The announcement came earlier this week. The next game in the renowned Assassin’s Creed series will be centred around everyone’s favourite pillaging beard boys, the vikings. I myself have a very mild (ghats right will keep it cool) obsession with the Norse mythology and culture so I was excited to see what direction Ubisoft would take this title. From the trailer it’s clear that like the more recent RPG games before it, Valhalla will be leaning more heavily on the mythology side with the all father himself, Odin, appearing in the battle scene we were presented. The lead character is shown to be a powerful and skilled viking warrior leading an army to the shores of jolly old England against a defending force of what appear to be Templars! Of course some “fans” have already been vocal and dare I say, toxic in comment sections, bemoaning the historical inaccuracies like anyone around them really cares? The biggest gripe seems to be that your playable assassin can be ever a man or a woman. “But there weren’t really viking warrior women!” Cry the couch historians with fingers leaving grease stains on their phone’s screen. Luckily Ubisoft were ready for that accusation. Laying out the facts that no one can really confirmed or deny the level of involvement women had in Norse culture as the Vikings, quite famously, didnt actually write much down. What we do know, is that viking women were treated in a fairly progressive way. Much more so than most cultures of the time and even for a long time afterwards!
Anyway, the point of this little article was to make it clear I’m very happy with this direction. I haven’t played an Assassin’s game to completion since Black Flag, and while I can appreciate each game is a fantastic piece of work and the more recent games new spin on the title has brought in new fans and near flawless gameplay, I just wasn’t feeling it.
I think the problem was, none of the historical sites the games chose really interested me all that much, the closest I’ve come to wanted to smash one of these games as Odyssey as Greek history is fascinating! However, I just never went out and got the game. Now though, with long boats on the horizon and a war cry bellowing across the waves, I can already feel myself preparing my bank card for an ultimate edition pre order of this nordic themed assassin adventure!