Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, a roguelike trip to Niflheim

Assassin's Creed Valhalla

While it is true that Assassin's Creed Valhalla has been an extraordinary success, with the best debut ever for the Ubisoft series and post-launch support extended for the first time to the second year, the free mode The Forgotten Saga should be seen as a gift. that the French company wanted to do to its users to thank them.

Of course, the new campaign also stands as a real sequel to the events of the Dawn of Ragnarok expansion, which should therefore be played for fully understand the reasons for Odin's journey to Niflheim, "the kingdom of ice and cold in Norse mythology", controlled by the goddess of the dead Hel.

It is also an experiment, perhaps the most courageous attempted so far as part of the Assassin's Creed series: the tests that the Havi will have to overcome in an attempt to complete his mission will be repeated again and again after his eventual defeat, in a roguelike context of the all unreleased for the series.

Roguelite, actually: although at each apparent death of Odin we will be asked to start the path all over again and we will lose most of the items and skills gained in battle, some things will be possible retrieve them and at the same time use the resources collected (and stored) to upgrade the classes ("complete") selectable at startup and unlock the talents of a completely new tree.

Story: sons of a greater god

Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, Odin discusses his mission with Thor As we told in the review of Assassin's Creed Valhalla: Ragnarok's Dawn , Odin had to face the armies of Surtr in an attempt to save his son Baldr, who was held captive in the world of Svartalfheim. If you have not played the expansion, stop reading immediately and move on to the next paragraph, because even in The Forgotten Saga the basic concept is to recover Baldr, in this case, however, from the realm of the dead.

Una mission Impossible? Not for the Havi, who is absolutely determined to make up for his mistakes and is not afraid to confront Hel and his lieutenants, on a journey that will lead him to visit first the frozen lands of Kaldstad and then gradually other maps, all manned. by powerful final bosses who will put us to the test. As mentioned, in case of defeat we will have to start over: will we be resolute enough not to give up?

Structure: between sacrifices and rewards

Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, Odin in front of the statue of a deer that restores health As mentioned, the one represented in The Forgotten Saga is a path that develops through different maps, each characterized by the presence of specific enemies and final bosses, but also some secondary quests and some secrets to discover, if we wanted to invest some time in exploration. Without crows, transformations or mounts, our movements will be those of a simple man but we will be able to get faster passages in the scenarios by completing a specific task.

Forget the peaks through which to synchronize: the only points of interest in this mode of Assassin's Creed Valhalla are those related to chests and their eventual rewards, all obtainable by coming out victorious from a clash. We will find groups of enemies guarding a chest, or altars that suddenly make numerous opponents appear, or commanders carrying the object we want, and so on.

Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, Odin in the presence of a boss Dying is part of the game, of course, and it does not happen infrequently: although the degree of difficulty is not particularly high and the different approaches to the clash of Valhalla remain valid, therefore both the long shots with the bow (but with a very limited number of arrows), both silent eliminations and frontal assaults (performed perhaps with the support of some special ability), the health bar can only be restored at the deer-shaped statues.

At the game over, however, all is not lost: the collected resources are preserved and permanent upgrades can be unlocked, the aforementioned complete (in practice the classes) and resort to the merchant present in the point of departure of the adventure to recover at least one weapon and one skill we had during the previous attempt, so as to avoid relying completely on chance for the initial equipment.

Gameplay: roguelike, but not soulslike

Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, Odin in the presence of the first boss The Forgotten Saga offers an unprecedented roguelike experience and there is no doubt that some aspects of the gameplay action RPG suggest a soulslike sense are missing consolidated elements such as the rebirth of the enemies killed at each rescue, as well as above all a nastiness and an ability to inflict damage that our opponents in this mode simply do not possess, although they are sometimes rather difficult.

Yes it is made a lot of talk about what Assassin's Creed is or not, and we imagine that this specific downloadable content represents to date the most distant interpretation ever compared to the original formula of the to series. At the same time, however, the most consistent challenge and the possibility to fall back in case of excessive dangers instead of fighting always and in any case, aware that in the end we will succeed, in many ways resumes what was the initial vision of the series.

Technical realization: new worlds to explore

Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, one of the initial scenarios of the mode On the technical and artistic front, The Forgotten Saga undoubtedly has the merit of introducing new worlds to explore , once again drawing on Norse myths to deliver new and undoubtedly fascinating scenarios, as well as bosses generally inspired from a visual point of view. Once again the comparison with the extraordinary English landscapes of Valhalla is merciless, but a good job has been done in any case. on the screen, while the dubbing in Italian proves once again to be solid and well-interpreted, in the hope that at least as far as Assassin's Creed is concerned Ubisoft will never be tempted to eliminate it and thus save on localization.

In conclusion

Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga, the essential inventory at our disposal Assassin's Creed Valhalla: The Forgotten Saga is a really interesting mode, a must for all fans of this chapter of the Ubisoft series and in particular for who has completed The Dawn of Ragnarok, given that from the narrative point of view we are in fact facing a sequel. The roguelite approach shuffles the cards on the table, giving us a different, fascinating and obviously challenging experience.

The excellent combat system, the emphasis on limited resources, the randomness of the finds but also the possibilities of to preserve and recover something with each new attempt will accompany us in this unprecedented adventure; which is not long, at all, even if the duration of the package is obviously influenced by the number of deaths and attempts that we will have to make before being able to face Hel and thus fulfill our duty as father ... of the gods.

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