#I might post my Thoughts about bridging ACO to ACV later

[lucyintheskywithtemplars]

AC: Ragnarok--no, that’s a Thor movie--Valhalla!

Okay! So. I was in a teleconference today (because the one thing that hasn’t shut down during this pandemic is Construction, Especially of Hospitals) when Ubisoft did their Thing. So I missed it. But now: time to watch the trailer.

(I did get to passively, distractedly watch the art thing yesterday they did on twitter, but all I got from it was pretty landscapes and silhouette of a Big Guy, so aside from the Ubisoft AC Special (TM), and VIKINGS, I don’t know what I’m about to see. Huzzah!)

Disclaimer: I tried to keep my language clean, but that failed at some point

Bullet points, go!

1. So.... that’s looking to be a fairly burly guy. Or at least very well armoured.

2. If there is no option to play as a lady this time I will S C R E A M and then promptly wage internet war (no I won’t). Kass spoiled me, you can’t take that away from me, Ubisoft!

3. A priestess woman... is she our female playable character?

4. It’s taken me until now to figure out that the voice over narration is an actual character speaking and not just... a random voice over narrator.

5. LOL the narration is all about how they kill indiscriminately and of course Ubisoft pairs that with a “oh look at this woman and her child(ren?), let’s allow them to run away from the fighting and violence and not kill them” and I mean. This is AC of course they’re going to make their protag / protag’s people look good, so I’m not surprised, and knowing that this is a character narration means it’s propaganda to some degree (Templaaaaars!). I’m just. You’re really going out of your way to show where the lines are drawn, but in the most subtle manner you can manage, eh?

6. I gotta say: that switch from actual battle to play fighting and training with the fam? That’s a nice transition. Almost as good as the ones for the Origins Theatrical Trailer (all caps, because that? Is the shit. Still my favourite. Leonard Cohen! Bayek! Aya/Amunet! Egypt! Cleo and Caesar and did I say Bayek! And SENU, MY LOVE <3 <3 <3 <3 <3).

7. I didn’t bother to look up what year (decade) this is set in exactly, but I’m going to assume it’s pre-Christianization of the Scandiwegian countries/lands, so that means A) this is probably not going to have a happy ending, and B) my immediate reaction of KING JOHN! WHERE IS ROBIN HOOD? Is way off base

8. Guy in the background is reminding me of what’s his face from ACII. Damn it. I remember Savonarola, but not him. The Gonfallioniere (sp?). I’m recording all of my thoughts trying to remember this fool’s name because it’s bugging me so much I SHOULD KNOW IT. Um. What’s his face. The Betrayer. That guy. Getting those same vibes from Mister Background For The King. (An eminence grise?)

9. AAAAAAND... BATTLE! This is feeling like that one mission in AC3, where they tricked us into thinking we could do the same thing in actual play as Connor did in the trailer. THAT’S WHAT I’M FEELING, I am Worried. Not super stealthy to be front and centre in a giant free for all!

10. (I say like the entire premise of this game isn’t VIKINGS. What do I know)

11. WHAT IS THAT FLORENTINE LAWYER GUY’S NAME?????

12. So the... leader? Chief? Head honcho? The dude gets taken out and the guy-who-is-I-guess-our-boy just lobs that... axe? Very nice.

13. A hooded person! So maybe we actually ARE being stealthy? Is that our boy/girl?

14. No, my bad, that was just fucking god. (KASS? IS THAT YOU?)

15. “Odin is with us!” Well, that was definitely our standard bird of prey that just took off (I’m including Corvids in this--I just 100% typo’ed that as “Covid”, I’ve Pavlov’d my fingers apparently). So random hooded person who is Not Odin what is wrong with you is... maybe probably our boy/girl? Nice. And dude who is speaking is not?

(15.2. I have to admit, I’m on my second watch, and I’m still having trouble keeping track of who is who between each scene. Is the guy who meets the priestess and gets blood markings the same one we see talking? Is it the leader who gets shanked in the battle? Is it someone else entirely? I don’t know! I’m just going to assume that we’re focusing on the guy who speaks during the battle because of Reasons From Further Points.)

16. No, seriously, what is that fool’s name from Florence? Damnit.

17. Dude-on-a-horse! ...I’m assuming you’re the guy from the scene with the King. And now you’re on a horse! With a... giant of a man beside you. (Ser Gregor Clegane, is that you?)

18. Holy shit it might be, I want a normal person to stand beside both Mister Mountain and our boy, how big are you guys????? Height, muscle, mass, weight, armour, all of the above? The scales for these people look. So weird.

19. Mario Kart 64 had the battle rounds for two or more players? And when you selected it there was that (Luigi?) voice clip that said, “Battol!” Yeah, I definitely heard that when our boy faced off with Mister Mountain.

20. NOT LOOKING TOO HOT THERE, P.O.V. CHARACTER, MAYBE YOU NEED A LITTLE HELP FROM YOUR HOODED FRIEND?

21. HA! HELP GRANTED AND--

22. YOU ARE FUCKING KIDDING ME. Now I need to go back and rewatch and see if I can pick up on that bracer from earlier scenes. (And over the back of the hand? Definitely a follow through Origins then.)

23. THE SHIT. IS THIS.

24. !!!!!!!! ALBERTO UMBERTI! YOU FUCKER I FORGOT YOUR NAME!!!! Anyway.

25. But yeah, I was really hoping for some kind of surprise stealth kill like the arrow storms from Brotherhood, but... this works? I guess? I DON’T KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT THIS.

26. I lied--I know exactly how I feel about this. Very... RPG-ish, more God of War than AC. I’m probably going to enjoy it anyway because I do enjoy God of War, but since this is supposed to fit in the timeline between Origins and ACI (Altair! It’s been too long, I’ve missed you, your arrogant prick), I was kind of hoping for something that leaned more towards the stealth of Altair (except for when I’m playing the game) and less the knock-em-down, drag-em-out brawling of Odyssey.

On the other hand, our boy (and hopefully lady!) goes a-viking, so. I don’t know why I thought it might be anything different?

27. I didn’t comment on the music but! This sounds familiar! It has a very Woodkid-vibe to it, but without being Woodkid (I think?????). And lots of sound effects, of course, so I’m going to have to look this up to get a proper feel for it. It just sort of... faded into the background except in one or two spots, and I know that’s what you want for good sound mixing, but this is a trailer, not a feature length film, I want to hear the song. I’m assuming it was chosen for a reason, I’d like to be able to tell what that reason is.

(27.2 They actually used a song from Jonsi for the Black Flag trailer, and since Sigur Ros is from Iceland this might have been the better time to use it... oh! Wait I can just go look up if they have a track similar to this. Exciting!) (I apologize for the lack of proper spelling there, I’m fighting with my keyboard to make it type English characters properly, let alone ones that my computer considers “special” characters :\ )

Thoughts: Okay, well, one trailer and me otherwise ignoring all the rumours for AC means I have nothing solid to really form an opinion about. Aside from A+++++ animation quality, Ubisoft, you never fail in that department. (Game quality and glitches, on the other hand... I still remember Arno’s L’Oreal commercial, Ubisoft,)

I’m excited to see northern Europe and the British Isles in game form! It might be the only form of travelling I get to do in the next few months. ...even though this is supposed to be out just before New Years?

I said just above that I had Thoughts on how the story would be bridged between Origins and ACI, and I still do, but I’m intrigued to see where and how Ubisoft is going to take this and play with it. I also need to check and see if they’ve confirmed a timeline/decade/year that this takes place in, so I can go pour over all the history from that time period. ...and maaaaaaybe we’ll get to go see Constantinople when it was Constantinople and before it became Istanbul during Ezio’s lifetime (ish)?

AC: Revelations: fighting with Jannisaries. AC: Valhalla (DLC?): fighting as a Varangian Guard (the sort-of precursor to the Jannisaries)

A girl can dream, right?

#meco livefails ACV #HA #I DON'T NEED TO COME UP WITH A ANOTHER WAY TO WRITE THE ACRONYM! #SUCCESS! #ACO and ACOdy kept messing me up lbr #anyway #I might post my Thoughts about bridging ACO to ACV later #and yes #it really did bother me that much that I couldn't remember Umberti's name #I'm still not 100% sure that's right #but I can't actually be assed to look it up #assassin's creed #assassin's creed valhalla