Disclaimer: I played and finished this game on Epic (78hr playtime), and bought the game here so I could leave this review where people might actually see it.

I wish this game was just bad. I wish it was the standard low effort AAA trash. A thing leaves your mind so quickly when it’s unremarkable and makes no impression, and I wouldn’t even be compelled to write about it if it was just a bad game. But Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is not a bad game, it is a painfully, heartbreakingly, mediocre one. It’s worse than bad. Because it promises to be good, and it should be. Because I can’t even begin to fathom the monumental amount of effort and care that went into crafting a world and setting that I should be entirely entranced with, and I have never really experienced a game with such a vast scale in both locale and narrative. Yet the end product is still, against all odds, a poorly designed and incredibly over-bloated game.

There are at most, and I’m really not exaggerating this, about 4 hours maximum of actually interesting narrative content in this game which has somehow been strewn across 60 hours of lacklustre, undriven, pointless and repetitive gameplay (60 hours is the lower end by the way, if you ignore basically all of the hundreds of near-useless collectables and side-ventures). Most of the interesting narrative occurs at the END of the game. There are several points in the main progression where the gaps between interesting story beats are separated by, without hyperbole, 16 hours of filler arcs. That is longer than some of the earlier AC games in their entirety. Just. On. Filler. Filler story that has no bearing and no connection to any of the actual interesting plot. It honestly boggles the mind how the narrative structure and design of this game actually made it through several rounds of production.

My best bet for where this game lost its footing is very simple and boils down to this: Assassin’s Creed Valhalla was made by a mis-managed group of teams that, in their own right are obviously incredibly skilled developers, but as a conglomerate very clearly did not talk to each other and collaborate, at all, during production. This is the best, most concise way I can describe the dull ache this game will leave you with, as what you will find is a game filled with a hundred different things to do and stories to tell, but no cohesion or unifying foundation to hold them together, and no reason to explore any of it.

Completing this game was painful, a self-flagellation and a rot that would not leave me until I finished it at least once and could shelve it for all eternity. And now I am free.

Play this only if you are a die-hard fan of the series, or if you are clinically obsessed with Vikings, anything less will be a sincere waste of your time.

With love,
A clinically viking-obsessed, die-hard fan of the series

If you play with headphones be VERY aware that the audio quality on this game is absolutely abhorrent. From the first line of dialogue spoken, it was glaringly obvious the low bit rate the audio has from dialogue, to footsteps, to combat. I had to quit and refund because I cannot put up with listening to this game through a tin can. If you play on speakers, maybe it wont be noticeable. Very disappointing from a AAA game studio. I've played a lot of indie games and have never heard anything like this.

Definitely the weakest in the series - I'm a huge fan of the original formula in AC and was originally skeptical of the RPG element when Origins was released! However, Origins won me over as did Odyssey and I'll admit to being very excited about Valhalla once I had seen some game play and stills released by Ubisoft ... it was short lived once I got in game though.

It's a beautifully crafted world which is ultimately devoid of life. It really does feel like they could not be bothered with character development - literally everyone no matter how small or large their part was to play in the story felt like a side character and you therefore do not feel compelled to pursue their story nor worry about what happens to them.

The skill tree was unnecessarily large to the point where you again, genuinely don't really care.

Can a game be too big I've often wondered....the answer after playing this one was yes.

Oh, and the achievements......really Ubisoft.....really!?!?!?

Overall 2/10 - get it if your a huge fan of AC but only if it's less than £10!! If you're thinking about playing AC for the first time then check out Origins and Odyssey first, as it would be a shame if this one put you off them.

Its a very very dense game, it is for sure not for everyone but from my experience it can be very fun but one has to have the patience to get through it.

feels like a chore just to play

beton

aaa

Would be great but it is on Ubisoft platform. Sad to see that 15% of players actually made it out of Norway. The rest dropped the game and gave up.

This game crashes so much, I'm just going to hang it up and stop playing

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is one of the most disappointing and frustrating games I’ve ever played. It tries to be The Witcher 3, Dark Souls, and Hades all at once but fails miserably at everything. The combat is dull and repetitive, the story is bland and forgettable, and the game is riddled with bugs and crashes—many of which existed in previous titles like Origins. It feels bloated with pointless activities and unnecessary grinding, making it a chore to play. I only bought it hoping for something like Origins or Odyssey, but it’s worse in every way. Unless you’re a completionist forcing yourself to finish for achievements (like me), I strongly recommend skipping this broken mess.