Game

[Borys]

`

[HardcoreRetro]

How many "timesavers" will the game include?

[Nintex]

More:

- We'll be able to play as a male or female again

- Our character is from Ireland, but was kidnapped and raised by vikings as a kid and has an English name. This is an important part because our character still remembers her/his parents and friends from Ireland, and this will be important for choices made by the player later on. The MC is the son/daughter of a god

- We get to use mystical weapons, but only two weapons used by gods, those being Mjölnir and Gungnir

- We don't fight gods, but we do fight mystical creatures such as fire and ice giants (not really God of War size style, their size are pretty comparable to the cyclops from Odyssey)

- It will be a cross-gen title

- Initial release date set to October 2020

- MC will be able to perform a lot of supernatural tricks. As an example, you can move as if you were lightning and attack with said lightning. There will be more complex RPG mechanics this time. Using Mjölnir will amplify lightning and physical damage, while using Gungnir will amplify magical power and resistance in general. Other weapons will do the same thing, but only to amplify a random stat with a random percentage

- Microtransactions will be focused on cosmetic items like Odyssey, but grind mechanics have not been reduced, and you'll have to work as hard as you had to in Odyssey

- Side quests received a massive overhaul. All the side quests are as detailed as in Witcher 3, with little to no fetch quests

Expected announcement is in February at the PlayStation 5 event.
Alongside a new Prince of Persia and perhaps Splinter Cell but that last one is still in flux.

[thisismyusername]

How many "timesavers" will the game include?

You just know they'll make the grind 20x longer with the progression being as slow as Oddy's.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Thankfully, Cheat Engine will fix this on PC.

[close]

[Pissy F Benny]

Detailed side quests, I'll believe that when I see it 

[thisismyusername]

- Weapon durability does now come into play, forcing players to use their weapon pool more effectively and forced to manage a smaller inventory that can be upgraded.

I can't wait for shit to be even more annoying. Instead of 50x weapons than you need, it'll now be 50x weapons you're FORCED to need. Brilliant design there.

Origins was fine. The whole RPG-ification of the series has actually been a bad thing in hind-sight with how much tedious busywork they fucking add to it when I just want to main-line the fucking game story so I can discuss the meta-plot with a co-worker that is into the series.

Also all the supernatural stuff sounds whack, after the second "third" game they totally lost bungled the plot.

FTFY. Meta-plot was fine and even somewhat interesting with the conspiracy nonsense until 3, where they went "OH SHIT WE'RE ON A TIMELINE AND IT'S 2012 NOW! WE CAN'T DO SHIT BECAUSE OBVIOUSLY A CATACLYSM ISN'T GONNA HAPPEN! RETCON! RETCON! RETCON! Oh and let's kill Desmond off and not replace him ever since barely anyone gives a shit about the modern times!"

Narrator: TIMU cared.

"Yeah, but you're one person so fuck you. We're going to do self-contained stories while having an animus scene that doesn't fucking make sense when we aren't doing a meta-plot anymore! YEE-HAW!"

[Svejk]

I'm intrigued, but also can't help but feel some AC3 vibes... Parkour shit mainly being trees and cliffs... eh. 

[Pissy F Benny]

the parkour shit hasn't really mattered that much for a while tbf, probably since 3.

[nachobro]

This sounds pretty cool. I always liked the sailing but the combat on boats always felt kinda bad (though it was okay in Rogue) so it being more exploration focused is okay by me.

Co-op thing sounds dumb but Ubi only makes one game and just reskins it these days so that's to be expected

[MMaRsu]

- Up to 4 player drop in drop out co-op like Ghost Recon wildlands.

Absolute garbage

Gonna be another live service esque garbage piece of shit game where you loot colored weapons and upgrade your skills and trot through zillion camps

[MMaRsu]

More:

- We'll be able to play as a male or female again

- Our character is from Ireland, but was kidnapped and raised by vikings as a kid and has an English name. This is an important part because our character still remembers her/his parents and friends from Ireland, and this will be important for choices made by the player later on. The MC is the son/daughter of a god

- We get to use mystical weapons, but only two weapons used by gods, those being Mjölnir and Gungnir

- We don't fight gods, but we do fight mystical creatures such as fire and ice giants (not really God of War size style, their size are pretty comparable to the cyclops from Odyssey)

- It will be a cross-gen title

- Initial release date set to October 2020

- MC will be able to perform a lot of supernatural tricks. As an example, you can move as if you were lightning and attack with said lightning. There will be more complex RPG mechanics this time. Using Mjölnir will amplify lightning and physical damage, while using Gungnir will amplify magical power and resistance in general. Other weapons will do the same thing, but only to amplify a random stat with a random percentage

- Microtransactions will be focused on cosmetic items like Odyssey, but grind mechanics have not been reduced, and you'll have to work as hard as you had to in Odyssey

- Side quests received a massive overhaul. All the side quests are as detailed as in Witcher 3, with little to no fetch quests

Expected announcement is in February at the PlayStation 5 event.
Alongside a new Prince of Persia and perhaps Splinter Cell but that last one is still in flux.

 

Sounds like bullshit to me

[Svejk]

I think the make or break for me will be if they decide to to put in mythical creatures in it, a la AC: Odyssey.   I LOVED that they did that.

Edit:
Just saw this...

The hidden blade is back and is far more customizable in terms of cosmetics. Can be upgraded to kill in one stab.

So it's gonna pull that "certain enemy types will require 3-4 stabs to the jugular to actually die" shit again?   

[thisismyusername]

This sounds pretty cool. I always liked the sailing but the combat on boats always felt kinda bad (though it was okay in Rogue) so it being more exploration focused is okay by me.

Co-op thing sounds dumb but Ubi only makes one game and just reskins it these days so that's to be expected

- Up to 4 player drop in drop out co-op like Ghost Recon wildlands.

Absolute garbage

Gonna be another live service esque garbage piece of shit game where you loot colored weapons and upgrade your skills and trot through zillion camps

...Unity, my dudes. That already had 4-player drop-in, drop-out multiplayer.

I'm the only person that's probably played the entire series on this board...

More:

- We'll be able to play as a male or female again

- Our character is from Ireland, but was kidnapped and raised by vikings as a kid and has an English name. This is an important part because our character still remembers her/his parents and friends from Ireland, and this will be important for choices made by the player later on. The MC is the son/daughter of a god

- We get to use mystical weapons, but only two weapons used by gods, those being Mjölnir and Gungnir

- We don't fight gods, but we do fight mystical creatures such as fire and ice giants (not really God of War size style, their size are pretty comparable to the cyclops from Odyssey)

- It will be a cross-gen title

- Initial release date set to October 2020

- MC will be able to perform a lot of supernatural tricks. As an example, you can move as if you were lightning and attack with said lightning. There will be more complex RPG mechanics this time. Using Mjölnir will amplify lightning and physical damage, while using Gungnir will amplify magical power and resistance in general. Other weapons will do the same thing, but only to amplify a random stat with a random percentage

- Microtransactions will be focused on cosmetic items like Odyssey, but grind mechanics have not been reduced, and you'll have to work as hard as you had to in Odyssey

- Side quests received a massive overhaul. All the side quests are as detailed as in Witcher 3, with little to no fetch quests

Expected announcement is in February at the PlayStation 5 event.
Alongside a new Prince of Persia and perhaps Splinter Cell but that last one is still in flux.

 

Sounds like bullshit to me

Splinter Cell has been rumored for AGES (or what feels like it) since that Ghost Recon: Wildlands event. So around 2-3 years now. It hasn't been announced and every game event it's always "OH SPLINTER CELL WILL BE ANNOUNCED THERE!"

As much as I want another one (and liked Blacklist despite it having issues with TOTAL GHOST'ing [2-3 areas have to be glitched to do that, hello Subway train]) I doubt Ubisoft is doing it, mostly because fans have hated for the most part every SC post-3: Chaos Theory in some way.

I think the make or break for me will be if they decide to to put in mythical creatures in it, a la AC: Odyssey.   I LOVED that they did that.

Edit:
Just saw this...

The hidden blade is back and is far more customizable in terms of cosmetics. Can be upgraded to kill in one stab.

So it's gonna pull that "certain enemy types will require 3-4 stabs to the jugular to actually die" shit again?   

I don't recall the 2-stab hidden blade enemies in the series. I think only Origins had them and that's mostly because of the RPG system.

If anything, the hidden blade could basically speed run you through the game once you had the proper equipment (Smoke Bombs, two-hidden blades) in the other (like the Ezio trilogy) games and you NEVER needed the other weapons. So I can sort of see what they're going for with the "you'll have to upgrade to one-shot enemies with it" but it's still dumb.

[Svejk]

I mean I only played TWO AC games but I preferred the one without mythical creatures and bosses.

I have played enough of Souls game as it is - do not need to have them in yet another series!

I mean it's got space aliens in the series, why not mythical creatures too. 

[nachobro]

...Unity, my dudes. That already had 4-player drop-in, drop-out multiplayer.

I played unity, it was pretty meh and I quit early after I broke the game. Impossible to know about 4 player modes cause I don't think 4 people ever played it.

I'm the only person that's probably played the entire series on this board...

I'm sorry to hear of your suffering

[Don Rumata]

Some history nerds on reddit mentioned this as well. The Norse/ Vikings didn't build tall structures like pyramids/ Zeus statues etc. This will be a problem for memorable synchronization points in Ragnarok.

Origins (and in particular Odyssey) already had comically exaggerated scale with their buildings and monuments.

[HardcoreRetro]

I'm the only person that's probably played the entire series on this board...

I played all of the mainline titles. Didn't play the 2.5D trilogy or the portable games.

[thisismyusername]

I played unity, it was pretty meh and I quit early after I broke the game. Impossible to know about 4 player modes cause I don't think 4 people ever played it.

It was the main selling point of it:

I'm sorry to hear of your suffering

*wank*

I'm the only person that's probably played the entire series on this board...

I played all of the mainline titles. Didn't play the 2.5D trilogy or the portable games.

Portables (DS and PSP anyway, I forget if there's a 3DS one and the sequel to the PSP's port) are skippable. Liberation which was on Sony's failed handheld actually got an HD port, so some of the frustration of the gimmicks there were probably removed, but it's still pretty skippable as the costume system was underutilized.

2.5D is serviceable if you're wanting to play a continuation of Mark of the Ninja.

[TVC15]

Like name 3 architectural Viking wonders.... uhhh.... Stonehenge? No! That was prehistoric and druidic. Probably some wooden Fort but man.... FUCK FORTS after AC:O and AC:O.

(Image removed from quote.)

12th Century Wooden Church in Norway. Eh...

Vikings also did not concentrate as much as ancient Greeks i.e. Alexandria had >100,000 citizens, biggest Viking settlements >1000. Wonder how they will deal with that.

Are you from like the 19th century? Stonehenge predates the druids by like 2000 years.

[Don Rumata]

I played all the mainline ones except for Blackflag (because i hate the naval shit).
I love the series, despite having hated a bunch of entries with a passion, which is also why i usually ignore the criticism parroted around (they're all the same, towers, too many icons, etc).

Unfortunately however it seems Ubisoft completely gave up on even trying to give an illusion of historical plausibility, and with Odyssey went full mythological, so from here on out, i expect them to just appease the common knowledge of the time period they represent, including morphing in all the super natural shit associated with it.
It's a big disappointment, but i'm sure i'll still be able to enjoy it on some level.

[nachobro]

i stopped after rogue but i did like them all, probably brotherhood the best. i really wish they'd just make the feudal japan AC game everyone (or at least i) wants from them.

however division 2 really failed as an engaging game in the "do all the icons on the map" genre so i'll need something.

[TVC15]

I like all the games in the series and have finished almost all of them, but I miss climbing tall buildings like they were in the first two games. Especially in the very original, climbing some buildings was almost like a puzzle when it came to figuring out the right path. I think the series should have leaned into this more, but it was an element quickly eliminated. I recall it even being reduced in the first sequel.

[Nintex]

They should've done England but not scrubby industrial revolution England but castle sieges feudal England.
I think an AC in Tsarist Russia would be great also and of course Japan, India or China. I was surprised by how well the Greeks worked in AC: Odyssey though.

What I did miss was the 'Davinci Code' mixing of real-life paintings, art, locations and events with the narrative of the game. Assassin's Creed 2 did that perfectly and it was very immersive as a result.
They haven't quite managed or attempted to do that again after ACII.   

[Akala]

AC is an odd one, I am more on the side that liked the historical aspects of it and am not huge on the mythology angle they have tilted to. I was never huge on the present-day sections of the series, but it is kind of the spice that gave it it's unique flavor I think.

2 was the last one I fully completed and loved it. Still have fond memories of murdering people up and down the Italian countryside, jumping into canals and haystacks, etc. The sequels felt more like expansions, and it's looked kind of cookie cutter for a long time from the sidelines. They just overmilked the series and should have had less of them. Avoided 3 due reviews and disinterest. I tried again with Black Flag but couldn't get into it. Unity, and Rogue Syndicate that were freebies at some point, but haven't touched.

Finally grabbed Origins on sale late last year due to the history tour mode, and it's really cool. Haven't had a chance to try main game. Saw Odyssey had same mode and has been getting really good word of mouth so rolled dice on the ultimate rev at end of year sale so I should be good on AC for a WHILE. It came with the remaster of part 3 too.

Norse setting is super played out anyway, will grab down the line if they have a history mode though.

I think an AC in Tsarist Russia would be great also and of course Japan, India or China.

Aside from Japan, weren't these the settings they flirted with in the side-scrollers?

[bork]

I think an AC in Tsarist Russia would be great also and of course Japan, India or China.

Aside from Japan, weren't these the settings they flirted with in the side-scrollers?

Yup.

[Nintex]

AC is an odd one, I am more on the side that liked the historical aspects of it and am not huge on the mythology angle they have tilted to. I was never huge on the present-day sections of the series, but it is kind of the spice that gave it it's unique flavor I think.

2 was the last one I fully completed and loved it. Still have fond memories of murdering people up and down the Italian countryside, jumping into canals and haystacks, etc. The sequels felt more like expansions, and it's looked kind of cookie cutter for a long time from the sidelines. They just overmilked the series and should have had less of them. Avoided 3 due reviews and disinterest. I tried again with Black Flag but couldn't get into it. Unity, and Rogue Syndicate that were freebies at some point, but haven't touched.

Finally grabbed Origins on sale late last year due to the history tour mode, and it's really cool. Haven't had a chance to try main game. Saw Odyssey had same mode and has been getting really good word of mouth so rolled dice on the ultimate rev at end of year sale so I should be good on AC for a WHILE. It came with the remaster of part 3 too.

Norse setting is super played out anyway, will grab down the line if they have a history mode though.

I think an AC in Tsarist Russia would be great also and of course Japan, India or China.

Aside from Japan, weren't these the settings they flirted with in the side-scrollers?

I think they should start to mix the History Tour things with the game again although it might not be what everyone wants.
Odyssey really surprised me by how good it was and how much they learned from BOTW and Witcher 3 and the likes but at times the gameplay loop becomes a grind.
In that way it has the same problem that most Ubisoft games have. They have a ton of content but too little variety.
It also depends on your play style I guess. Most of these types of games are not built to complete a 100% but more created to follow the main path and pick what quests/things you find interesting.
At the same time you don't want to miss any of the cool side quests of which some are really good. Maybe a solution would be to rank the quality of the quests in the game. Maybe quests that are 'must play' content should have a different marker compared to 'grind quests' or something.
So you get a better sense of what you can skip or what is there for players who want to max out their levels and unlock everything. 

Still it's amazing to see how far video games have come in terms of portraying these epic historic worlds in such incredible detail.
I'm definitely going to pick up Origins as well at some point as it hasn't aged a day for a 3 year old game.
Odyssey definitely made me a fan again.

Can't wait to see what Ray Tracing and a minimum target of 9 teraflops will do for this series 

[Svejk]

If they're using a similar loot system as Odyssey, they need to have the armor appearance change option right off the bat. 

[Let's Cyber]

I played a fair bit of Odyssey, enough that this needs to be drastically different to get me on board. I like the idea of squad mates but we'll see.

I think AC would have been better off taking concepts from Hitman and MGS rather than Bioware RPG stuff but whatevs

[TVC15]

They should've done England but not scrubby industrial revolution England but castle sieges feudal England.
I think an AC in Tsarist Russia would be great also and of course Japan, India or China. I was surprised by how well the Greeks worked in AC: Odyssey though.

What I did miss was the 'Davinci Code' mixing of real-life paintings, art, locations and events with the narrative of the game. Assassin's Creed 2 did that perfectly and it was very immersive as a result.
They haven't quite managed or attempted to do that again after ACII.   

I liked the da Vinci-ish stuff in the first few games—the glitches and hidden puzzle stuff, I mean. I would have liked more of that, but after a few games it was still limited to pixel hunting shit and puzzles we’ve seen in other games before, so I can see why it disappeared once they stopped giving a semblance of a fuck about the future storyline. But yeah, maybe start bringing that stuff back. Runes and shit are always great for puzzles, right?

[Borealis]

Weapon durability does now come into play, forcing players to use their weapon pool more effectively and forced to manage a smaller inventory that can be upgraded.

Who the fuck keeps asking for this on dev teams? Given that they've been cribbing overall design from TW3 since Origins, you would've thought they'd avoid its shittest mechanic.

[Let's Cyber]

I know AC is a collaborative effort within Ubi now, but I assume this is primarily the Black Flag/Origins team? It will have been 3 years since Origins, plus it seems they've cut the other Montreal teams out of the AC pipeline after III and Unity.

[Don Rumata]

3 years seems very little for a game of this size though.. especially with the generational jump.

[Let's Cyber]

Yes this is the Origins team. Given how much better Origins [writing, character, no mythology] was than Odyssey I could not be more happier.

Agreed. The tone of Odyssey was all over the place.

3 years seems very little for a game of this size though.. especially with the generational jump.

I mean, Origins and Odyssey were both on 3 year dev cycles. And they're presumably using still using the same engine this time around so they should be pretty familiar with it.

I wouldn't expect this to be their next-gen showcase at all. I assume they've had another team working on their Unity equivalent for 2021 or 2022.

[Svejk]

Even if this drops this gen, I'd rather wait till the next gen version to play it.