, you have successfully lured the leaders. Now be ready to take them out. Oh did I forget, not only the experience points, you get enemy loot and some decent war prizes( armor piece,legendary weapons). I am eagerly waiting to have a go at this war.
Good old seaways
Who likes to wander the sea singing the old songs, looking over the horizon. Yes the very best of AC Black Flag is back completely in Odyssey (only a glimpse in Origins ☹). It makes perfect sense since most of the map is covered with water. Since it's around 400 BC, we will have arrows as our primary weapons. You get to choose whom you want to recruit to your ship. You can assign Lieutenant for your ships with their own perks. You can also customize the look and feel of the crew. To put it in one point, all the customization from Black Flag are back accordingly and with many more new features. Looking forward to go sail away in the vast ocean.
Humongous Map
I have to say this, Odyssey has the biggest map in the entire series , roughly around 130 square km which is 1.5 times more than Assassin'. With beautiful beaches, dense forests, shivering snow caps Assassin's Creed Odyssey is a blend of all these mesmerizing views. So rich and detailed that there are a lot of side quests. Now the total game time rounds up close to 50 hours, which is only the main story, if the side quests are included then its goes up far beyond 50. Sure you can say I will skip all the unnecessary dialogues which brings down the time to around 30 + hours. Well we need to travel through different points, but with such a beautiful world I would use the fast travel pretty less.
RPG
If you thought AC Origins, so called, RPG system is complex, then say goodbye to the new system. There are a lot of customization, lets start with clothing. The type of clothing you choose will have their own pay offs. With a variety of weapons, where a spear will be the initial weapon for the player, different play styles can be achieved. You can even engrave your weapons as to get additional traits. As you level up, you need to keep upgrading your weapon, or get a weapon of the according level.
The skill tree is a bit similar like Origins with the 3 main strings as Hunter, Warrior, Assassin. There are lot of new skills, some of my favorite are spartan kick, grabbing shield, fast assassination, health regeneration. Now you can assign upto 4 of these abilities as hot keys, each of which will consume some adrenaline. The combination of these abilities will define your game style as a Assassin or a Hunter or a Warrior. There are a lot of skills to choose, now don't worry if you don't like the skills you can always reset them, without loosing any skill points, for a small fee - that's a welcome change. This means at any point you can completely change your game style accordingly.
Gone are the days when you feel lonely as an Assassin in the game. Remember that all your actions have consequences, in this version a ,so called, naughty meter keeps track of your mischief. As it builds up, a bounty is placed on your head. The more crimes you do higher the bounty. As the bounty builds up a lot of mercenaries will come after you for the prize on your head. Now if you are at a suitable level you can fight off these mercenaries else I suggest to pay them off. They might attach you from any where, so you will have to be always on your guard.
Final Verdict
Odyssey is a much-welcomed update to an already successful system in Origins. Odyssey is more aligned to the RPG play style kinda similar to The Witcher style - in my opinion. With all these new features this game is going to be a major milestone in Assassin's Creed timeline. Ubisoft have also confirmed that there will be a lot of post-game release content that goes well with all the Greek myths and keep the fans engaged. Personally, I am eagerly excited to play this game. I will write up another blog about my impression after some gameplay.