Assassin's Creed Odyssey - A Great Game That Ignores the Franchise's Roots
Having just completed my first playthrough of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, I have mixed feelings. This is a massive game - sprawling, gorgeous, and virtually endless - and yet, I wonder if it’s even still an Assassin’s Creed game. With Odyssey, and even more so, Valhalla, Ubisoft pursued the ambition of an Origins RPG so much that it feels like the series lost much of its essence along the way. When I think of the Assassin’s Creed games, the first that comes to my mind is the fluidity of stealth, the precision of parkour, and the mastery of infiltration. Odyssey still has some of that, but it's buried under frantic systems that try to do it all - RPG, exploration, and epic drama. The pivot to a more RPG-driven game is fine in and of itself, but I find myself craving the clarity and precision of the earlier games. The World and Presentation To start with, Greece is beautiful. Ubisoft has created a world that feels real again. The Aegean Sea sparkles in the s...