User:Master Sima Yi/Origins review

I'll be very honest. I was really disappointed with the latest two offerings in the Assassin's Creed franchise, Unity and Syndicate. It resulted in franchise fatigue for me, lessening the amount of time I involved myself with Assassin's Creed and wiki work. Origins got back the excitement I felt with the early games. We are now thrown into Ancient Egypt, arguably one of the most fitting settings for the franchise. Mixed with a brand new gameplay system, Origins promises to be the revitalization of the series, right on time for its tenth anniversary. Did it deliver?

The Assassin's Creed series has always prized itself on its recreation of historical locations for players to emerge in. Origins is no different. In fact, I'd say it raises the bar exceptionally high. The game's recreation of Egypt is perhaps the most mesmerising world the series has yet to offer. Anyone who had reservations about the setting lending itself to Assassin's Creed will have to face the fact to be wrong.

Not only are sandy locations properly balanced out with areas of lush vegetations, ancient Egyptian structures like pyramids and temples offer great climbing gameplay, and cities like Alexandria, Memphis and Cyrenaika offer the city-climbing craving for any old school fan. Meanwhile there are lots of secrets for fans of the mysteries tombs of old to discover around the map, which offer more opportunities for exploration and parkour.

The beauty of the world is perhaps one of the game's biggest victories. While Unity ' s Paris would easily take the title of prettiest game world in the series, it has now easily been overthrown. The singular big open world with fully integrated cities is something that I wish the series will pick up on going forward.

The only downside is that the desert areas, as some might have feared, are extremely empty. In fact, the narrative doesn't even take you to the majority of them, and you're left to explore what little there is on your own time. For me personally, this was no issue. The world is large enough to oversee some of the more barren areas.

However, what we do in this world is just as important as how it looks. And this is where I feel the game doesn't deliver on its promise. Before we dive into content-related matters, let's discuss the story that the game offers us, and whether or not it really is the reinvigoration that the series' narrative so sorely needs.

Origins tells the story of Bayek of Siwa, the last Medjay. Historically, the Medjay were an ancient order that functioned like a police force and served the pharaoh. When the Ptolemaic dynasty was established, the Medjay disappeared. In the game's story, Bayek serves as the protector of the Siwa Oasis.

The game starts off with an intense intro cutscene and has Bayek return to Siwa from a long journey around Egypt, pursuing the men he deems responsible for the death of his young son Khemu. These men belong to the Order of the Ancients, the precursors to the Order of the Knights Templar. Sharing grief with his wife Aya, Bayek goes on a quest to exact revenge on the Ancients. Meanwhile Aya serves as protector to Queen Cleopatra, who is engaged in a civil war with her younger brother Ptolemy XIII, a puppet for the Ancients.

As Bayek goes about the land and pursues different targets belonging to the Order, he encounters numerous people and allies who require his help. The game is rich in such side content - delivered through us via an all new quest system which we can do at any point during the game -and it breathes the required life into this vast world that would otherwise be completely empty. A lot of these side quests have some interesting storylines. You discover more about ancient Egyptian customs, rituals and way of life.

However, I found in my playthrough that a lot of these side quests revolve around the various guard and bandit camps that are planted throughout the region. The majority of these quests end up with you needing to infiltrate such a camp and either killing a target or rescuing a target, and sometimes, even carrying that target out of the camp.

This quest formula isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does become a bit of a grind when four out of five quests (estimation may not be 100% accurate) end up with such a camp infiltration. The world is beautiful enough to maintain interest, but at the same time the quests don't really complement all the locations in this world. The side quests should offer opportunity to explore all the locations you never go to during main quests, but instead we're stuck in camps that look quite alike.

But let's not forget something crucial to the game, and that is its combat system. The new gameplay mechanics really save a lot of these quests from feeling too boring, as the completely reworked combat system adds a lot of flavour to the old formula. The old mashing buttons system and waiting for the enemies to struck at you in turns to counter is completely gone. Instead, we're faced with a much more brutal strike, block and dodge system, while enemies don't wait their turns to strike at you.

Add to this a lot of varied boss fights, enemy levelling and an opportunity to change the game's difficulty, and you'll have various moments where you have a tough time on your hands. It enforces a good combination of stealth and combat; picking off as many enemies in stealth to make sure you don't get completely swamped in combat.

The game not only differs a wide variety of weapons including swords, spears, scepters and halberds, but the new bow system is better than any former interation we got of a gun, crossbow or bow. And we even get different styles of bows, allowing for even more gameplay variety. Add to that the little touches like setting your arrows on fire when holding them near a flame and using that with oil to create massive distraction opportunities, and the game offers a lot of gameplay variety not seen in previous games.

It's one of the game's highlights and one of the aspects of the series' revitalization that truly delivers. This combat change was extremely necessary, as older Assassin's Creed ' s suffered from gameplay that I deemed to be too easy. This new system throws the franchise in with the big boys like The Witcher and Dark Souls, a game for what one might call the more "serious gamer".

To sum everything up before I get to where I suppose my real expertise lies - story and lore - the game does a lot of things well, namely delivering a vibrant and life-like recreation of ancient Egypt and granting us the huge variety of gameplay that we're long overdue, while also feeling a little repetitive in its side content.

So, let's get to the story and lore. I will not address the entire narrative, but I will feature the things that I deem important to compliment or criticize. Without further ado:

During the first sequence, Bayek kills his first target and acquires an Apple of Eden from him - an Apple which the Ancients planned to use to open a vault in Siwa. As I had hoped, we're off with the mystery and intrigue of the First Civilization and its tech from the very start. However, the game never really addresses with this artifact does and Bayek never uses it. In fact, we only see it a few times, and most of what happens to it happens off-screen.

After Bayek rejoins his wife in Alexandria, she gives him the Hidden Blade, a weapon that was "used to kill Xerxes" and that she received from Cleopatra. It is obviously the weapon that belonged to Darius, but he is never mentioned by name. A great nod, but one that is not developed upon. In fact, hardly any of the established AC lore that predates Origins is mentioned or even acknowledged, and this is not a good thing.

The first half of the main narrative is about Bayek travelling across the land pursuing the members of the Order. This concept felt like one of the greatest strengths in game like Assassin's Creed II and Assassin's Creed Syndicate, working your way through a web of intrigue and taking these people down. However, we never find out what drives any of these targets, what their role is in the Order and what they do to ensure their control over Egypt. It made me lack motivation.

However, the Animus Corridor cutscenes are the best they have ever been. Making a lot of use of Egyptian mythology, they're true visual marvels and add some otherwise crucially missing dialogue with these people about their goals and motivations, but it sometimes feels like too little too late.

After the early targets are taken down, we're thrown back into Alexandria and spend time with Cleopatra and Julius Caesar, which arguably is the best thing about the game. In the time we spend with them, Cleopatra and Caesar probably receive the best characterization in the game besides Bayek himself. We meanwhile see some nods to Alexander the Great and his Staff of eden, and the game ends up very respectful to previous lore in regard to their true affiliations. These are things that put a smile on my face while playing.

Things felt like they spiraled down a bit towards the end. After Cleopatra and Caesar show their true colours, Bayek's brotherhood seems to get formed from scratch consisting of a small group of people he interacted with during his fight against the Ancients (one such person only appears in side quests I hadn't done yet and another only appears once during the main narrative).

In the end, this brotherhood gets formed from scratch, with no prior acknowledgement that there were Assassins (or proto-Assassins) centuries before this game takes place, and all the statements in previous games that the Assassin-Templar war has been going since the dawn of humanity.

If felt like establishing the brotherhood in 47 BCE really narrows the scope of the franchise, and leaves me wondering where people like Darius, Wei Yu, Iltani and their targets fit into the war. Not to mention the missed opportunity of addressing the Rosetta Stone, written in 196 BCE, which supposedly had information about the Assassins.

The Ancients' leader ends up being a character we only see once during the game, who is nonetheless inexplicably evil and whose motivations remain a mystery to me as much as anyone else in the Order. The reveal ended up feeling a little underwhelming, even though there's nothing inherently wrong with the character himself.

At the end of the game, Aya decides that she and Bayek should split up. Bayek seems to hardly object to this, and Aya seems to feel very little over this decision either. The monologue about their "creed" (which is never explained or emphasised on) and their motivations for their new brotherhood feel shallow, because the substance of the Assassin philosophy is absent.

It makes the final act feel a bit rushed, because it doesn't take its time to properly explain these things. The Creed, its maxim and tenets are crucial to an origin story about the Assassin Brotherhood. Meanwhile, Bayek losing his ring finger due to the Hidden Blade and the feather weighing from Egyptian mythology are nice nods to the early Brotherhood, and Bayek's religious side as a role in its founding.

Their name the Hidden Ones also ties into that mythology, and tying in the Amunet is one of my favourite nods and ties the narrative well together. It was cool to see her eventually play a key role in the assassination of Caesar at the end of the game, something I always wanted to write a fanfic about. I'm a bit unsure of Caesar's affiliation with the Order at the end of the game, but the sequence itself was an incredible cool ending.

As for modern day... I'm glad to see that has finally returned, but we got an unlikeable protagonist who has no one to interact with, nothing of any worth to do, and the unnecessary return of an old character who feels completely different due to the voice actor change and dialogue that doesn't fit his old persona. And then it ends without a proper conclusion. The grand return of modern day ended up very disappointing. I hope that the expansions and future installments really improve on this, because in its current incarnation it feels unfinished.

Overall, I feel like the game really delivered in some aspects but was not the flawless experience that I hoped it would be after an extra year of development time. The game does some things so much better in terms of gameplay, immersion and world building, but ends up falling flat in what you do with said gameplay and world. Overall, I'm gonna have to hand this game a 7.9. It's not quite hit the excellent game mark, but with some extra elaboration on story and side content, it easily would have.