Finished Valhalla yesterday and I had a good time, but as others have pointed out, a frustrating time. I’ll give a ranking/ score at the end.

I cleared every zone, did all the deliveries (that the game allowed), and got all the mythical weapons. So here are my thoughts.

This was a fun game, I had a good time for the most part. 

POTENTIAL SPOILERS (no story details)

Good:

- Setting. I loved the English country side, running through ancient Roman ruins. See the Viking architecture. I would sit and imagine how things looked back then.

- World events (zone side missions) - I think these were the star of the show. I loved almost all of them. I think how they made sure they were short and could be finished right in the same area was perfect. The stories were fun and I didn’t have to run all over the place. I’ll play again just to do these again.

- Weapons - they looked cool and I tried them all out for several hours. All the weapons are viable. Daggers are quick and darty. Spears give range and are quick. 2handers are impactful and brutal. I would change up weapons depending on my mood and didn’t feel disadvantaged.

- Main story - The Sigurd storyline was good, I became invested in pushing that through and discovering the mystery.

The Bad

- Stealth - it’s cool that they brought back insta kill, but it doesn’t really matter, the enemies seemed to always alert everyone. Whole outposts would know where I was if I took someone out with an arrow from a haystack. And as another posted commented on, by the time you’re at mid game, stealth is pointless cause you can walk through entire forts and never worry. You can’t assassinate zealots, so no challenge or fun trying to sneak up on them.

- Skill tree - this thing is pointless. First, you can’t see and plan skills cause it’s all hidden. Second, skills are scattered everywhere. I started down the assassins skill tree cause I though that’s how I’d play, but then I would find ax stats or range stats, so I started wondering if I was going down the right tree. Then some of the abilities made no sense in the sections. Like getting adrenaline for sneak stealing, but that was in the ranged (wolf) section?!? Lastly, in the end it didn’t matter, sense I was clearing every zone as I went, I maxed my skill points 3/4th of the way in, so I had everything anyway.

- Storylines - The main Sigurd story was fun, but the pledging story and Asgard and Vineyard storylines felt so disjointed or disconnected. By the end I was just pledging zones so I could get back to the main story and they make you do EVERY zone! Not like Odyssey where there were whole regions to explore later outside the story. Asgard and Vineyard just served to pull you out of things for no good reason. They would have made good DLCs or something but added little. 

- Endgame - if you clear every zone as you go, there is no endgame. There is nothing left to explore, unlike previous AC games. There are no mythical creatures to take on, no bounty hunters to kill and no zones you haven’t been to. There is some equipment to finish up, but since there is nothing left to fight, they serve little purpose.

- Weapons (legendary) - this was disappointing cause by the time I got the coolest sword or hammer there was nothing left to fight. Thor’s hammer is awesome, but I didn’t really get to use it which is a shame. In Odyssey you’d get Achilles armor or Agaminnons helmet and feel cool or more powerful midway through the game. I could upgrade armor to mythical, but you’ve been with that armor almost all game, so it never really felt special. I know a lot of games save the best for last, but most of the time there is hard content to go use it on in the end. Medusa. Omega Weapon, etc.

- Hunting/ Wild life - the hunting deliveries are doable but are time consuming. There is only one spot I found black bears, and there are only two bears with about a 40% drop rate for their fur. You need 11 or so of their fur, so you have to keep traveling around to respawn them, then run back to them. Dog teeth, no just any dogs either, only enemy dogs and I only ram into 3 or 4 enemy dogs the whole game, so same as black bears. Wolf Fangs, except it’s not wolves or don’t look like wolves, it’s a white fox looking animal in Norway, but there is no clue that they are wolves. I just by chance noticed fangs dropped by them. I ram around for hours trying to figure that one out. The reward for all this sucked also, I got a bow, another bow I won’t use cause it’s so late in the game. Didn’t even trigger an achievement.

The Horrible

- The bugs/ glitches - this is one of those games that is really good, which makes the bugs and glitches worse and exhausting (many have pointed this out). This isn’t like FO76 where you know the game is broken to [censored], but you expect it and it’s almost comical. No this game works well most of the time, so bugs and glitches frustrate you. Why did Eivor stop climbing for no reason? Why did I get stuck in the snow with no way out? Why did I just randomly jump backwards while climbing a mountain etc. 

  - Fishing! - I couldn’t complete the last two fish deliveries because the fish either never spawn (flat fish and mackerel) or they would all disappear literally while I was looking at them. I spent an entire day trying to collect fish only to find out this part of the game is bugged to [censored]. I can’t believe this hasn’t been patched or patched out as a requirement for now.

 - Asgard! - so I had an astrik next to finished because I saved Asgard for last, like very last and I am glad I did. I did my typical clear the zone as much as possible and then do the main quest. Well, if you do that in Jotunhem (sorry for spelling), you break the game and can’t continue that portion. I went into a cave to get wealth chests, well apparently you can only go into that cave once, cause the game locked the entrance. So when the story led me there, I could no longer go into the entrance. No work around, no reloading to fix. Just blocked. So glad I waited to do Asgard.

- No New Game+ - why can’t this be included on release day? I don’t get why it has to be patched in later. I want to play through as female Eivor, I definitely don’t want to go collect all the equipment or fish again.

Overall I enjoyed the game, as can be seen by the desire for New Game+. But this isn’t close to the best AC. Of the new ACs (Origins/ Odyssey) I rank it 3rd. Both Origins and Odyssey felt smoother with better flows. Yes, Odyssey’s story could drag on at times or you had to grind, but at least new equipment kept things interesting and you didn’t have to go to every single zone/ island. Same with Origins. Of all the ACs, I’d probably put it below 5th or 6th.

I want to play more (and did start a female Eivor last night to kill time till Cyberpunk) but that’s probably more of me just wanting more AC.

I'm actually enjoying Valhalla alot though the combat is completely trash most of the time... hit boxes don't make any sense on the AI or your character, had an AI kill me when their back was turned against me like [censored]? Switching to fire/poison abilities are infuriating... just absolutely clunky and slow especially in the heat of battle. Switching to different styles of various weapons is completely garbage and challenging compared to Odyssey where it was on the fly of what weapons you want to use i know because of the dual weilding mechanic which can be reworked some how.. A quick snap transition to bows and arrows and your melee weapons is absolutely garbage it either doesn't respond to the command input or it takes a few seconds for your character to pull it out. Also, Zealots doesn't make any sense too me are they mercenaries or what? But even Zealots are broken too, how in the hell am I supposed to fight a lvl 90 Zealot thats in a lvl 20 area thats is completely trolling and blocking me from completing a quest because in 2 hits or 1 im dead? It's so broken and absolutely infuriating, I just meditate and hope they go away before finishing a quest.... like just the whole combat needs too be reworked, Zealots need to be the same lvl as the area you are fighting in or matched with your lvl... Bows and arrows needs to be reworked as far as if I'm locked on to someone and I switch to bows it should immediately shoild snap on to the character but it doesn't the lock on gets removed and my character is ending up shooting arrows in the air. Some Npcs dialog gets stuck they either end up repeating the same dialogue over and over again like the lady with the cats, had to restart my session because of it.

This is absolute nonsense. Once you complete the Vinland Arc there is literally no reason why I can't bring my gear to Vinland with me. I shouldn't be relegated to using these lame weapons and gear that are provided in this area.