Assassin's Creed: The Wasted Open-World
Recent Assassin's Creed titles missed the mark with their open worlds, but will Valhalla?
With the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/Series S gearing up for launch, the gaming industry is under more pressure than ever to deliver truly jaw-dropping software. To push the boundaries of technology and really show us what they can do.
In the industry lately, open-world titles have been de rigueur. From The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild to Red Dead Redemption 2 and Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, developers and publishers everywhere have been creating huge, elaborate playground for gamers to explore, rife with side-quests, secrets and all manner of distractions besides.
This is all well and good, but where will it end? If everyone tries to one-up everyone else with the ‘biggest and most impressive open-world yet,’ players will soon be unable to see the wood for the trees/uninspired sidequests.
Assassin’s Creed: Origins and Assassin’s Creed Odyssey both provided stunning visions of the ancient world, with expansive and highly detailed maps and campaigns absolutely chock-full of content. At the same time, Ubisoft may have gone too far in this regard, causing players to lose interest long before they saw everything that the games had to offer.
What could this mean for the much-anticipated Assassin’s Creed Valhalla? Have open-world games simply have gone too far?