Assassin’s Creed Valhalla trailer is nothing short of mind-blowing and the fact that we get to jump into the Viking experience is amazing, but there is deep lore that has been uncovered which will help you understand the world that our lead character and Viking Raider Eivor lived in.
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Assassin’s Creed Valhalla Breakdown
Let’s clear a few things out before, this installment of Assassin’s Creed takes us back to the 9th Century, for history buffs this was the Dark Ages in England and mostly throughout the world. So the world we’re stepping into will be a cruel, unforgiving world which will test even the strongest of people alive.
Story
Living in Norway, with other Vikings was always dangerous and your role in this game is to find a new place to settle in England as you take your entire tribe across the North Sea from Norway to England. Vikings were always known to be raiders and pillaging is part of their legend along with epic battles, fearlessness, and their devotion to Odin.
Similarly, it seems like Vikings in this story were under a lot of stress when n Harald Fairhair became king of Norway after the battle at Hafrsfjord. He tried to unify the petty kingdoms of Norway under a single rule which must have driven Eivor and his tribe away.
It seems like there will be a Norwegian King who will convert to a Templar and thus bringing forth a huge fight that will destabilize England and Norway in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.
Setting
Now coming to England this will be your introduction in the game to travel if historical accuracy is applied. The Vikings should reach first come to the kingdom of Wessex. In the trailer you see a King talk about the Vikings, this is King Alred the Great who ruled over England and has a history of fighting the Viking invasion.
As it is with Assassin’s Creed, there will be Assassin’s and Templars in the game but with different names. It seems like Assassin’s will be called Hidden Ones and Templars will be named as Order of the Ancients.
In the trailer breakdown video, which was hosted on Ubisoft North America’s Youtube page. Ashraf Ismail, Creative Director, and Darby McDevitt talk a lot about the game and the setting of how it is going to progress. They reveal that Eivor will certainly meet with Assassins in this game, which establishes that Assassins have already existed in the game and both their motives will align at a certain point in the game.
Along with Wessex, the game will take you through all the major kingdoms of that time in England like East Anglia, Mercia, and Northumbria. There haven’t been any talks of Scotland and or Wales being apart but we’re not counting it out as of now.
Combat
With combat, we get the return of the hidden blade which will surely be given by one of the Assassins to Eivor and the battle that we see in the trailer will probably be towards the end. With combat comes a new dynamic that is being introduced and it has something to do with Odin.
Unlike Gods, as we know them now, Vikings had a give and take relationship with Odin who helped them in their battles and journeys in exchange for something. The trailer shows a raven that can be perceived as an omen helping the Vikings on the battlefield. It’s implementation however is yet to be disclosed.
But be ready to see both of Odin’s famous raven named Huginn, which translates to Thought and Muninn which translates to Memory.
There will be new mechanics which will certainly be more like an RPG where you get to upgrade your weapons and craft them when you get the chance. This has been in the series for a while but with the new installment Assassin’s Creed will take advantage of the next-gen console and bring weight to the weapons.
It feels like the combat for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla has been inspired a bit from For Honor, where every swing you take has a different dynamic and feel to it. With the dual battle-axe, it should bring speed to the game but other weapons shall give a different feel.
You can read this quote by Achraf Ismail on combat in an interview with game informer, “Well, the Viking age was really brutal. We needed to deliver that; some of the key terms we were using early in the project were “visceral,” “crunchy,” “brutal,” “weighty.” We wanted every swing of an axe to mean something – you can feel it. A lot of effort has gone into that sense of impact. But also the weaponry; there are a lot of famous weapons that come from this time period. For instance, the Viking round shield. So, we have a round shield. We have tower shields. We have flails, and spears, and bearded axes, and Dane axes, and longswords”.
He also goes on to say that enemies in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will make use of their environment and this should give you different combat feeling no matter how many hours you’re in. “We’ve put a lot of variety into our enemies. A combat system can only shine if the enemies themselves shine. A lot of variety, a lot of unique capacities, a lot of surprises in the ways enemies can use the environment (and one another) against the player. We wanted to make sure, if you’ve been playing for 10, 15, 20 hours that you’re still being surprised by what the enemies can do in the world and with one another”.
