Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
As a massive fan of Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed franchise (I’ve even got the logo on my upper back), I’m always excited to see where the story is gonna progress to next - and with Valhalla’s setting I couldn’t have been happier. You play as Eivor, a Viking warrior who you can choose to play as male or female, or Let the Animus choose for you. Whatever choice you make can be altered at any time via the in-game menu, explained by the Animus holding both male and female streams of the story. For continuity’s sake, I will refer to Eivor as female going forward, as this is the choice I made. After some harrowing events growing up, Eivor - now fully grown - must set out on a quest for wealth and power with her brother Sigurd.
Sigurd was meant to become the next King, but due to various events, this does not happen - paving the way for the quest to England. England’s four kingdoms: Northumbria, Mercia, East Anglia and Wessex, are filled with warring factions, so heading there to raid for glory seems like a good shot. Upon arrival in England, you will set up your own settlement, known as Ravensthorpe - your home away from home, which will upgrade over time and as you gather raw materials from successful raids. Eivor has a raven that will follow at all times, scouting areas from above for any items of interest, and keeping an eye out for potential danger. It’s fun to deviate from the story at times and just plot a waypoint and travel there ‘as the crow/raven flies’ to see what you’ll come across, whether that is some good loot or any NPCs you can assist.
It’s an impactful story, and with a world filled with little discoveries waiting to be made you’ll often be hit with a gut-punch or two. One particular ‘event’ I came across whilst exploring the mountains was a group of kids playing, and I chose to help them in their little make-believe raid, only to discover at the end that they are pretending to kill people on my side. This really caught me by surprise, as it’s human nature to believe that what you are doing is for the greater good (even when it isn’t), so to them, they were never the ‘baddies’ - we are - and vice versa. These little snippets of life in the world really make things feel all the more real, and when faced with certain choices - be they part of the main story or as a side-quest - it really pulls you in.
Played on Xbox Series X, the game is visually stunning with 4K graphics and running at a reasonably steady 60fps. You’ve got a helluva lot of ground to cover, with much of Norway and England ripe for exploration. The snow-covered Nordic mountains are an absolute delight to traverse with the crisp white snow being super satisfying to look at as your feet crunch in, a trail trodden-in evidencing your recent whereabouts. Looking up to the stars is mesmerising, with the Aurora Borealis frequently visible in the night’s sky, and with the camera mode so easily available you can snap shots anytime you please. Similarly, England has its own personality of sorts with grittier, almost grubbier locations due to the more frequent use of stone for building, and the dense fog over the sprawling meadows. Everything is really impressive to look at, and it’s easy to waste a fair bit of time taking a million photos, trying to pull off the best “artistic shot”. The lighting throughout is fantastic, and really lends a real-ness to everything that I don’t think I’ve seen be pulled off so convincingly before on console.
Audio-wise, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is a bit of a mixed-bag, with some things being overly quiet but still understandable and others feeling completely muffled beyond redemption. Thankfully, I play with full subtitles/closed captioning as I struggle with my hearing in the first place, but this shouldn’t be something that is just accepted. Granted, these issues were not constant, but it did put a slight damper on things when it arose - especially as some of the lines spoken by Eivor at random whilst exploring are un-subbed, leading to a bit of confusion when you can’t understand what has just been said. As I say, this is something I feel that shouldn’t just be accepted in general, so I hope that this will be resolved with a patch at some point. The voice acting, when the audio issues are not happening, is fantastic with plenty of emotion and humanity in characters’ voices. So to struggle to hear them at times feels a bit disheartening, as it takes away from the story a little. Luckily, the soundtrack doesn’t seem to be affected by these issues, and is absolutely perfect with a very authentic feel for the time.
In between missions you can opt to take part in raids whenever you come across enemy encampments (make sure to call-in the raid, rather than just taking on everyone yourself so that it actually counts! Ahem - Possibly made that mistake myself…), and in your down-time you can regularly find me taking part in the drinking competitions, or flyting (a poetic insult challenge) with the locals. Even spending time doing things like building and upgrading your settlement to allow for a Blacksmith, or even your own Barracks to be built - and have your vikings pop up in other peoples’ worlds.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla not only looks good, it feels good too. Combat feels simple at first, but with a very extensive skill-tree that allows you to customise your own levelling up, this helps to tailor the experience to your preferences, be they a requirement for better health, or making the decision to be more stealthy versus having stronger attacks - it’s up to you how you want to press ahead. Additional skills can be learned, with brutal effects to make the combat feel all the more rewarding. There are also plenty of accessibility options within Valhalla that open it up to all players, from subtitles and closed captioning to different adjustments for varying types of colour-blindness. There are options for menu narration, as well as adjusting icon and text sizes, and all can be seen in real-time via a preview on screen, so you’ll know if these adjustments will work for you or not. There is also the option to remove things such as blood, if you’d prefer to have a less gory playthrough, as leaving this option unchanged will allow for many a decapitation or brutal, bloody hacking of limbs as you wildly swing your axe at your enemies.
There is just so much to do and see in Valhalla and with a story as intense and interwoven as this, it really keeps your attention long after you’ve switched it off. The chaos amongst all the warring factions in England juxtaposes with the serene quality of exploring through your own free-will, and makes for a truly entertaining time. I love being able to just take time out to set a waypoint on my map and just head in that general direction and see what lies in wait.
Similar to previous Ubisoft titles such as Watch Dogs Legion, extra cosmetic items can be purchased via the in-game store, which is a little disappointing. I don’t want to bang on about it, but as much as these extra cosmetics add no gameplay difference aside from the visuals, they would be nice to have without spending extra money as they’re usually pretty striking designs in order to tempt you to buy. Games such as this really don’t need to add microtransactions - all items should be unlockable through the game alone. We see too many games going down the microtransaction route but that’s a whoooole other topic I’m not gonna dive into right now!
There’s also a Season Pass available, giving access to an exclusive mission from launch: The Legend of Beowulf, and two expansions coming next year. These all look to be really interesting, so I can’t wait to see how these stories play out. This can be purchased for £32.49 from the Xbox Store.
In the end, we decided to give Assassin’s Creed Valhalla the Collecting Asylum rating of 8.5/10.
Have you played AC Valhalla yet? What did you think of it?
Let us know in the comments below!
- V x
Thank you to Ubisoft for the Assassin’s Creed Valhalla Ultimate Edition Xbox review code!
