@animuslover One thing they have heavily improved is to combine many of the loot with small puzzles. They do become repetitive at some point but then you are already 40h in the game whereas running in a camp and just collecting all loot like you could do in Odyssey was repetitive after 3h. All the same small outpost designs with the chest on top of the middle hut and one at a guard tower. And then there were big outposts copy pasted too. 2 of them actually right beside each other. I feel the game improved massively here. Yea, there are not as many outposts as in Odyssey but as of now (56h in) they all feel mostly unique.

Most things you mention like the stupid AI is also present in Odyssey for me. They actually have to improve that in the next iterations.

I don't have time now to elaborate a lot more on what they have improved. I may come back later to this thread to add my 2 cents to the discussion. But I don't think the original AC fans are a small minority tbh. They are probably 50% of the fanbase. Ubisoft will have made their market research and deemed it a big enough group to actually act upon complaints coming from them. They didn't achieve the quality these people wanted anyway. But as far as I have heard everyone from that camp thinks they are aiming at the right direction but not delivering the quality needed.

@ubi-baron
A fellow gamedev here, want to give some more info I found by systematically analyzing the bug at hand:

• The mesh of the tunnel/rift you go through is not visible prior to accepting the quest "The Lost Cauldron" if you have already picked up the collectable inside. You can't enter the tunnel/rift at this state.
• As soon as you acquire the quest "The Lost Cauldron" the tunnel/rift reappears for that quest. (If you walk to it)
• If you enter the tunnel/rift the new zone inside is not loaded, you pass through it and land under the hand mesh. (Someone called this a visual bug previously)
• As soon as you save and load or teleport the tunnel will disappear completly instead of just not working. You can't get it to spawn again by any way I tested.
• If you save when you are inside the unloaded area and load again, the tunnel also disappears but you cant exit the area any longer. The tunnel is still climbable from the inside tho.
• I can confirm that the tunnel is working when a previous savegame is loaded where the collectable wasn't obtained yet. (Unfortunately for me this is not a workaround right now as I would lose a lot of progress)

I hope this information will help the team to narrow down the cause. Seems like there is an intentional mechanic behind it to block the passage which doesn't fully reset when the quest "The Lost Cauldron" is accepted.

@h1elp0me1 If you want to complete the world event without doing the quests correctly, this worked for me:
Go to the spot you are supposed to stand on. Slowly walk to the river nearby. The dialog of the lady should trigger. Stand still, wait for it to complete. World event done.

Nope. I disagree. Modern Day and how the past story is connected to it is absolutely amazing in Valhalla again. It's one complete unit. Everything fits together perfectly.

@abeonis I am sure you'll find somebody cheating their wife in any company there is in this world. I don't want him to be my best friend I want him to create an awesome product like Valhalla is.

Sad thing also is that you have to have a hair style for every hair color so it looks like there are a lot of styles when in fact there are like 4 with 4 different colors each.

@omnimon You will be able to loot it during the story quests there. Had the same problem

@fylkirpanzer It really shouldn't be a choice as this either happened in history or not. If they do it in DLC then it should happen for everyone.

Besides spoiler

@digitaly_random Good bye and have a nice day

I believe OP wanted to point out the hypocrisy of Ubisoft when it comes to the change they made in the description of the Zealot and I think he actually made his point brilliantly and hilariously good. If we can't have NPC which are disfigured according to their description we shouldn't have black out drinking games either.

But maybe I am wrong and this isn't sarcasm and OP is dead serious?

Edit: And to elaborate a bit more about the hypocrisy part. If Ubisoft changes the description they really should remove the drinking game as it is way more integral part (and will be seen by a lot more people) and is at least as "problematic" if not even more "problematic" than the description. My preferred outcome is for Ubisoft to just don't care. Not about the drinking game neither about the zealot description.

I believe they want to release a new patch with the first content update. Yea, seems like weird priorities considering that some people can't finish the game.

@longjohn119 It is also everything Odyssey wasn't

@pvocc Nah, the keys are not bound to corpses but laying beside letters on the 3 cursed places nearby.

@max18400 But you have to be honest here. AC2 didn't had a huge historical story. The history was just "existing" basically. It conveniently helped the plot sometimes etc. but it wasn't the main focus. Same basically with Black Flag. It only showed a very narrow perspective of pirate history (mostly Blackbeard and his crew)

You could basically make 4-5 games like Black Flag to tell the whole story of things happening during that age.

I feel like AC Valhalla does tell us way more history than AC2 did tbh. Which is why I want a second season pass with at least 1 DLC in England tbh. I want MORE of it because it is so good. I want them to tell me more of this because they delivered a very interesting story. (I read most of the actual history during AC Valhalla by now and they did not stick 100% to the actual history but this fits AC because it is telling "the real history" and not the one we believe in today because it is the most likely version etc.)

So if they make a poll about second season and having more England stuff count me in

@max18400 They could do a 2nd season pass And maybe it's just bugged. Considering you can only complete the game 94%. Something IS missing in the game currently. Either it was cut or it is bugged. The seer also foreshadows that the village will burn and people will die if Eivor continues. So maybe it will come with a free update later?

@imaginaryruins One thing I observed in Odyssey with side quests is that they often have the exact same face as other side quest NPCs. Sometimes I saw the same face for 2 side quests after another and first thought "Huh? This guy again, wow" until I read the persons name and saw it was supposed to be someone else. As Valhalla doesn't have these side quests any longer with dialouge and dialouge options etc. (at least most world events don't have them) I didn't recognize seeing the same faces. I am sure they reused them here too. But as there is no focus on their faces and dialouge my eyes don't catch that immersion breaking moment.

@max18400 The personal Eivor story arc basically begins with Sigurd rescueing Eivor and ends with Eivor rescueing Sigurd. What happens after the last Modern Day section is just an epilogue. Mainly to finish off the Order and Settlement story.

I feel the personal ending for Eivor was satisfactory. I wanted to play more Ezio and in Rome after AC2. They went that way with Brotherhood. So I felt like the story wasn't finished yet too with AC2.

I felt the same with nearly every AC game. They could all continue. Especially Origins. Many people would have loved a second game with Bayek.

And yea, I am all for Eivor getting the Ezio Treatment (getting sequels)

@max18400 There are only 5 side quests in total...

And story isn't just about the ending. The ending is in modern time. The story started with Layla going into the animus spoiler

Compare it to AC2. Ezios story wasn't finished obviously. Same with Altair in AC1. The reason why we go back in history isn't to get a satisfactory historical ending but to get something in modern time we expect there to be.

Of course I would wish for a second game with Eivor or a 2nd Season Pass. I like Eivor. But I don't need to see where his/her story ends to be satisfied. As the story is connected and that's exactly what I expect from an AC game. I would be fine with "the Ezio Treatment" for Eivor.

@guest-udh6e0gf Can't share your opinion.

Landscapes are awesome, I love the fighting, Parkour oppurtunities are back (mechanics are broken since Origins and still not fixed), story is extremly superior to Odysseys. I had to stop playing Odyssey and come back a year later to finish it. Enjoyed Valhalla from beginning to end. Side missions are nearly non existant but what's there is way better than anything you can find in Odyssey. (Randvi date, Petra mushroom trip etc., side quest unlocking "Mans best friend" ability)

I am so much looking forward for the DLCs

Edit: The problem at hand is more that you can't imagine that other people enjoy the game. This is a you problem.

@chuckkatse It works for the easy ones. I did it like that first. But later you will have to stack higher. So if they haven't added the support to lower the stones on Keyboard I would consider this a bug/missing feature.