Assassin’s Creed has been one of the main staples of gaming for quite some time now. It has spanned over 12 mainline entries and has evolved considerably throughout the years. Once a stealth action-adventure open-world, it has now transformed into an almost full-blown RPG. With the newly released Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, the third RPG entry, we think it’s a good time for Ubisoft to change some things with the series.
Related: All Assassin’s Creed Games Ranked
The Lead Up – Problems With The Series
Assassin’s Creed has quite a bunch of problems. First of all, the annual release schedule of the series prohibits developers to make big changes to the experience. Instead, we get a new story with incremental changes to the core gameplay being pumped out every year.
Origins felt like a breath of fresh air when it released in 2017. A change to the Assassin’s Creed formula was heartily welcomed by critics and players alike. However, this soon sparked a debate about whether or not these changes should stay or not. Ubisoft quickly responded to this question with Assassin’s Creed Odyssey – a Greek mythologic epic that transformed our beloved series into a full-blown RPG.
The disconnecting story coupled with the excessive grind and loot made this one of the most divisive games in the series. Many fans felt that the tone and mechanics were more akin to something like The Witcher than Assassin’s Creed. Valhalla has also made incremental changes to these systems by dialling back some of the RPG systems.
Whatever your stance might be on the direction of the series, we can all agree that some things need to change, for better or for worse.
Also Read: Elden Ring Gameplay First Impressions By Phil Spencer
The Sales Figures Of The RPG Titles
Let’s look up the sales number for these titles for a bit. Before Assassin’s Creed went RPG, every entry usually sold around 7-10 million copies – with the highest being Assassin’s Creed 3 coming in at around 12 million copies.
Despite coming out at a time when the franchise started to fatigue and a buggy start, Assassin’s Creed 3 did go toe-to-toe with some of the most heavy-hitters that year, Mass Effect 3 and Borderlands 2. The series warranted a major rework when Assassin’s Creed Syndicate sold poorly in 2015.
The sales figures for Assassin’s Creed Origins and Assassin’s Creed Oddysey are not available publicly, but Ubisoft did announce Assassin’s Creed Origins racking up $890 million in sales. Dividing the number by a retail price of 60$ yields about 15 million copies sold, but that’s not the whole picture. Special editions, DLC content, and microtransactions all add up to make it a lot blurry. Assassin’s Creed Odyssey brought even more of the cash flow but no sales numbers have been revealed as of now.
What makes it weirder is companies love boasting about their sales numbers. From huge publications such as the likes of Rockstar Games to humble ones such as Rocket League’s Psyonix take immense pride in their games’ player base – constantly pumping out numbers of copies sold. This further solidifies the above argument that a lot more cash is brought in by the aforementioned add-ons than people might actually think.
The Critical Reception For The Assassin’s Creed RPGs
Assassin’s Creed has always been a critical darling. The jaw-dropping visuals combined with an ambitious scale have always managed to capture the hearts of critics and gamers alike. Ranking the critic scores of the RPG titles, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey comes at the top with a score of 83 while Assassin’s Creed Valhalla and Assassin’s Creed Origins tie out at 81.
The user score reveals a different trend though. Assassin’s Creed Odyssey has the lowest user score coming in a 6.3 while Assassin’s Creed Origins and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla have user score of 7.2 and 7.0 respectively. Assassin’s Creed Origins was the best one among the three which is mostly because it was breath of fresh air for the series. For the record, all these user scores are less than their critic counterparts.
Why this is interesting is because it is quite the opposite with other open-world games. Similar games such as 2020’s Ghost Of Tsushima usually have a higher user score than the critic score. This is because most open-world employ a plethora of psychological tricks and systems to keep you engaged at all times. This makes gamers feel a lot better about the world and game than it actually is. On the other hand, critics who are accustomed to these tricks view it as filler content that does not value their time.
Where To Look Out For In The Future – Inspirations and More
It’s time that Ubisoft should stop capitalizing on the mechanics of other popular games. The two major problems we see with the series is exploration and freedom of combat.
Let’s first acknowledge that exploration and side content has improved considerably with the RPG titles, but we can surely do better. However, the combat has seen a shift from stealth to brutal melee combat. It only makes sense for a dude in a hood to hunt from the shadows rather than swinging his sword in the face of his foes.
A good place to start could be Sekiro- Shadows Die Twice. FromSoftware’s latest title has a lot more similar to current Assassin’s Creed titles than you may think.
Both titles focus on combat scenarios where you are given the choice and tools to tackle them in any way you want to. You can engage the enemies head-on or stealth kill them or really anything in between with the only fail state being your demise.
Sekiro’s enemies are a lot tougher and aware of their surroundings than Ubisoft’s open-world games. But FromSoftware makes sure to reward a skilled stealth player with a one-hit instakill.
Even bosses can be taken out in a hit if you are really sneaky. On the other hand, the newer AC games demand you go and engage in their hack-n-slash combat. Stealth instakills are only possible if your power level is comparable to your foes and most of the bosses can’t be stealthed at all.
This is a huge departure from the original games that were entirely focused on tactical and social stealth. An adaptation of this game’s combat system could really fit well with Ubisoft’s open-world design for Assassin’s Creed.
Another place to look out would be games like Red Dead Redemption 2, The Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild for the joy of exploring. Intentionally hiding content away from the player is a really great virtue that should not be overlooked. Sekiro and other Souls games do it too by cutting off entire quests and areas for the more casual players.
The true essence of open-world games is the excitement and fun in exploration. Putting your content on designated spots on the map not only defeats this purpose but makes the game a lot more linear and restrictive.
