The Feeling of Ancient Nostalgia
The first Assassin's Creed game I bought was the second instalment, I'd seen my friend's brother play it and had to have it. I've never been into violent video games, never owned a copy of Call of Duty or Battlefield, but when I saw someone climbing across Basilicas in a white robe only to swan dive into a pile of hay, it astounded me. I completed the entirety of both Assassin's Creed II and Brotherhood when I was 15 going on 16.
I will say though, after that, I lost interest, Ubisoft kept producing astounding cinematic trailers, only to come out with buggy, broken messes that often had 20+ needless and complex mechanics. Their track record since Assassins Creed II was poor at best, despite the fact they kept pushing what was technologically capable if it wasn't the engine that let them down, it was the abysmal present-day story (and sometimes in addition to the main story). Seeing gameplay uploaded to YouTube was the closest I came to playing these games, and when the Victorian-set AC Syndicate came out, I sighed and turned away.
However, in June 2017 when AC Origins was revealed, I sat up in my chair a little. The ambition to set a game in Ancient Egypt and manage to maintain the action of previous instalments despite contextual historical restrictions was honestly impressive. I was still a little burned from the previous let downs, and considering the AAA pricing of £50, I gave it a pass, but quietly, Ubisoft gained a little bit of my respect again.
Then, came Odyssey
Released October 2018, right under my nose I won't lie, is the earliest story Ubisoft sought to tell, not to mention the largest. Set in Ancient Greece, it introduced elements from RPGs, such as the choice between a male or female character, dialogue options, multiple romance options between different genres, weapon classes that affect the fighting style, all of this was completely new to me, and I loved every bit of it. I got to a point, sailing across the Aegean sea with the sun setting over the Lakonian mountains, that it didn't feel like a game best known for stabbing, it felt nostalgic in a way I still can't quite describe.
And it got better
Every city I explored felt alive, felt tangible, felt beautiful. It truly shows how advanced the Greeks were, Ionic structures that felt like skyscrapers, freshwater baths, and temples decorated with murals, lifelike and stunning. Even after studying Greek architecture for a while in high school, I never got the sense of wonder looking at drawings and pictures of ruins than I did by virtually walking through them.
I think the point I'm trying to make here is that, beyond being a game where you murder your way across the Greek Isles, it brought to life one of the most fascinating lost cultures imaginable and showed them in their
flaws with the class system of Sparta, but most of all in their staggering beauty. Architecture, democracy, philosophy, all from over 2000 years ago. It always makes me wonder what would have happened if the Greek or Roman civilisations prospered to modern-day, how much more advanced would we be? Would we be more united or divided? Would we have accelerated issues like overpopulation and climate decline? A video game woke this internal discussion in me, made part of me want to risk Typhoid and go back to Ancient Greece if I could. The fact that what could be considered lines of computer code, has made me so emphatic on the subject goes to show how much soul I believe this game has.
Yes it has its bugs, yes it has its faults, but the fact remains that they will never spoil the view from a boat as the sun sets, the sky opens, and a lantern burns dimly on the coast of a forgotten shore.
