Assassin's Creed Odyssey Review

Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (PS4, Xbox One, PC)  

8.5 / 10

A Familiar, Epic Journey

Another year, another Assassin’s Creed. For a while there, these games were up there with Call of Duty and Battlefield on the yearly release schedule and you really could tell they were being rushed. However, after Ubisoft took an extra year to make Origins, and by extension Odyssey, you can see how revitalized the series is becoming. This is more apparent to me in this entry. The mechanics are identical to Origins, but the world is more vibrant, characters more likable, and the content keeps you engaged far longer than Origins can. It may not be the best Assassin’s Creed game, but I haven’t had this much fun with the series since Black Flag.

     Odyssey takes us back to Ancient Greece during The Peloponnesian War, and yes, I had to Google how to spell that. This time you take the role of Spartan turned mercenary Kassandra or Alexios. Unlike Assassin's Creed Syndicate that allowed you to play multiple Assassins, you don’t switch between the two characters. Who you pick is who you play as throughout the entire game. You follow this character as they travel through the Greek world, searching for their lost family while dismantling an unforeseen force working against them. Along the way important historical figures such as Socrates, Pericles, and Herodotus, among many others make appearances.

        Odyssey continues the RPG approach to the world previously seen in Origins. It gives you a giant open world to play in complete with optional areas, bosses, side missions, and locations. Armor is looted from chests and dead enemies and inventory management is a must. These mechanics are as seamless as they are with Origins and compliment everything you do. Every action has a reward, whether it’s money, a weapon, or straight experience. Odyssey features a more streamlined skill tree and allows the player to build the type of Assassin they want. Unlike Origins, this skill tree is more about upgrading the abilities you have instead of giving you a ton of passive effects you don't need to think about, as is a go-to skill tree trope in most RPG’s. Leveling up was always a breeze, though and I never felt like I was grinding due to the plethora of ways to gain experience. Not once did I think of using the time-saving micro-transactions, that were present. A big difference in gameplay that was only hinted at in Origins, is naval combat. If you played Black Flag, though, this system will feel very similar as well. The addition of naval battles isn’t unwelcome, this is the only game I know of that lets you cleave your enemy's boat in half, but the lack of cannons and gunpowder give everything less flair.

        The story told in Odyssey is my favorite since Assassin’s Creed 2. It takes Kassandra from one end of the world to the other and is a beast to complete. I clocked in over 75 hours before finishing the story proper, with around 50 of that being solely on story missions. Every character you meet is full of personality and will make you laugh or angry in a very real way. This is partly due to the inclusion of choice in the story. You have the ability to turn Kassandra into a raging Greek asshole, or a  Greek Robin Hood with a heart of gold. Some choices seemed superficial and go against what a quick Google search will tell you isn’t historically accurate, though. However, the fact Ubisoft gives the option to kill, romance, or befriend certain characters put a smile on my face more often than not. Some choices you make do change the world, but many never come back up again and give the impression that whatever you picked did not matter. However, this is clearly the staging ground for a more dynamic choice filled experience in future games.
      Speaking of future games, this game brings back Layla Hassan as the main modern day Assassin exploring Kassandra’s memories. She is given a little bit more leg room to move around in this time around and given more purpose. Her part in the grander story concludes with a subtle teaser that future games may include a bigger modern-day portion, something that the series had almost seemed to have forgotten about for the most part. Modern day and Ancient Greece hold plenty of twists to keep fans happy though, and it leaves me optimistic for the future.

       Greece is easily the most beautiful setting thus far. Each city is teeming with life, and the wilderness is filled with ruins, bandit camps and forts to overthrow. Ubisoft is clearly proud of the historical accuracy and time they spent putting the world together, due to the inclusion of an Exploration Mode. In this mode, most, but not all, story missions will give you general directions of where you should go if you ask the right questions. This enables you to explore the world and find caves and tombs you might not have if you had the direct route laid out for you. I played the whole game this way, something I wouldn’t normally do, and my experience was better for it. One section of the world that I absolutely fell in love with is underwater. There is almost a completely different world under the waves. Sunken temples and ships cover the ocean floor. Reefs with hundreds of fish just give the impression that everything underwater is just as alive as on land.  Also sharks. There are a lot of sharks.
        As great as Odyssey is, there are some glaring flaws that warrant bringing up. Firstly, the game is a bit of a buggy mess. Now, veteran Assassins Creed players know this isn’t anything new, and I was playing it on PS4. Since Xbox is the primary Assassin's Creed system, players might have a better time in this department playing there. That said, The game crashed on me for seemingly no reason three or four times, I experienced utterly massive frame rate drops, and assassination targets spawned in walls more than once. Everything was fixed by reloading the game, of course, but it was still annoying. Loading times are some of the worst I have ever experienced too. Fast Travel wasn’t something I did often due to my want to explore, but when I did I would sit for a minute and a half to two minutes depending on what area was loading. Finally, The voice acting and animation in conversations need a serious overhaul. Bad accents and choppy animation is something Assassin’s Creed should have evolved away from long ago.
        Don’t let online critics sway you. This game is a blast. It has its flaws, but it clearly has had a lot of time and effort put into it. Kassandra is sickeningly likable, and the journey she takes is incredible. Longtime fans will be pleased with some of the modern day twists, and first-time players will be drawn in by the sheer amount of activities to take part in. With Red Dead Redemption 2 on the horizon, the game world may look impossibly bleak, but it still sits a reminder of how great a game can look. Everyone should take this journey, everyone should see what Kassandra or Alexios have seen, and be better for it.