Oh man, the mercenaries in Odyssey that will hunt you down if you gain notoriety by acting like a douche are described as Orgins phylakes meets Shadow of Mordor's Nemesis system. Nice! Every game is populated by 50 mercs of various difficulty. There's some handcrafted mercenaries, and the rest are randomly generated. You'll never completely clear the map of them, since a new one will take the place of the one you killed.
If you have one you don't feel like fighting, you can pay off the bounty on your head or you can track down the person who put the bounty on you and kill them. This wipes out the contract for your life.
I'm starting to wonder just how well this game is going to hold together. It has so many awesome features operating in tandem that I wonder if it's going to feel bloated and over-complicated like Shadow of War. Benefit of the doubt, for now.
Well, at least you have to gain notoriety to attract attention. You probably wont have to stop every three seconds to listen to a Merc go "RANGE-AH!" :P
Everyone has a price. Throw enough gold around and someone will risk disintegration.
+1
DemonStaceyTTODewback's DaughterIn love with the TaySwayRegistered Userregular
"To recruit crew, first knock them out and then attach a fulton balloon send them to your quartermaster"
oh no, I'm doomed to spend way too long on this
Yeah, that sounds about right.
You wouldn't believe the amount of people that used to have the shit beat out of them and then just wake up to find out they're working on a damn boat for the foreseeable future.
Well, at least you have to gain notoriety to attract attention. You probably wont have to stop every three seconds to listen to a Merc go "RANGE-AH!" :P
And then at the end of the game: Uber Commander Agrapos [Rank: *****/***** | Level: 50 | Invincible to Ranged, Melee, Stealth, Assassination, Fire, Gravity, Water, and Apples of Eden | Summons Invincible Shadow Clones | 25% Chance to Corrupt Save File on Hit]
OK so I just "100%ed" Assassin's Creed Odyssey. This means all achievements, all location completed including in the DLC, all the puzzles solved, all abilities, etc. No hints, either, which I'm slightly proud of as some of the papyri puzzles were pretty slick brainteasers. The only things I didn't do: I did not complete my final Club Challenge, which requires you to purchase all the Club Rewards. Since I already beat the thing, I see no reason to waste 320 Uplay points on rewards I'll never use, just to tick a box. I also didn't complete all the Discovery Tours - just enough to complete all the achievements.
My playtime was 99:18. Definitely played for well over 100 hours, though, considering the tours I did do plus the 10 hours I originally played when it released.
The bad: Ultimately, I don't like the direction the series went in. I feel like there's just too much content and this creates severe pacing issues with the main narrative for players. One could argue that this puts pacing into the player's hands, but I personally feel the developers/designers should be guiding the player through the narrative rather than just throwing all this content at them and telling them to go nuts, at their own pace. There's nothing wrong with boundaries, even in a sandbox game, and they can improve the experience. I feel the more recent games lack that guidance - ever since Unity, perhaps. For me, I prefer narrative to gameplay. Not that the narrative is weak in Origins, it's just a bit unfocused, or at least it gives the player too much leeway for it to feel unfocused. I basically did everything possible - every location and sidequest and puzzle and whatever - before even completing Chapter 2. When I did go back and play through the main story from Chapter 2 to the end, the narrative felt very short, a little jumpy, and I think the emotional impact certain story beats could have otherwise provided was...muffled as a result. Sure, I chose to play it that way so I'm partially responsible for that, but I think they should have made different decisions here.
Also, the step away from the modern day narrative is something I dislike. I feel like they made a half-hearted attempt here but it just trailed into nothingness. I said I didn't look up any hints, and that's true, but I did google if I had missed something in the modern day stuff because it seemed to just abruptly stop, like mid-sentence. Like the modern day stuff ghosted on me.
Also also, the lack of walk/run speed differences really fucked with my brain. I'm not sure if I felt like Bayek was too slow or his speed was just fine but it was...weird and offputting. Swimming was way too slow, though. I hated every single time I had to go across islands, entering deep(ish) water to do so.
And...too much loot. It's certainly not as bad as Diablo 3 was at launch, but by the end of the game, my Bayek was carrying thousands of weapons around. Pointless.
The good: The engine, the RPG elements, the characters, the graphics/aesthetic/beauty, the narrative (aside from pacing issues and the modern day weirdness), etc. were all top notch. The world was extremely well-crafted. The Discovery Tour stuff is genius and I will come back to it eventually. Despite my long-winded negative comments, I think this is definitely one of the best of the series. I don't really like the direction they took the series in, but since we'll never get another AC2/Brotherhood-type Assassin's Creed, I can live with this. It's good. It's really good.
I just preordered the Ultimate Edition of Assassin's Creed Odyssey. $120 is rather insane, though, but whatever.
Switch: SW-7690-2320-9238Steam/PSN/Xbox: Drezdar
+3
Dr. ChaosPost nuclear nuisanceRegistered Userregular
edited August 2018
Man, I really hope the database is back in Odyssey. It was so needed for Origins.
I liked reading up/learning up on the regions and history as I played the game and seeing those areas for the first time in the actual playthrough.
The older ones definitely did. I can't recall if Origins did, though.
Now that I think about it, the way older ones definitely did. Like the Ezio games, but I don't recall Black Flag, Unity or Syndicate having or not having them.
Everyone has a price. Throw enough gold around and someone will risk disintegration.
0
SnicketysnickThe Greatest Hype Man inWesterosRegistered Userregular
Okay, you meant you 100% Origins. That freaked me out for a second
Yes. Whoops. Lol
Bullshit!
How did you get it early? Who are you working with? Is it Abstergo?!
Haha no I mean he was right that I meant Origins not Odyssey.
I was waiting for a week to make that post after I dawdled on getting that final, 67th achievement after finishing everything else (the 20 Daily Life discovery tours) and then just rushed through my write up. And I had just prepurchased the Expensive Edition of Odyssey before I wrote the post so I just transposed in my head.
Switch: SW-7690-2320-9238Steam/PSN/Xbox: Drezdar
0
SnicketysnickThe Greatest Hype Man inWesterosRegistered Userregular
"On Assassin's, we had a game [in 2018] and we have one this year, but we are not going to have a full-fledged Assassin's next year," said Guillemot. "It's just because the team were working separately, so we have two games now, one year after the other. But next year you're not going to have a fully fledged one."
Asked whether this meant there would be a spin-off title or something smaller instead of a brand new, fully fledged entry in the Assassin's Creed series, Guillemot confirmed that this would not be the case either.
"What you'll have is lots of content coming on [Assassin's Creed Odyssey]. The team really want to give, on a regular basis, some new possibilities for play, so when you get [Odyssey] this year, you're going to get in for a couple of years, actually."
Which is a good thing I think, a more considered approach does seem to have produced a more substantial game, so I'm all for it.
Honestly what I want from AC games is a bit more challenge and a higher skill ceiling. I think some of the older games had some nuance and required a bit of understanding that you weren't expected to get things right the first time.
Climbing for me was a real highlight of the series until around AC4, where they basically removed any timing or challenge when it comes to parkour. Challenge Rooms suddenly became a lot less exciting because it was a lot harder to ever mess up and lose progress.
Combat I'm a bit more mixed on. The Origins style certainly looks fine and I know lots of folks dig it, which is cool. For me personally I just don't like the level system. It felt like a cop out the devs went with after people abused the hell out of stealth kills and combos in the Ezio games. To me the last game with really fun combat and at least semi-interesting climbing was Unity, but obviously that game had bigger issues.
I think the writing has been decidely "meh" since AC3, and for as much crap as Desmond stuff got I kinda miss it now. AC3 is also the closest we ever really got to a modern day set AC title, those sections as Desmond were neat if a little bland.
Tbh the only consistently badass thing is the setting and level design, which never really seems to let me down. Like I haven't scooped Origins yet but I totally will when I see it for $20 just to walk around Egypt and fuck with animals and stuff
Honestly what I want from AC games is a bit more challenge and a higher skill ceiling. I think some of the older games had some nuance and required a bit of understanding that you weren't expected to get things right the first time.
Climbing for me was a real highlight of the series until around AC4, where they basically removed any timing or challenge when it comes to parkour. Challenge Rooms suddenly became a lot less exciting because it was a lot harder to ever mess up and lose progress.
Combat I'm a bit more mixed on. The Origins style certainly looks fine and I know lots of folks dig it, which is cool. For me personally I just don't like the level system. It felt like a cop out the devs went with after people abused the hell out of stealth kills and combos in the Ezio games. To me the last game with really fun combat and at least semi-interesting climbing was Unity, but obviously that game had bigger issues.
I think the writing has been decidely "meh" since AC3, and for as much crap as Desmond stuff got I kinda miss it now. AC3 is also the closest we ever really got to a modern day set AC title, those sections as Desmond were neat if a little bland.
Tbh the only consistently badass thing is the setting and level design, which never really seems to let me down. Like I haven't scooped Origins yet but I totally will when I see it for $20 just to walk around Egypt and fuck with animals and stuff
Origins really does set a high bar for environments, among other things. It’s not as immediately fun as Black Flag, but it soars, oh how it soars, as you stick with it.
I never made it to the soaring part in Origins. I lost interest pretty quick. I didn't feel that in the earliest part of the game that Bayek was a very compelling character and I didn't find his murder/revenge plot to be a particularly engaging story.
+2
Linespider5ALL HAIL KING KILLMONGERRegistered Userregular
I never made it to the soaring part in Origins. I lost interest pretty quick. I didn't feel that in the earliest part of the game that Bayek was a very compelling character and I didn't find his murder/revenge plot to be a particularly engaging story.
Absolutely fair. The beginning is clunky, both narrative and gameplay-wise. There’s also the weird in media res thing they do...like they were trying to tease out the truth but Bayek just isn’t very compelling before they finally let you actually get to know him.
Linespider5 on
0
-Loki-Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining.Registered Userregular
Origins you needed to get to Alexandria, IMO. Siwa and the little town after it felt really constricted. Once you reached Alexandria it started to open and felt much more like an Assassins Creed game.
I just beat Origins the other day. I can't say I ever reached a point where it clicked with me. It's a good game, but it lacks whatever certain something that made the previous games compelling.
I expect I'll keep chipping away at it until I "complete" it, since I've 100% every previous AC game so far. I'm tempted to pick up the Ezio Trilogy afterwards, to see if those games are what I remember. I have strong feelings about each of the AC games, but I've never actually gone back to any of them after I finishing them, since there's always been another game around the corner.
I have to say that as much as I enjoyed Origins, I got to the first DLC (The Hidden Ones) and just stopped. For me, most AC games suffer from an endgame that's too protracted and that offers little that is new; Origins was somewhat different in that the final area felt distinctly new and different, but THO is very much a typical example of "More of the same"-style DLC. I know that The Curse of the Pharaohs is supposed to mix things up, but I don't particularly like skipping parts of a story, so for the moment I think I've had my fill of Assassin's Creed. Accordingly, while I like much of what I've heard about Odyssey, I don't think I'll be getting it at launch.
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
I ate up all of origins and the dlc and adored it on pretty much every level. And I'll be one of those idiots who buys the super mega ultra pack of odyssey because I know I'll play all of it cos I have problems
I have to say that as much as I enjoyed Origins, I got to the first DLC (The Hidden Ones) and just stopped. For me, most AC games suffer from an endgame that's too protracted and that offers little that is new; Origins was somewhat different in that the final area felt distinctly new and different, but THO is very much a typical example of "More of the same"-style DLC. I know that The Curse of the Pharaohs is supposed to mix things up, but I don't particularly like skipping parts of a story, so for the moment I think I've had my fill of Assassin's Creed. Accordingly, while I like much of what I've heard about Odyssey, I don't think I'll be getting it at launch.
If it makes you feel any better, The Hidden Ones felt like a genuine coda on the story in the main game, while Curse of the Pharaohs feels like a weird extended sidequest.
No other series gives me my historical walking and stabbing simulator. As popular as the series is, really no one puts you physically in an open world in the French revolution or ancient Greece (or hell, the best pirate game in years), so I'm sure I'll pick up Odyssey at some point. But I'm equally sure it won't be at launch. Too many burns from Ubi and the series quality has been too shaky (AC3 and Unity mostly) to trust full price at launch.
Super stoked about what Odyssey is showing, but definitely picking up on a sale.
No other series gives me my historical walking and stabbing simulator. As popular as the series is, really no one puts you physically in an open world in the French revolution or ancient Greece (or hell, the best pirate game in years), so I'm sure I'll pick up Odyssey at some point. But I'm equally sure it won't be at launch. Too many burns from Ubi and the series quality has been too shaky (AC3 and Unity mostly) to trust full price at launch.
Super stoked about what Odyssey is showing, but definitely picking up on a sale.
Yeah, I don't know how they'd fit it into the mythology but I'd love to see future installments set in Tenochtitlan or Nineveh or Anuradhapura or something.
+1
Dr. ChaosPost nuclear nuisanceRegistered Userregular
I still don't understand what witchcraft they learned or dark god they bargained with to make sailing and ship combat as fun as it was in Black Flag.
I don't know how I feel about Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Assassin's Creed Odyssey selling 2 day early access. But I guess it's moot since the editions I preordered have that.
Do you guys think I can 100% Odyssey in 2 days? It's probably only 80-90 hours long.
I have to say that as much as I enjoyed Origins, I got to the first DLC (The Hidden Ones) and just stopped. For me, most AC games suffer from an endgame that's too protracted and that offers little that is new; Origins was somewhat different in that the final area felt distinctly new and different, but THO is very much a typical example of "More of the same"-style DLC. I know that The Curse of the Pharaohs is supposed to mix things up, but I don't particularly like skipping parts of a story, so for the moment I think I've had my fill of Assassin's Creed. Accordingly, while I like much of what I've heard about Odyssey, I don't think I'll be getting it at launch.
If it makes you feel any better, The Hidden Ones felt like a genuine coda on the story in the main game, while Curse of the Pharaohs feels like a weird extended sidequest.
Curse of the Pharaohs was really, really good in my opinion.
Switch: SW-7690-2320-9238Steam/PSN/Xbox: Drezdar
+1
SnicketysnickThe Greatest Hype Man inWesterosRegistered Userregular
Curse of the Pharaohs was definitely its own stand alone thing really, but it was a fantastic experience, I don't usually literally gasp at video game scenery that often any more but it made me do so on multiple occasions.
Thinking about foregoing stealth completely in Odyssey.
I mean, you're playing as a greek frontline soldier in a war hundreds of years before the brotherhood was a thing. Fuck it, right?
Go all out with that spear thing.
Yea my goal is to focus on the warrior tree and find the coolest swords and just beat everyone down that gets in my way. I keep hearing the combat feels really good so I might as well make use of it. A few of the upgrades in the assassin tree see decent for regular combat as well so I'll use some of those for my extra points.
0
Dr. ChaosPost nuclear nuisanceRegistered Userregular
edited August 2018
Well, I say that but I haven't been super into the bits of combat I have been in Origins so far. I appreciate that it feels like theres a real threat of danger vs just countering everything to death in previous games though. Its abit rough but its a start.
Scepters are pretty nice aswell. I turned Bayek into a deadly monk with one of those things on the moments I've been caught.
Posts
I'm starting to wonder just how well this game is going to hold together. It has so many awesome features operating in tandem that I wonder if it's going to feel bloated and over-complicated like Shadow of War. Benefit of the doubt, for now.
oh no, I'm doomed to spend way too long on this
D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
Healing items are no longer consumables. Healing it a skill on a cooldown now, which is kind of neat.
You wouldn't believe the amount of people that used to have the shit beat out of them and then just wake up to find out they're working on a damn boat for the foreseeable future.
Good ol Shanghaiing/crimping.
And then at the end of the game: Uber Commander Agrapos [Rank: *****/***** | Level: 50 | Invincible to Ranged, Melee, Stealth, Assassination, Fire, Gravity, Water, and Apples of Eden | Summons Invincible Shadow Clones | 25% Chance to Corrupt Save File on Hit]
My playtime was 99:18. Definitely played for well over 100 hours, though, considering the tours I did do plus the 10 hours I originally played when it released.
The bad: Ultimately, I don't like the direction the series went in. I feel like there's just too much content and this creates severe pacing issues with the main narrative for players. One could argue that this puts pacing into the player's hands, but I personally feel the developers/designers should be guiding the player through the narrative rather than just throwing all this content at them and telling them to go nuts, at their own pace. There's nothing wrong with boundaries, even in a sandbox game, and they can improve the experience. I feel the more recent games lack that guidance - ever since Unity, perhaps. For me, I prefer narrative to gameplay. Not that the narrative is weak in Origins, it's just a bit unfocused, or at least it gives the player too much leeway for it to feel unfocused. I basically did everything possible - every location and sidequest and puzzle and whatever - before even completing Chapter 2. When I did go back and play through the main story from Chapter 2 to the end, the narrative felt very short, a little jumpy, and I think the emotional impact certain story beats could have otherwise provided was...muffled as a result. Sure, I chose to play it that way so I'm partially responsible for that, but I think they should have made different decisions here.
Also, the step away from the modern day narrative is something I dislike. I feel like they made a half-hearted attempt here but it just trailed into nothingness. I said I didn't look up any hints, and that's true, but I did google if I had missed something in the modern day stuff because it seemed to just abruptly stop, like mid-sentence. Like the modern day stuff ghosted on me.
Also also, the lack of walk/run speed differences really fucked with my brain. I'm not sure if I felt like Bayek was too slow or his speed was just fine but it was...weird and offputting. Swimming was way too slow, though. I hated every single time I had to go across islands, entering deep(ish) water to do so.
And...too much loot. It's certainly not as bad as Diablo 3 was at launch, but by the end of the game, my Bayek was carrying thousands of weapons around. Pointless.
The good: The engine, the RPG elements, the characters, the graphics/aesthetic/beauty, the narrative (aside from pacing issues and the modern day weirdness), etc. were all top notch. The world was extremely well-crafted. The Discovery Tour stuff is genius and I will come back to it eventually. Despite my long-winded negative comments, I think this is definitely one of the best of the series. I don't really like the direction they took the series in, but since we'll never get another AC2/Brotherhood-type Assassin's Creed, I can live with this. It's good. It's really good.
I just preordered the Ultimate Edition of Assassin's Creed Odyssey. $120 is rather insane, though, but whatever.
I liked reading up/learning up on the regions and history as I played the game and seeing those areas for the first time in the actual playthrough.
AC had consumable healing items?
I... don't remember this at all.
Now that I think about it, the way older ones definitely did. Like the Ezio games, but I don't recall Black Flag, Unity or Syndicate having or not having them.
(It's not much new really, but neat to see more cutscene Kassandra)
D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
Yes. Whoops. Lol
Yeah a lot of the early ACs had usable “medicines”
You would buy them from the Doctors in the plague masks, I think that was in the AC2 trilogy at least.
How did you get it early? Who are you working with? Is it Abstergo?!
Haha no I mean he was right that I meant Origins not Odyssey.
I was waiting for a week to make that post after I dawdled on getting that final, 67th achievement after finishing everything else (the 20 Daily Life discovery tours) and then just rushed through my write up. And I had just prepurchased the Expensive Edition of Odyssey before I wrote the post so I just transposed in my head.
Which is a good thing I think, a more considered approach does seem to have produced a more substantial game, so I'm all for it.
D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
Climbing for me was a real highlight of the series until around AC4, where they basically removed any timing or challenge when it comes to parkour. Challenge Rooms suddenly became a lot less exciting because it was a lot harder to ever mess up and lose progress.
Combat I'm a bit more mixed on. The Origins style certainly looks fine and I know lots of folks dig it, which is cool. For me personally I just don't like the level system. It felt like a cop out the devs went with after people abused the hell out of stealth kills and combos in the Ezio games. To me the last game with really fun combat and at least semi-interesting climbing was Unity, but obviously that game had bigger issues.
I think the writing has been decidely "meh" since AC3, and for as much crap as Desmond stuff got I kinda miss it now. AC3 is also the closest we ever really got to a modern day set AC title, those sections as Desmond were neat if a little bland.
Tbh the only consistently badass thing is the setting and level design, which never really seems to let me down. Like I haven't scooped Origins yet but I totally will when I see it for $20 just to walk around Egypt and fuck with animals and stuff
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Origins really does set a high bar for environments, among other things. It’s not as immediately fun as Black Flag, but it soars, oh how it soars, as you stick with it.
Absolutely fair. The beginning is clunky, both narrative and gameplay-wise. There’s also the weird in media res thing they do...like they were trying to tease out the truth but Bayek just isn’t very compelling before they finally let you actually get to know him.
I expect I'll keep chipping away at it until I "complete" it, since I've 100% every previous AC game so far. I'm tempted to pick up the Ezio Trilogy afterwards, to see if those games are what I remember. I have strong feelings about each of the AC games, but I've never actually gone back to any of them after I finishing them, since there's always been another game around the corner.
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
If it makes you feel any better, The Hidden Ones felt like a genuine coda on the story in the main game, while Curse of the Pharaohs feels like a weird extended sidequest.
Gamertag: PrimusD | Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
But most my issues with it are seemingly directly addressed in Odyssey so I'm pretty excited for this one.
Super stoked about what Odyssey is showing, but definitely picking up on a sale.
Yeah, I don't know how they'd fit it into the mythology but I'd love to see future installments set in Tenochtitlan or Nineveh or Anuradhapura or something.
It was so simple but so perfect.
Do you guys think I can 100% Odyssey in 2 days? It's probably only 80-90 hours long.
Curse of the Pharaohs was really, really good in my opinion.
D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
I mean, you're playing as a greek frontline soldier in a war hundreds of years before the brotherhood was a thing. Fuck it, right?
Go all out with that spear thing.
Yea my goal is to focus on the warrior tree and find the coolest swords and just beat everyone down that gets in my way. I keep hearing the combat feels really good so I might as well make use of it. A few of the upgrades in the assassin tree see decent for regular combat as well so I'll use some of those for my extra points.
Scepters are pretty nice aswell. I turned Bayek into a deadly monk with one of those things on the moments I've been caught.
This is a clickable link to my Steam Profile.