Every set-piece assault in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla has been carefully designed around the narrative to “feel unique” in a variety of ways. While the historically-themed franchise has fairly been criticized for grindy in-game activities as of late, Ubisoft wants to assure that assaults will be quite different.
Speaking with SegmentNext in a recent interview, game director Benoit Richer stated that assaults will be varied enough to not feel like a grind in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. He called them “epic Viking moments” for the narrative and which have been divided between “a wide variety of setups, ingredients, progression elements and context” in the game. Richer though refrained from revealing just how many assaults Eivor will have to take part in.
As for the assaults, they are climactic moments of some of our narrative arcs and for all of them, there’s a wide variety of setups, ingredients, progression elements and context to makes sure that each of them feel unique and support the main narrative.
As for how many, we’ll let the player discover those epic Viking moments!
As the narrative of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla unfolds, Eivor will be required to take part in large-scale assaults against heavily fortified castles and strongholds. These special moments will presumably mark the end of each arc and hence, will be designed according to the storyline just as Richer pointed out.
However, assaults will not be alone. Eivor will also be conducting raids to secure resources and personnel for the creation of a settlement. Richer stated that the settlement will be “at the heart of the narrative structure” of the game. Decisions made by Eivor on every adventure will have consequences and which will impact their settlement and people. The settlement will also feature a variety of buildable buildings that give Eivor access to new services, tools, and activities.
Note that Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will have a charisma stat that can open up new dialogue options for branching narratives and unique outcomes. Provided that Eivor has a high speech talent, that good charisma will eventually mean good news for the settlement as well.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will officially release for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC on November 17, 2020. The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X releases will be detailed by Ubisoft once the next-generation consoles have launched at the end of the year.
