Assassin's Creed Odyssey is Ubisoft's first attempt at a full-on open world RPG in the AC universe. It's clear that Origins and Odyssey were developed during the same windows in order to use a lot of the assets. There's a lot of similarity between Ancient Greece and Ancient Egypt visually, and it's led some people to call Odyssey a "full-price DLC" for Origins. Let me be clear - this game is so much more than a reskin of Origins. It's a full-on epic RPG with choice, consequence, myriad systems, and refined combat to boot.
Choice and Consequence
One of the big new things in this edition of AC is that right from the very beginning of the game, you must make choices that funnel through the rest of your experience. There are reportedly nine different endings to Odyssey, and all roads lead to uncertain conclusions as you play through the story and pick your sides in the many conflicts. Heck, you even have to pick between the male hero Alexios or the female hero Kassandra within the first five minutes. And yes, that affects the story too.
Customizable Skill Choices
At any given time, Kassandra or Alexios can have four skills for melee combat and four skills for archery. The three trees from Origins are still here, but all new skills spread across them mean you can really customize what you're capable of to fit your play style.
Fully Customizable Ship and Crew
Open sea sailing is back in Odyssey, made famous in AC: Black Flag, and revisited in Origins. But this time, you get to deck our your crew, customize your hull and armaments, even choose the looks of your crew and the ship itself. The whole thing is far more in depth than previous installments, and finding and recruiting new crew by knocking them out and "making them an offer they can't refuse" is way more fun than it has any right to be.
Exploration Mode
Recent Assassin's Creed entries have had a tendency to do too much hand holding. Odyssey aims to fix that by offering up two different modes of play - the traditional guided mode, which sort of holds your hand and shows you exactly where to go - then there's Exploration Mode. The latter gives you general directions, information gathered by talking to quest givers, and then lets you use those clues to find mission objectives. It's a far more organic way of playing the game and one that makes AC Odyssey feel less like you're being led around by the nose.
The Mercenary System
For the first time in an AC game, you can actually get caught stealing things from people, or doing bad things in the world. If you do, mercenaries will begin to come after you, and try to take you out. It's like a small-scale version of the Middle-earth games' Nemesis system. Taking them out grants special loot, notoriety, and quests that add a whole new dimension to the game.
There are so many more reasons to keep an eye on Assassin's Creed Odyssey today as the reviews start pouring in. But if you enjoyed the direction the series was taking with Origins, you're going to love Odyssey. I, for one, hope Ubisoft continues this open world RPG saga in the next installment (which is reportedly at least 2 years away). What I wouldn't give to see the same RPG treatment in a more modern setting like the one we had in Syndicate.
Will you be picking up Assassin's Creed Odyssey this week?
