Eager to continue my journey as Kassandra once more, I jumped into this second episode as soon as it came out. Although there was some trepidation because I had seen all about the controversy surrounding the second episode, I still had to see it for myself and judge it for myself as everyone should do. After adding another 3 hours to my already over 100 hour playthrough, I was able to get all of the trophies so that means it’s time for a review.
Taking place right after episode 1, Hunted, which you can read my review of here, you’ll continue as Kassandra or Alexios and run into Darius and Natakus or Neema while exploring Achaia. Realizing that no matter what they do they’ll always be on the run, Darius needs your help once more to escape Greece and get away from another section of the cult and the leader of this section, The Tempest. Will Darius finally be able to escape with the help of Kassandra or Alexios in this intense naval focused DLC? Or will Darius and Natakas or Neema finally find a place to call home?
The Controversey
Many Spoilers will follow
As you may already know Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is based heavily on choice as this franchise moves on its way to becoming a full blown RPG. Part of the choice that you can make pertain to your characters sexuality. Play Kassandra and Alexios as you want, straight, gay/lesbian, bi, or even asexual if you choose. This choice is thrown out the window in this DLC as no matter what you choose your character will enter into a relationship with either Natakas or Neema and produce a child. That is not how an RPG works and Ubisoft’s half-assed apology really hit a nerve as they said it had to be done for story reasons and “bloodline” reasons. The whole “bloodline” story basically ended years ago and makes no sense in the timeline seeing as Odyssey comes before Origins and Origins was about Bayek avenging the death of his son. After the death of his son there were no other children meaning no more bloodlines. I understand that Odyssey comes before Origins and this has to be linked, but does it have to do that by taking away the players choice? Being a part of the LGBTQ community, I played my Kassandra as a full blown lesbian who bedded every female character she could. To see her turned into a doe eyed idiot over some man in this DLC was just disgusting as I had no say in it. Did I break Natakas heart in the end by telling him I only wanted a family, yes since this was my only option. The only choice I had in this DLC that pertained to my heavily choice driven style of playing. There were so many different avenues Ubisoft could have taken for this major part of the story and their lack of doing so was just lazy. While they promised to fix this, I don’t see how they can and this did sour my opinion of this game and any other so-called RPG they make in the future.
Although I liked the overalls tory for this DLC, it was a little underwhelming. The cliffhanger at the end that will come into play in the final episode of this DLC was an interesting one, but not one that made this DLC worth it. The only interesting thing I could find about this DLC that was good was the increased naval activity and the new naval toy that was added to the Adrestia. All of this was over shadowed by the lack of choice and once again the briefness of this DLC.
The playability of this game remained stable once more as a few new skills were added to enhance your playing style, but that was it. Although the new naval toy is fun for the DLC, who will this come into play later on in the game especially if you’ve already completed the game? I can’t see myself going back out in the water just for fun to burn a bunch of ships. If the last four installments don’t concentrate on naval battle then it’s pointless. Notably, game breaking bugs and glitches were back as I had a complete game crash when trying to manually save. Everything was fine and nothing got corrupted as I was able to start the game again and pick up where I left off, but it is worth mentioning that it happened and needs to be fixed.
The graphics, while the same, were a little underwhelming as Achaia is no Macedonia and there wasn’t anything that I felt like I missed in this area during my initial playthrough. Also, there seemed to be facial problems this time around as when Kassandra went to express emotion it felt off and forced, just how I felt when going through each awkward scene.
There are another 5 trophies for this DLC and as with the first episode before it, the trophies are easy to obtain. All you have to do is complete the DLC, easy, use your new skill and naval toy, easy, use a weapon given to you in the game, easy, and eliminate the new branch of the cult, also easy. With the trophies being this easy there should be no reason why you shouldn’t be able to fully complete this DLC and get all of the trophies.
This game is still a single player game so there is still no multiplayer.
Overall I give this DLC a 2 out of 5.
What’s Great:
+ Kassandra and Alexios’s adventure lives on as you find yourself helping Darius once more and are left with a cliffhanger of an ending.
+ New skills and naval toys to try out and play with until you eventually get bored with them because you can only burn so many ships and laugh manically before it becomes a little overdone.
What’s Not So Great:
– Another DLC on the short side. The story is a quick one and felt a little rushed. Hopefully the final DLC for this adventure will be a little more fleshed out and contain more choices.
– Beware of glitches that cause game crashes and underwhelming graphics.
This wasn’t the greatest DLC for this game in so many ways. A main way was that this so-called RPG game turned into a standard Assassin’s Creed game since important choices were taken away. What I’m looking for going forward is to see how Ubisoft rights their wrongs and to just complete this episodic adventure before moving onto the next. At this point I would say that unless you want to pick up the season pass to get Assassin’s Creed III and Assassin’s Creed Liberation for free to do so because it’s a good value, but if you’re looking for something enjoyable to continue Odyssey and then maybe hold off to see how things progress with the DLC going forward.
1 Broke Gamer Girl 