Arse Creed Vikings

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Out today on current gen and my copy is currently installing on my PS4.

Seems the game is getting good reviews but there are a lot of bugs right now (apparently) so hopefully a patch comes soon.

There is a free upgrade to next gen too.

[Yevrah]

It had bloody well better be free given the deluxe version is what, £110?

I really shouldn't buy this but depressingly I know I will.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Something stupid like that.

I got the normal PS4 version for £45.

[Ian]

This'll be another "wait until it's cheap" effort for me, I suspect.

Though I must say compared to basically any of the others in the series I have the least historical tourism interest in this. No big cities that seem likely to be especially interesting in this period, no amazing man-made landmarks to climb I wouldn't have thought. Or not many. Origins I played until I'd seen the big stuff and then gave up on it. Odyssey I went for ancient Greece and stayed because Kassandra was a hoot. This? Feels a moderately meh setting even if Vikings are obviously excellent.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Two quick observations.

Firstly, they've nailed the sound of snow. It sounds brilliant just mooching about in it.

Secondly, the autosave seems to be a bit naff. I did a little bit earlier, found some little island and cleared the enemies out with my mates that I had rescued as the first main mission. I then exited to main menu (it gave me no warning about not having saved) and I just loaded it back up. My mates, about 10 or so, had vanished and all the enemies hadn't been killed.

Edit: Got back onto my boat and all my mates are there, perhaps the cowards just couldn't be arsed to fight.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

The dice mini-game, Orlog, is brilliant.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

It seems my game is bugged

Ubisoft's current workaround is wait for a future patch or delete the game and restart...

[Gray Fox]

They are currently being held hostage. Maybe this is why.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

So I genuinely can't play this right now.

For some reason Ubisoft PS4 games do not have the option to get a free PS5 upgrade (and Ubisoft are refusing to comment on it) and my PS5 keeps showing an error when trying to download the patch so I can't boot up the PS4 version...

There is a workaround to get the PS5 upgrade by making a Turkish PSN account and downloading it there which I've so far not bothered with but will probably do it next week.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Okay...

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

And I'm finished with the story. Save file says I've "played" 70.5 hours although actually play time is probably closer to 65 which is far too long really. I think they were a bit overambitious with the main story.

I think it's a good game (I haven't played Odyssey which I've heard a lot of praise for but this is probably only behind 2 and Black Flag for me) however I think it's hard to really call it an Assassin's Creed game.

Stealth mechanics are a bit shit, especially distrust areas as you'll instantly trigger enemies unless you're "blending in" although I think that was intentional as Vikings aren't the stealthiest. The free running in the game is also probably the worst it's been, Eivor feels incredibly clunky whilst climbing (probably intentional again but still shit) and for some reason he seems to have a mind of his own. There were many times I was climbing and holding my left stick straight up but all of a sudden he'd start going left because the camera perspective had changed every so slightly or because of reasons. You also get stuck on bullshit things or for some reason a certain wall isn't climbable (this is accurate in real life but no other AC game I remember bothered with this) or he'll decide a handhold just above and to the side of him isn't in reach despite it easily being so.

Following on from that windows are a real shitter. He wont climb through a window as he's going, he'll try to climb up and over it and to climb through it you have to stop, peer inside and then hit X which is just painful.

On the positives I think the combat looks really cool, they've put a lot of time into making it look great especially the finishers. I seemed to have a different finisher for each enemy type and for some enemies I'd have a finisher based on the weapon I was using. Also had a great set up late game wielding a two-handed battle axe (which sets itself on fire) along with Odin's two handed spear creating a cyclone of death which saw many enemies limbs fly off.

Another negative were "puzzles", there are so many loot chests hidden behind bullshit barred doors with wanky solutions. They're not puzzles (the game did have a couple of them and they were fine) they were just annoying and took up a lot of unnecessary time.

The worst was a couple of chests hidden in a sunken tower and you have to basically navigate an underwater maze to get to them. There was fuck all light and far too much seaweed which meant it was almost impossible to do it and I had to resort to a Youtube video and even then struggled as it was so hard to see where they were going.

There's probably more positives/negatives but I can't remember them right now. Overall it's a good game but it's not an AC game (it's trying to be a Witcher game really), it's too long and pretty clunky in places. Plus the glitches at the start didn't help.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

And I'm finished with the story. Save file says I've "played" 70.5 hours although actually play time is probably closer to 65 which is far too long really. I think they were a bit overambitious with the main story.

I think it's a good game (I haven't played Odyssey which I've heard a lot of praise for but this is probably only behind 2 and Black Flag for me) however I think it's hard to really call it an Assassin's Creed game.

Stealth mechanics are a bit shit, especially distrust areas as you'll instantly trigger enemies unless you're "blending in" although I think that was intentional as Vikings aren't the stealthiest. The free running in the game is also probably the worst it's been, Eivor feels incredibly clunky whilst climbing (probably intentional again but still shit) and for some reason he seems to have a mind of his own. There were many times I was climbing and holding my left stick straight up but all of a sudden he'd start going left because the camera perspective had changed every so slightly or because of reasons. You also get stuck on bullshit things or for some reason a certain wall isn't climbable (this is accurate in real life but no other AC game I remember bothered with this) or he'll decide a handhold just above and to the side of him isn't in reach despite it easily being so.

Following on from that windows are a real shitter. He wont climb through a window as he's going, he'll try to climb up and over it and to climb through it you have to stop, peer inside and then hit X which is just painful.

On the positives I think the combat looks really cool, they've put a lot of time into making it look great especially the finishers. I seemed to have a different finisher for each enemy type and for some enemies I'd have a finisher based on the weapon I was using. Also had a great set up late game wielding a two-handed battle axe (which sets itself on fire) along with Odin's two handed spear creating a cyclone of death which saw many enemies limbs fly off.

Another negative were "puzzles", there are so many loot chests hidden behind bullshit barred doors with wanky solutions. They're not puzzles (the game did have a couple of them and they were fine) they were just annoying and took up a lot of unnecessary time.

The worst was a couple of chests hidden in a sunken tower and you have to basically navigate an underwater maze to get to them. There was fuck all light and far too much seaweed which meant it was almost impossible to do it and I had to resort to a Youtube video and even then struggled as it was so hard to see where they were going.

There's probably more positives/negatives but I can't remember them right now. Overall it's a good game but it's not an AC game (it's trying to be a Witcher game really), it's too long and pretty clunky in places. Plus the glitches at the start didn't help.

I'm not going to 100% it but I might go back and finish killing the whole Order off.

Edit: Just remembered something. Cracks/tight spaces e.g. in a cave or whatever, for some reason even though they're quite big (Eivor comfortably fits easily in them) he'll go through them SO FUCKING SLOWLY.