Assassin's Creed Odyssey

[Chris Simon]

Yeah, I know. AC game in RPG section. I'm risking being told off quite harshly. But bear with me

This game received some flak for what it isn't, but personally, I love it for what it is. And it is a lot of things.
For one, it's as little an AC as it gets. Which I personally consider a big plus. It also is an RPG. First in the series, in fact. Be it the quite extensive skill trees that allow for deep personalization and customization of one's playstyle, or a literal crap-tonne of gear that one can obtain, with a quite extensive list of passive bonuses that you can use to truly craft your own character to suite your style.
I've sunk some time into it. Over 150 hours, in fact. Which, incidentally, is about the same amount of time I've spent in The Witcher 3 (before DLCs).
Now I'm not going to directly compare the two. I'm pushing my luck as it is.
But I did get the same "feel" off of both of them.
The massive open world, interesting quests with interesting characters (lots of them), an overwhelming number of question marks on the map, when ever you enter a new region.

And the biggest plus of all - I love ancient Greece. And seeing the famous characters come to life (something that AC was always know for, fo better or worse) was a great experience.
The game is a great experience. For me, anyway.

There has been some controversy around the Ubistore, of course, but honestly, I've never been compelled to buy anything there. Yes, you can buy money and XP booster packs, there. OR (the nerve), you can actually play the game as it's meant to be played and never need them. I don't see how anybody would have probelms with that. (Aside from the fact that MTs are inherently evil and should be erradicated from gaming, with which I agree, of course).

TL/DR: If you like previous Assassins for what they were and want to try what it's like if they try to make a proper RPG out of the franchise, with every RPG trope there is, go for it. I gave it a go and it captivated me pretty nicely.
And if you're one of those who believe we should boycott the big companies, simply not buying AAA games, I disagree. I think that "Vote with your wallet" should go both ways. If they release a good game, free of all the crap, no matter who they are we SHOULD consider buying. I honestly don't regret buying this.

(P.S: I considered posting this in the user reviews, but decided against it. Mainly because it's rather short and not an actual review - just an opinion. (Though you could argue that every review is an opinion in the end) and also because I'd like to hear from people, their thoughts on what I feel about the game and the direction Ubi decided to go with this.)

Cheers!

[Chris Simon]

Absolutely. I'm currently nearing 200 hours in-game, which is almost unheard of, with the exception of the big RPG names.
I even went to the shop and actually bought a couple of things (Pegasus and one set of armour that I liked) simply to "tip them"

[JackofTears]

Yeah, they'be been leaving the future story behind more and more with each new release, hopefully, they'll wrap it up permanently and then move on. If not, well, I can handle half an hour of meaningless future gameplay if it means I get more fantastic AC titles like this.

[Chris Simon]

Odyssey absolutely belongs here, this game is a full fledged arpg, like Dragon Age ... or, at least, very close. The comparison to the Witcher 3 isn't a bad one, as this game obviously took a lot of lessons from Witcher and is probably the best game to be released in its genre since then. Witcher 3 is still the better game, with more deeply crafted side stories, a deeper sense of character, and more powerful repercussions for your actions, but this is a very decent attempt to achieve something similar.

Agreed. I think (and it is a bit of a shame) that at this point this franchise is kind of held back by the fact that it's AC, therefore "have to do certain things in certain ways". But if you forget about that or learn to roll with it, as an open world RPG it's pretty neat!

[JackofTears]

Odyssey absolutely belongs here, this game is a full fledged arpg, like Dragon Age ... or, at least, very close. The comparison to the Witcher 3 isn't a bad one, as this game obviously took a lot of lessons from Witcher and is probably the best game to be released in its genre since then. Witcher 3 is still the better game, with more deeply crafted side stories, a deeper sense of character, and more powerful repercussions for your actions, but this is a very decent attempt to achieve something similar.

[JackofTears]

I never once had a problem with xp advancement and story progression. Because this is an rpg you are expected to explore and do side quests as part of the game, if one doesn't do those things they have no one to blame for being underleveled but themselves. This game was marketed as an rpg and as such, needs to be played like one.

[Whitetail8]

Enjoying this game so far, I am up to the part where you first start killing cultists, if you keep up with side quests and exploration (which you should do to get the most out of the game) there is no need to spend money on MT. Like Origins I really like the historical setting, it actually makes you feel like you're exploring ancient Greece which is something only games can allow you to do.

[Aidy]

It also is an RPG.

I wouldn't call it an RPG. I know it has RPG elements like exp, levels, gear, skill trees etc but I'd still say it's an action game, albeit one with RPG elements. Though when I think about it FF XV wouldn't really be an RPG either

First in the series, in fact.

Did you not play Origins? It's pretty much the same game only they made enemies rubber-band around your level and changed the skill tree and equipment to make stealth a bit harder (IMO). In Origins you didn't have your ship permanently either, but Origins was based on land rather than islands like Odyssey. Apparently both games were written at the same time. Comparing Origins and Odyssey my biggest problem is that Egypt and Greece....meh, too similar. I'd like to have seen something crazy different.

As for the game, I've had no problems with levelling or progress, but I've been doing a lot of side missions, I've only been progressing the main story when I get bored of the cookie-cutter quests.

Compared to Witcher, where that game really stands out are the side quests. They all have a decent story, characters, cut-scenes, often you have moral decisions to make. Each one you can tell has been individually crafted. AC's side missions are just "Kill the bandits at this camp" x 1,000,000 and "Gather me a flower from this area" x 1,000,000. They're more like Bethesda's radiant quests.

[Cyber]

This topic actually convinced me to give Odyssey a try. I was kind of surprised to see AC mentioned so much in the RPG section. I haven't really played anything after the few first entries in the series, and since when Ubisoft releases a game I ignore it I wasn't aware of any considerable change in the series. I was under the impression it's still the usual Ubisoft open world formula. Ancient Greece and Egypt are also my favorite historical settings, I'm sure they bastardized them, but even playing something with a modern Greek veneer on it still sounds pretty cool.

[Omegapyrate]

I wish they'd just cut the modern-day crap out of it completely and simply focused on making (fiction-ey)historical games.
They almost did it in Odyssey. There are like three or four completely unnecessary and to be honest a bit immersion-breaking modern-day intermezzos and that's it. They might as well cut it out completely, nobody would mind.

I must be in the minority who would actually like to see more modern-day stuff then. XD But I get why a lot of people don't really like that stuff.... and they kinda screwed up with the endings in this one, I felt.
I loved Odyssey on the whole though- I still miss the more classic AC elements like dense urban enviroments, crowds and discreet assassinations though.

[Chris Simon]

I liked how the AC evolved gameplay-wise but I don't agree on their story narrative decisions in the latest instalments. For me that part of the games was a letdown. We'll see how future AC games go.

I wish they'd just cut the modern-day crap out of it completely and simply focused on making (fiction-ey)historical games.
They almost did it in Odyssey. There are like three or four completely unnecessary and to be honest a bit immersion-breaking modern-day intermezzos and that's it. They might as well cut it out completely, nobody would mind.

[Whiskycat]

I liked how the AC evolved gameplay-wise but I don't agree on their story narrative decisions in the latest instalments. For me that part of the games was a letdown. We'll see how future AC games go.

[Storm Rider]

Origins and Odyssey have proven to be the correct choice to take on the Assassin's Creed franchise. I think we all agree that III was the first let down and that after Black Flag/Rogue we played to good games, but not the ones we saw on the Ezio Trilogy or the incredible Black Flag and its gameplay. Unity and (after the ton of patches) and Syndicate were not bad games in the end, but they felt rushed. Something that does not happen to Origins and Odissey, even if the latter was released only one year after.
However, I see room for improvement on the Origins/Odyssey formula, since it can be improved, for example, on the skill tree or in the progression system, since in Odyssey there were times that I felt I couldn't advance or I was stuck for days in a certain level (I can't remember yety, but it was between lvl 15 and 20).

Also, I never buy boosters or anything like that, so if you really play this like it should, you don't need them anyway. I finished the game and I never used any booster, so they are completely optional.

[Chris Simon]

King_Nothing
(the quote option is giving me an error)
Another great byproduct of enemy scaling is that you are always getting an appropriate gear from the loot.
You're never in a situation where you're so OP that it stops being a challenge and getting low-level trash as a reward. This way the game keeps being challenging and interesting.

[Chris Simon]

I love the new direction that AC franchise is taking with first origins and now odyssey. Latter one seams like more polished origins with a lot of quality of life improvments. That being said i enjoyed it so much. Praying for Feudal Japan AC soon.

Dude, Japan would be really awesome!