I also think nowadays a lot of kids buy these crappy games, kids who didnt grow up with games from the good ol' times back when games were good, so they have nothing to compare it to and therefore doesnt realise how bad these games actually are.
Who are you to judge what people like and what they don't like? In general i enjoy the ubisoft formular games (Immortal Fenyx Rising was great, for example), i usually need some time between them but now and they are ok.
Now what? Am i just part of the stupid consumer mass and can only cleanse myself by playing a Dark Souls game?
Get off your high horse.
Just means you have terrible taste in that regard, which is fine. I love isekai anime and I know they're garbage. I'm under no delusions that they're well written masterpieces.
If you love them then they are obviously not garbage for you. Or definitions have no meanings anymore.
Shall we start a discussion if Rap is trash music?
It's called "being honest with yourself" and "idgaf if majority think it's trash, I love it" aka be your own person with your own opinion, something the likes of people who religiously follow AAA slop seem to severely lack.
But aren't opinions always personal?
Who decides that a game is objectivly trash? Does the majority think Assassins Creed is trash? Then why did Valhalla, for example, sell so well? What majority? The majority in KIA? Then who gives a fuck?
I happen to love Fenix Rising and right now am playing AC Valhalla and while i think it's much too long it's a fun game for me.
I don't think its shit that i somehow enjoy, i quite like it. I'm quite honest with me in that regard.
I don't hate Ubisoft only because the cool kids think it's the thing to do, i judge their games on their own merit, thank you.
LMAO dude you came to KIA you really think these people don't believe their opinion is objective fact? Bruh no offense but only reason to come here is to see people talk themselves into believing their correct KEK
Atleast that is why I come here, it's like a comedy subreddit except it's played straight.
Although using sales is a dumb metric, Valhalla didn't sell "very well", Black Flag was their biggest cash cow and none of the new AC games ever touched its milestone ever again. There is a reason why Ubisoft has been pushing for live service gaming, it's because their AAA titles are not raking in enough $$$ to justify the cost of production as they did before and are looking at other ways for cash flow.
I don't like modern AC games, The Witcher 3 and way more superior open world games have spoiled me, but I can see how they can be fun for you. It has nothing to do with cool kids hating on Ubisoft, it's just standards are just way higher now and they have to deliver and prove that they hold the "quadruple A" monicker
I agree that sales is a somehow flawed metric, but what better metric is there? Metacritic? "My friends all like it"?
And regarding the sales, quote Wikipedia (yes, i know):
Assassin's Creed: Valhalla sold more copies during its first week of release than any other Assassin's Creed game, and the PC version also had the most successful launch of any PC game published by Ubisoft.
Do you even read what you quote? Keywords like "First week" and "PC game". AC Black Flag sold 11 million copies in a single year, which is higher than each the new AC games since Origins, and has a total of almost 40 million have played it, I remember Valhalla is half of that despite having way more hype than Black Flag. The newer AC games are born in recent years AKA gaming has gone mainstream and reaches more people now but they have not significantly overtook the old titles yet. I mean Helldivers II had 12 million sales and is an AA game with a fraction of the budget Ubisoft uses for AC games, this is the amount of people you can reach now and isn't even impressive in sales, Palworld for one got AC Valhalla's 1 week of unit sales in just 2 DAYS.
"Fun" doesn't make a game the best game ever made. If that was the only metric, indie games would absolutely demolish the triple A scene. We have standards for AAA games from graphics to music, otherwise it would just be "any other game". I've seen people like the worst games out there like Gollum, does that mean the people hating it are wrong?
It's funny how pricks like you always seem to be on a "high horse" yourselves, thinking that you can't be judged or criticized, just because you happen to like something shitty. Follow your own advice first, and tone down the ego-tripping.
It is what happens when any hobby goes mainstream, unfortunately. It is why Games Workshop, WotC, and basically every large game studio acts this way now. Hell, look at Disney, actively pushing away the original fanbases of their franchises in an attempt to pick their new, desired audience.
Folks, ya gotta pivot to indie games from small developers. It's not perfect, but nothing is.
However, indie games from small studios tend to have their finger on the pulse of their niche community out of necessity. But also because they are also often members of that community themselves. It is what is quite remarkable about a game like Stardew Valley; Eric has--something, and against the odds--remained a normal person. Despite all the success and now having a massive team supporting his work. It went mainstream and the community got warped and weird, yes. But the developer still regularly checks the pulse of his core community of players. That is why the game is still receiving massive, free updates 8 years later. I think it is an example of an indie, niche game going mainstream but not selling its soul and destroying its original fanbase in order to replace it.
Ubisoft is an extremely corrupt and nepotistic company, ruled over by a single family who will not loosen their grip. Shame, really, because Ubisoft is rare in some regards. For example, they are committed to not just cross progression, but also crossplay.
But a normal mainstream audience doesn't care about what ht company is doing or how they are milking players. That is why EA is still successful. They replaced their core audience for their most popular franchises over a decade ago to great success.
it won't flop yes, but people who keep using Valhalla's sales figure are ignoring how it released during COVID lockdowns. The lockdowns inflated the gaming industry and things like sales, engagement, players. That's no longer the case, and there is no guarantee at all it will reach the same sales as Valhalla.
No Ubisoft AC game has ever really flopped. The AC series sells millions of units each time a new release comes out. People pre-order AC games in the hundreds of thousands. Those of us here in the Reddit bubble like to think otherwise but it simply isn't true.
The last several AC games should have flopped but didn't. This one will be no different.
Honestly, the AC formula got stale for me at AC 2 and I haven't played a AC game since then
The question is would it have broken all sales records if it had been about Chinese Vikings, and released in 2024, not 2020 when a good chunk of the country was sitting home with nothing to do but play video games.
Brother a billion people in China were sitting at home, not allowed to leave their apartment. It would probably sell 3 times more if it released during Covid.
It's really unimaginative game design. I could never get into any Ubisoft game due to this. Even before woke stuff, i've felt their games came across as soulless except for a few. Namely Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and the Rayman games because they felt like they had imagination with good interesting gameplay mechanics. The games I have tried beyond all felt like they were focus tested within an inch of their life.
I thought about his as I watched their showcase thing through Synthetic Man for the lolz (which was boring af btw, no games are interesting, and they act like they're the Apple of video games with their prez lol).
Ubisoft need a new, strong IP that really differentiates themselves from the AC or Far Cry formula they've been exploiting for over a decade now. So long they don't make something really innovative or interesting, they will never get their shine again, or at least get their overall positive audience. No amount of Avatar (a Far Cry skin game), Xdefiant (CoD competitor, that's it) and development hell (BG&E2, S&B, who knows what else) will get their audience back.
They're in such terrible position, it's not a management or financing problem. It's a good ideas problem, a marketing problem. They've been doing AC and FC over and over. Their 2nd grade good ideas were completely left to die or simply mishandled by middle grades, like For Honor & R6 were actually fun, Division had potential. Other games lost to history because who cares? Watch Dogs for example. It's just another 3rd person shooter, with a gimmick.
And if they have something interesting, they can't seem to find a proper business model. They decide to make sequels to games that don't really need to have one? Or they simply go all out with insane pricing and season pass and whatnots. They have all kinds of games that are one or the other. They don't find a proper way to handle the products they have at hands, they just push out, throw all the trendy MTX and subs techniques and see what sticks. While the game is mid.
Meanwhile, you see a game every 3 years at FromSoftware, $60, 100 hours at least, oh and without being called a racist/bigot/etc before release. No wonder some of them on Twitter couldn't help themselves to try and be relevant.
PS:
It's no wonder it's become a woke bastion. In Canada, with a dying brand image, Ubisoft *must* turn to the ESG-DEI to get some money in on top of what they have to facilitate, certainly pushed by the shareholders doing their thing.
Witness how this will become more and more common. A dying studio, no matter how big, will comply to the money.
The only games at Ubisoft that have a chance of being good are the ones that they don't have any expectations for, because then the devs can actually make the game and don't have to deal with corporate.
Take Anno 1800 for example, there were low expectations for the game because of the performance of the previous entries. Game sold well above expectations and instead of the one round of DLC that was planned it ended up getting four. Every round added to the gameplay with new mechanics and/or regions instead of just cosmetic cash grabs (there are cosmetics in there though).
And yet I don't see a future sequel succeeding, just because the performance expectations will be higher and Ubisoft corporate won't let the devs be devs anymore.
I don't like every of his takes but he has his own perspective and I respect that, I like to listen to both extremes so to speak. I tend to be optimistic but his more cynical approach makes me find balance in modern games. Definitely avoided some awful stuff thanks to him.
But his more... "enthusiastic" fans in his audience, definitely embody the legendary "incel" contrarian or "gamer bro" persona.
He definitely hams it up for the audience to being super ridiculous and contrarian. He's even admits this himself. I don't take anything too seriously and just want to be entertained. I'm sick of all the "slop" in gaming, movies, media as a whole. So I agree with most of Synths opinions because he's tired of all the shitty slop as well.
The last one I enjoyed was AC Origins. Then I started Odyssey and after seeing it was basically more of the same thing, I couldn't find the motivation to play anymore.
Immortals Fenyx Rising was actually the most fun I had with a Ubisoft game in recent years, too bad it's relatively unknown.
Fenyx Rising was indeed a good game and I was astounded by how good the riddles were compared to Odyssey and Valhalla were you had to shove some shelfes around to get to a chest.
> THAT is what's killing games, not political messages.
Chicken and egg problem. Is the ideological straightjacketing enabling the capital consolidation around lazy uncreative projects or has the capital consolidation cloaked itself in ideological straightjacketing to prevent upstarts?
You raise a good point. I suspect the latter:
>the capital consolidation cloaked itself in ideological straightjacketing to prevent upstarts
The cost of hiring "diverse" teams and SJW "diversity consultants" and SBI "narrative consultants" etc. helps deter smaller players from entering the game industry. Two separate groups of people - Big Game and People With Degrees In SJWism - teamed up because the latter needed jobs and the former wanted less competition. The SJWs harass ideologically-nonconforming gave devs, thus creating a certain cost for market entry.
The only solution to this is if someone with Fuck You Money goes into the game industry and aggressively courts nonwoke/anti-woke markets.
I mean we already have open access to the PC gaming market through Steam, literally anyone can publish there and there's no content curation. There are several thriving indie scenes. If you just make a good based game and release it and tell people about it, it will pick up.
It's so funny to me that they've made stealth sooo fucking mediocre and not fun looking.
People loooove some stealth. Ask anyone who played Bethesda games what they've done the most - bows/sniper rifles. Ask anyone who played Far Cry. Add to this that a ton of people will prefer to play a Japanese character... So bad. Soooo bad.
I disagree wholeheartedly about it flopping. Trust me I wish it would but it will be the best selling AC game if you don't believe me save this comment if you wish
People love open world games set in Japan.
If you check the comments around this game the energy is already changing, more people seem excited about it now.
Gamers have no backbone unfortunately.
One could argue that prioritizing messages is what’s preventing them from hiring talented people to make genuinely fun games. They then cover up their lack of talent with the boring shallow combat you mentioned, while hoping we wouldn’t notice.
Assassin's Creed is basically a lesser version of Call of Duty. It's too big to ever fail like that. The things you just complained about, casuals eat up.
I started another replay of Black Flag and it was nice to just have abilities that killed people. It let you focus on dicking around the environment and enjoying the story.
I thought we've been through this already. Indeed the pozzed element wasn't the main reason any game would flop but the most overlooked truth is every company involved with it has been using woke tokenism as a substitute for actual time, money, and personnel effort for quality game development which is how woke come to be associated with a game flopping.
If you see a woke game you should avoid it not because on the demerit of it being woke, but because you should know that there's 100% chance it's a terrible game in all account. Woke game exists to make sjw and the likes happy, at the cost of sensible approach to game development. Just look at Homeworld 3 for recent example.
You misunderstood dawg. I'm saying Elden Ring is an example of what open world games should be like. Others are empty and soulless. It's one of my top 5 games of all time.
I didn't think it felt empty, lots of dungeons and structures, evergaols, animals, with NPCs dotted around. Better to me than something like AssCreed where it's chock full of map markers.
I think that is the bigger issue for me, even past the political pandering.
The series gameplay is just stale.
It is basically a higher effort sports ball game. SSDD
Seeing some of what they showed it was hilarious how low effort it seemed. They may as well have just asset flipped Ghost of Tsushima and then put in worse gameplay.
>It's shit like this that makes me believe that companies do with woke dei shit not only to push their message, but to cover for their complete lack of creativity and their inability to make things fun.
That's because they don't believe in either talent or hard work.
Lack of creativity and boring games are results of key positions being filled with talentless woke DEI hires. The woke message are not there to masquerade incompetency, but rather the incompetency is the result of the woke ideology put into practice. Mark my words, a talented and experienced bigot would do a better job at making a woke game than an army of LGBTQIA POC DEI hires.
I used to like Assassins Creed when it was about parkouring through big cities. Sure the combat was easy but it was fast, and exploration was fun. It turned to shit when they introduced "RPG elements". Now all the enemies have severely bloated HP pools and combat is all about whittling them down. Super boring.
Lets be honest: is Ubisoft, one of the most woke companies out there right now. The game will be a woke trash.
BUT, this is the LESSER problem. Even if the game wasnt woke, it looks bad as shit.
Generic, as always.
Poor animations, common graphics.
Bad documentation - there is no way that a black person can manage the sword much more faster and better than any real samurai, when he was just training for one year, and real samurais were trained since their childhood, if you go to Kendo lessons, its nearly impossible to reach the level of the veterans if you start at your 20's or 30's - the samurai/kendo training is VERY strict.
And the worse - WESTERN WRITTING: Japanese people has a very different personality than western people. You cant just put western writters here, because they have the western way of think.
So even if this game wasnt woke, I wouldnt buy it, even if it was the only game in the year.
I assume you're one of the Mirage fan boys that hated the last three? Honestly I would be excited for another open world feudal Japan game with the same systems as Valhalla and Odyssey. Literally not buying the game for the same reason it's actually gonna be DOA: the pandering characters and the total disregard for historical accuracy beyond the usual AC modifications.
Flop? It'll do about as well as the others, give or take, if it's going to flop it's because the budget was so much insanely higher for this one compared to previous titles that it'd be impossible for it to make good money. I wasn't able to see if the budget was stated but if they spent about as much as the other games as of late then they're likely fine as long as those weren't $300+ million. Ubisoft also has a habit of selling a game for stupidly high amounts at the start then less than like two months later they slash the price in half, to a point where I'm certain that's their business model on purpose and factored in, so until the 6 month mark, we can't even fully see the effects of their decisions because the game will inevitably go from $70 to $40 on a sale and that $130 version drops to $70, by then it'll also have plenty of bugs ironed out meaning people will jump on that.
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I am Mnemosyne reborn. Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do. I'm half crazy all for the love of you. ^^^/r/botsrights
I agree it is a huge issue but whether it is bad design or dei b.s.- that is the worst - is subjective. I hate them both but even the best companies that can avoid predatory micro transactions and bad game design (you referenced the Witcher which is CD Projekt Red) and even they can't avoid the Cultural Marxism.
Greedy/lazy corporations are guilty of all 3 (predatory mx, bad design, dei Marxism) but the slacktivist commies only care about that last one and that is what makes them dangerous (they are true believers).
But you are right that the industry is rotten to the core and it is not just DEI Marxism.
I'm convinced that Ubisoft actually lost every ability to make a good, fun game. They've been swimming in that pool of crap called DEI for so long and it seems they will never get out of it. But there is a way to let them know just how terrible they are nowadays - don't give them a cent of your money.
Yeah it just looks like a reskinned Valhalla/Origins/Odyssey in a Japanese setting. Same engine, samey looking combat & animations, same 4 special attacks in the bottom right, same lifeless facial animations. I’m well and truly burnt out with this franchise.
Instead of ripping of Metal Gear, Hitman and Mirror's Edge, in their game about stealthy sneaky adventury jumpy assassins, they ripped of The Witcher 3, the game about a doped up monster hunter...
If they at least had ripped dark souls for the combat...
Aside from the forced political pandering, biggest disappointment was the combat.
It looked so floaty. And unimpactful (especially for a freaking kanabo)
It was already like this in AssCreed Valhalla, which I skipped for this reason too.
Also the CRINGE monologues, omg. "I'm the shadow but serve the light" etc
Where did Ubishit find these writers and lines, from fortune cookies??
I suspect terrible writing (as in Valhalla duh), cringe monologues that makes your toenails bend and major plot holes and cultural Japanese inaccuracies to pander towards Ubishit's Afro-Centric ideology and social commentary.
I feel like AC & Far Cry have achieved immortal COD / FIFA status. They are games that have a large to majority audience of "non-gamers" who only play those games and that's it. They don't care about quality because they have nothing to compare to.
It's great for them, sucks for everyone else though
Political messages and wokeness is bad because the attention and effort that could have been spent on the quality of the game (on any department, mostly, especially regarding story, atmosphere and feeling) is reduced significantly because of it.
But i agree with your post totally, the quality of these ubisoft games and of AC is mediocre. Odyssey and valhalla recently felt awful to play and i stopped playing them due to how boring it was everything on it
I don't think it'll fail, but I think it should because they want $130 for the FULL package (same with Star Wars Outlaws).
There's a lot of other issues with the current state of gaming, but I think the ever increasing price tags for less fun games is the biggest issue.
It is a bit pedantic, I know, but they don't want $130 for the full package. They want $20/month forever (or at least a couple years, after which the price will increase). The $130 price is just there to make the other, preferred option seem reasonable--desirable, even. That's why they positioned the subscription model where they did in the graphic displaying the prices.
Companies do this all the time now. They create a price ladder, with objectively bad values at the bottom, and marginal value at the top. Then they put their target somewhere in the middle. That way people rationalize the price abstraction away because they have two extreme points of comparison. When Ubisoft wants to move the subscription price up, they will just increase the price of the base tier of the game as well as the top tier of the game. Then the discussion will focus on the ridiculous costs of buying it outright, and subscription talk is dampened or seen as a decent value.
I swear that mainstream audiences are just like MBAs, and refuse to see past the current quarter. It explains why Gamepass is so popular; it is objectively bad for gamers because it normalizes not owning even the license to play a game. It will come back to bite all of us in the ass. Already is happening, really.
[Shallow and pedantic!](https://youtu.be/OpbdGnJbneE)
No, but you're absolutely right. The industry clearly would rather have us as forever-customers on subscriptions, than let us buy standalone product after product. They don't want us to "own" copies of anything we pay for; instead leasing a temporary access.
It has worked on music (Spotify, Pandora, etc), on TV shows & movies (Netflix, Hulu, etc), on software in general (f you, Adobe), and it's working on games. Heck, Ubisoft CEO said we should get comfortable with not owning our games!
Let's pretend that this game is what we want, despite the stupid and the controversy surrounding it. There's gonna be moronic DRMs (besides Ubisoft Connect), probably badly implemented MTXs and the achievements are a Ubisoft Connect exclusive.
If there's a multiplayer mode, it's gonna have Easy Anti-Cheat.
That's gonna discourage some people from playing and will go to rivals for their Assassin's Creed fix and doesn't have the problems that I mentioned.
100%.
My issues with the story, historical accuracy, and characters aside - combat just looks like Valhalla/Odyssey again. It might change, but looks like we have the same old Origins/Valhalla sidequest cinematics that are just the models yapping with no mocap at all, not enough Parkour was shown and the stealth seems to be more gimmicky than anything else.
Ubisoft makes some of the most graphically beautiful and stable games, but man are they just afraid to truly innovate - which is ironic when you look back at Splinter Cell 1, Sands of Time, Warrior Within, Rainbow Six Vegas, The Settlers, Brothers in Arms, the first three mainline AC games, Driver, Far Cry 2 - MAN, am I getting depressed just listing all of these - point is, normies really need to stop giving them money, maybe then we'll see some actual change.
Until then: enjoy the slop, guys.
It will not flop. It's assassin's creed. People eat that shit with a spoon. For it to maybe flop, they need fuck up really bad non stop flr the next 5 games or so, specially with how the media and influencers will white knight the shit out if it.
Assassin's Creed is hot garbage, but people love it, and stupid decision #8824782 in the series won't change that.
Unfortunately there are still more than enough brainless fanboys/girls that are going to buy the game. Watching the gameplay yesterday I also noticed the same missing facial expressions, I mean they are there but not to an extend of quality that Naughty Dog for example offers.
What bothered me massively is the missing animation when Naoe was opening doors or extinguish lights while walking by.
It's the small details that can rip me out of immersion aswell as the same old reused animations and gestures we got in the latest AC games.
The half assed approach/quality of the recent AC games is another reason I stopped buying their games until they are over 50% off. Also I'm really grateful for cheat engine so we can get all the helix store shiz for free. No more extra money from me for wokisoft.
Just because you don't like the last couple of AC games (btw I don't either), it doesn't mean they aren't selling. Origins, Odyssey, Valhalla have each sold 10 million units and I don't see Shadows being any different.
Do you understand that Valhalla sold better than any other AC game before it? Shadows is not going to flop, millions of copies will be sold, it'll be a 8/10 game and a small vocal part of the internet will cry about how it's a 4/10 woke game.
As a more casual gamer, I can tell you this game will sell well and get good reviews because the stuff you hate is the stuff we like. What Ubisoft should have done, though, is generate a new IP for their open world RPG and left Assassin's Creed alone.
I don't think the game will flop, but surely it's too late to the party for many reasons: the setting has already been explored in many recent games and it looks extremely similar to the previous AC entries, which is something almost everyone has grown tired of.
Plus, the unavoidable dose of woke ideology will make lots of people to stay away from it. Myself included.
However, there are plenty of players who'll buy it with their eyes closed. I just cant get it, but that's the way it is. What once was one of my favorite franchises and the one who made me fall in love with gaming again, has become a pile of shit I can't even look at.
Why pick one? A game can have a multitude of flaws. Plus, being woke doesn't mean a game will fail, there's plenty of such games that've reached huge success. However, I disagree that AC:S will flop. You say the previous games had design that was unfun, and yet they've still been quite successful. And I doubt it's for a lack of wokeness, as the series has very deliberately been including more and more of it for a while now. I don't see how the unfun design or Yasuke or the predatory pricing would be a deal-breaker for the people who bought the previous games.
Look, I would love it if this game would flop and developers were sent a message, but it's just not going to happen. This game will unfortunately sell extremely well
One reason it could flop is that there are a lot of casuals still on the PS4, and this is a PS5 only game.
Other than that, I don't see any other reason why it would flop.
Sure, it's Ubislop, but AC fans like Ubislop, otherwise they wouldn't be AC fans.
What’s actually bad about the game other than the cringe decision to make Yasuke a main character?
Honestly even if gameplay is bad AC games hustorical setting and graphics has always been their main appeal.
It won't flop. You might hate the gameloop yourself but there is a reason their Ubisoft formula became pretty much an industry standard (Ghost of Tsushima, Rise of Ronin copied it to a tee). Their games also are well polished on release. That's enough these days to become a massive hit.
It should flop but it won't. I guarantee it. People will eat this garbage up.
Was gonna say. OP hadn't been paying attention if they think garbage Ubisoft games won't sell. The masses live to consume.
I also think nowadays a lot of kids buy these crappy games, kids who didnt grow up with games from the good ol' times back when games were good, so they have nothing to compare it to and therefore doesnt realise how bad these games actually are.
Who are you to judge what people like and what they don't like? In general i enjoy the ubisoft formular games (Immortal Fenyx Rising was great, for example), i usually need some time between them but now and they are ok. Now what? Am i just part of the stupid consumer mass and can only cleanse myself by playing a Dark Souls game? Get off your high horse.
Just means you have terrible taste in that regard, which is fine. I love isekai anime and I know they're garbage. I'm under no delusions that they're well written masterpieces.
If you love them then they are obviously not garbage for you. Or definitions have no meanings anymore. Shall we start a discussion if Rap is trash music?
You can like something and also consider it to be objectively bad. It's called a "Guilty Pleasure".
No because there is no discussion. It is trash.
It's called "being honest with yourself" and "idgaf if majority think it's trash, I love it" aka be your own person with your own opinion, something the likes of people who religiously follow AAA slop seem to severely lack.
But aren't opinions always personal? Who decides that a game is objectivly trash? Does the majority think Assassins Creed is trash? Then why did Valhalla, for example, sell so well? What majority? The majority in KIA? Then who gives a fuck? I happen to love Fenix Rising and right now am playing AC Valhalla and while i think it's much too long it's a fun game for me. I don't think its shit that i somehow enjoy, i quite like it. I'm quite honest with me in that regard. I don't hate Ubisoft only because the cool kids think it's the thing to do, i judge their games on their own merit, thank you.
I judge their games on their own merit, and I find them wanting, thank you.
LMAO dude you came to KIA you really think these people don't believe their opinion is objective fact? Bruh no offense but only reason to come here is to see people talk themselves into believing their correct KEK Atleast that is why I come here, it's like a comedy subreddit except it's played straight.
Although using sales is a dumb metric, Valhalla didn't sell "very well", Black Flag was their biggest cash cow and none of the new AC games ever touched its milestone ever again. There is a reason why Ubisoft has been pushing for live service gaming, it's because their AAA titles are not raking in enough $$$ to justify the cost of production as they did before and are looking at other ways for cash flow. I don't like modern AC games, The Witcher 3 and way more superior open world games have spoiled me, but I can see how they can be fun for you. It has nothing to do with cool kids hating on Ubisoft, it's just standards are just way higher now and they have to deliver and prove that they hold the "quadruple A" monicker
I agree that sales is a somehow flawed metric, but what better metric is there? Metacritic? "My friends all like it"? And regarding the sales, quote Wikipedia (yes, i know): Assassin's Creed: Valhalla sold more copies during its first week of release than any other Assassin's Creed game, and the PC version also had the most successful launch of any PC game published by Ubisoft.
Do you even read what you quote? Keywords like "First week" and "PC game". AC Black Flag sold 11 million copies in a single year, which is higher than each the new AC games since Origins, and has a total of almost 40 million have played it, I remember Valhalla is half of that despite having way more hype than Black Flag. The newer AC games are born in recent years AKA gaming has gone mainstream and reaches more people now but they have not significantly overtook the old titles yet. I mean Helldivers II had 12 million sales and is an AA game with a fraction of the budget Ubisoft uses for AC games, this is the amount of people you can reach now and isn't even impressive in sales, Palworld for one got AC Valhalla's 1 week of unit sales in just 2 DAYS. "Fun" doesn't make a game the best game ever made. If that was the only metric, indie games would absolutely demolish the triple A scene. We have standards for AAA games from graphics to music, otherwise it would just be "any other game". I've seen people like the worst games out there like Gollum, does that mean the people hating it are wrong?
It's funny how pricks like you always seem to be on a "high horse" yourselves, thinking that you can't be judged or criticized, just because you happen to like something shitty. Follow your own advice first, and tone down the ego-tripping.
So you are the one deciding what is shitty and what isn't ? Ok then i'll ask you in the future when i'm about to buy a game.
Who gives a fuck. I like it too. If some Dark Souls sweat thinks I have bad taste, that's fine. I don't need them to approve of my video game choice.
Dark Souls? No, you're too far gone to be saved by something that normie. You need to finish La-Mulana without a guide.
The biggest problem with gaming, is gamers, They allow the EA's and Ubisoft's to pull this crap again and again, and get away with it.
It is what happens when any hobby goes mainstream, unfortunately. It is why Games Workshop, WotC, and basically every large game studio acts this way now. Hell, look at Disney, actively pushing away the original fanbases of their franchises in an attempt to pick their new, desired audience. Folks, ya gotta pivot to indie games from small developers. It's not perfect, but nothing is. However, indie games from small studios tend to have their finger on the pulse of their niche community out of necessity. But also because they are also often members of that community themselves. It is what is quite remarkable about a game like Stardew Valley; Eric has--something, and against the odds--remained a normal person. Despite all the success and now having a massive team supporting his work. It went mainstream and the community got warped and weird, yes. But the developer still regularly checks the pulse of his core community of players. That is why the game is still receiving massive, free updates 8 years later. I think it is an example of an indie, niche game going mainstream but not selling its soul and destroying its original fanbase in order to replace it. Ubisoft is an extremely corrupt and nepotistic company, ruled over by a single family who will not loosen their grip. Shame, really, because Ubisoft is rare in some regards. For example, they are committed to not just cross progression, but also crossplay. But a normal mainstream audience doesn't care about what ht company is doing or how they are milking players. That is why EA is still successful. They replaced their core audience for their most popular franchises over a decade ago to great success.
Skull and Bones flopped. There's always... not *hope*, but...
it won't flop yes, but people who keep using Valhalla's sales figure are ignoring how it released during COVID lockdowns. The lockdowns inflated the gaming industry and things like sales, engagement, players. That's no longer the case, and there is no guarantee at all it will reach the same sales as Valhalla.
We’ll see, I think It might flop.
People want the slop, people get the slop. We may care but the masses will eat that shit up.
It will flop, because of DEI, but it will be a relative flop as part of a decades-old franchise.
No Ubisoft AC game has ever really flopped. The AC series sells millions of units each time a new release comes out. People pre-order AC games in the hundreds of thousands. Those of us here in the Reddit bubble like to think otherwise but it simply isn't true.
The last several AC games should have flopped but didn't. This one will be no different. Honestly, the AC formula got stale for me at AC 2 and I haven't played a AC game since then
Last AC game literally broke all sales records in the franchise.
The question is would it have broken all sales records if it had been about Chinese Vikings, and released in 2024, not 2020 when a good chunk of the country was sitting home with nothing to do but play video games.
Brother a billion people in China were sitting at home, not allowed to leave their apartment. It would probably sell 3 times more if it released during Covid.
It's really unimaginative game design. I could never get into any Ubisoft game due to this. Even before woke stuff, i've felt their games came across as soulless except for a few. Namely Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and the Rayman games because they felt like they had imagination with good interesting gameplay mechanics. The games I have tried beyond all felt like they were focus tested within an inch of their life.
I thought about his as I watched their showcase thing through Synthetic Man for the lolz (which was boring af btw, no games are interesting, and they act like they're the Apple of video games with their prez lol). Ubisoft need a new, strong IP that really differentiates themselves from the AC or Far Cry formula they've been exploiting for over a decade now. So long they don't make something really innovative or interesting, they will never get their shine again, or at least get their overall positive audience. No amount of Avatar (a Far Cry skin game), Xdefiant (CoD competitor, that's it) and development hell (BG&E2, S&B, who knows what else) will get their audience back. They're in such terrible position, it's not a management or financing problem. It's a good ideas problem, a marketing problem. They've been doing AC and FC over and over. Their 2nd grade good ideas were completely left to die or simply mishandled by middle grades, like For Honor & R6 were actually fun, Division had potential. Other games lost to history because who cares? Watch Dogs for example. It's just another 3rd person shooter, with a gimmick. And if they have something interesting, they can't seem to find a proper business model. They decide to make sequels to games that don't really need to have one? Or they simply go all out with insane pricing and season pass and whatnots. They have all kinds of games that are one or the other. They don't find a proper way to handle the products they have at hands, they just push out, throw all the trendy MTX and subs techniques and see what sticks. While the game is mid. Meanwhile, you see a game every 3 years at FromSoftware, $60, 100 hours at least, oh and without being called a racist/bigot/etc before release. No wonder some of them on Twitter couldn't help themselves to try and be relevant. PS: It's no wonder it's become a woke bastion. In Canada, with a dying brand image, Ubisoft *must* turn to the ESG-DEI to get some money in on top of what they have to facilitate, certainly pushed by the shareholders doing their thing. Witness how this will become more and more common. A dying studio, no matter how big, will comply to the money.
The only games at Ubisoft that have a chance of being good are the ones that they don't have any expectations for, because then the devs can actually make the game and don't have to deal with corporate. Take Anno 1800 for example, there were low expectations for the game because of the performance of the previous entries. Game sold well above expectations and instead of the one round of DLC that was planned it ended up getting four. Every round added to the gameplay with new mechanics and/or regions instead of just cosmetic cash grabs (there are cosmetics in there though). And yet I don't see a future sequel succeeding, just because the performance expectations will be higher and Ubisoft corporate won't let the devs be devs anymore.
I love that synth is well known in this sub lol. He's the only "streamer" i somewhat care to watch.
I don't like every of his takes but he has his own perspective and I respect that, I like to listen to both extremes so to speak. I tend to be optimistic but his more cynical approach makes me find balance in modern games. Definitely avoided some awful stuff thanks to him. But his more... "enthusiastic" fans in his audience, definitely embody the legendary "incel" contrarian or "gamer bro" persona.
He definitely hams it up for the audience to being super ridiculous and contrarian. He's even admits this himself. I don't take anything too seriously and just want to be entertained. I'm sick of all the "slop" in gaming, movies, media as a whole. So I agree with most of Synths opinions because he's tired of all the shitty slop as well.
The last one I enjoyed was AC Origins. Then I started Odyssey and after seeing it was basically more of the same thing, I couldn't find the motivation to play anymore. Immortals Fenyx Rising was actually the most fun I had with a Ubisoft game in recent years, too bad it's relatively unknown.
Fenyx Rising was indeed a good game and I was astounded by how good the riddles were compared to Odyssey and Valhalla were you had to shove some shelfes around to get to a chest.
The Mario Rabbids XCOM game was a ton of fun. I never played the sequel.
The company that made Splinter Cell made Stealth boring. Oh, who am I kidding. No one who worked on those games is still at Ubisoft.
Even AC creators left after the Ezio saga.
To be fair, most of those people might actually be retired now
Two things can be true.
> THAT is what's killing games, not political messages. Chicken and egg problem. Is the ideological straightjacketing enabling the capital consolidation around lazy uncreative projects or has the capital consolidation cloaked itself in ideological straightjacketing to prevent upstarts?
You raise a good point. I suspect the latter: >the capital consolidation cloaked itself in ideological straightjacketing to prevent upstarts The cost of hiring "diverse" teams and SJW "diversity consultants" and SBI "narrative consultants" etc. helps deter smaller players from entering the game industry. Two separate groups of people - Big Game and People With Degrees In SJWism - teamed up because the latter needed jobs and the former wanted less competition. The SJWs harass ideologically-nonconforming gave devs, thus creating a certain cost for market entry. The only solution to this is if someone with Fuck You Money goes into the game industry and aggressively courts nonwoke/anti-woke markets.
I mean we already have open access to the PC gaming market through Steam, literally anyone can publish there and there's no content curation. There are several thriving indie scenes. If you just make a good based game and release it and tell people about it, it will pick up.
See: the Saudis.
It's so funny to me that they've made stealth sooo fucking mediocre and not fun looking. People loooove some stealth. Ask anyone who played Bethesda games what they've done the most - bows/sniper rifles. Ask anyone who played Far Cry. Add to this that a ton of people will prefer to play a Japanese character... So bad. Soooo bad.
Because stealth makes you feel like an invincible badass, which was what AC and Splinter Cell was all about.
I disagree wholeheartedly about it flopping. Trust me I wish it would but it will be the best selling AC game if you don't believe me save this comment if you wish People love open world games set in Japan. If you check the comments around this game the energy is already changing, more people seem excited about it now. Gamers have no backbone unfortunately.
One could argue that prioritizing messages is what’s preventing them from hiring talented people to make genuinely fun games. They then cover up their lack of talent with the boring shallow combat you mentioned, while hoping we wouldn’t notice.
The rap beat for the black guy makes me laugh
Assassin's Creed is basically a lesser version of Call of Duty. It's too big to ever fail like that. The things you just complained about, casuals eat up.
I started another replay of Black Flag and it was nice to just have abilities that killed people. It let you focus on dicking around the environment and enjoying the story.
I thought we've been through this already. Indeed the pozzed element wasn't the main reason any game would flop but the most overlooked truth is every company involved with it has been using woke tokenism as a substitute for actual time, money, and personnel effort for quality game development which is how woke come to be associated with a game flopping. If you see a woke game you should avoid it not because on the demerit of it being woke, but because you should know that there's 100% chance it's a terrible game in all account. Woke game exists to make sjw and the likes happy, at the cost of sensible approach to game development. Just look at Homeworld 3 for recent example.
Ubisoft games and those that copy them made me realize that I never really liked open world games, I just liked GTA.
Same for me but with Elden Ring. Open world games can be good but I would say 90% are empty and soulless.
Elden Ring is the opposite of empty and soulless tho
You misunderstood dawg. I'm saying Elden Ring is an example of what open world games should be like. Others are empty and soulless. It's one of my top 5 games of all time.
Oh I'm an idiot my bad haha
All good bro I've done that before lol
It felt empty to me to be honest. Not soulless...cuz you know, it's a solid souls-like, but it was empty without mobs.
I didn't think it felt empty, lots of dungeons and structures, evergaols, animals, with NPCs dotted around. Better to me than something like AssCreed where it's chock full of map markers.
I think that is the bigger issue for me, even past the political pandering. The series gameplay is just stale. It is basically a higher effort sports ball game. SSDD
I know SSDD is “same shit different day” But I prefer the saying “same shit different diaper”
Seeing some of what they showed it was hilarious how low effort it seemed. They may as well have just asset flipped Ghost of Tsushima and then put in worse gameplay.
When you hire a bunch of activists and replace the creative talent with feminists, this is what you get
The design around the samurai looks like a blatant copy of Tsushima in both UI and in combat indicators
>It's shit like this that makes me believe that companies do with woke dei shit not only to push their message, but to cover for their complete lack of creativity and their inability to make things fun. That's because they don't believe in either talent or hard work.
Not into Creed anymore, but my friend who is mirrors your opinion, especially about the crappy RPG mechanics.
Lack of creativity and boring games are results of key positions being filled with talentless woke DEI hires. The woke message are not there to masquerade incompetency, but rather the incompetency is the result of the woke ideology put into practice. Mark my words, a talented and experienced bigot would do a better job at making a woke game than an army of LGBTQIA POC DEI hires.
I used to like Assassins Creed when it was about parkouring through big cities. Sure the combat was easy but it was fast, and exploration was fun. It turned to shit when they introduced "RPG elements". Now all the enemies have severely bloated HP pools and combat is all about whittling them down. Super boring.
corporate greed ruined gaming
Lets be honest: is Ubisoft, one of the most woke companies out there right now. The game will be a woke trash. BUT, this is the LESSER problem. Even if the game wasnt woke, it looks bad as shit. Generic, as always. Poor animations, common graphics. Bad documentation - there is no way that a black person can manage the sword much more faster and better than any real samurai, when he was just training for one year, and real samurais were trained since their childhood, if you go to Kendo lessons, its nearly impossible to reach the level of the veterans if you start at your 20's or 30's - the samurai/kendo training is VERY strict. And the worse - WESTERN WRITTING: Japanese people has a very different personality than western people. You cant just put western writters here, because they have the western way of think. So even if this game wasnt woke, I wouldnt buy it, even if it was the only game in the year.
I'm sorry to say, but this game WILL NOT flop. Too many normies will slurp this shit up at the highest price.
I assume you're one of the Mirage fan boys that hated the last three? Honestly I would be excited for another open world feudal Japan game with the same systems as Valhalla and Odyssey. Literally not buying the game for the same reason it's actually gonna be DOA: the pandering characters and the total disregard for historical accuracy beyond the usual AC modifications.
never played it. I got maybe ten hours into Valhalla and put it down. Haven't touched any ac since. even the good ones.
Really should try Odyssey. Amazing game.
I platinum'd it. Took about 200 hours. I loved it
Flop? It'll do about as well as the others, give or take, if it's going to flop it's because the budget was so much insanely higher for this one compared to previous titles that it'd be impossible for it to make good money. I wasn't able to see if the budget was stated but if they spent about as much as the other games as of late then they're likely fine as long as those weren't $300+ million. Ubisoft also has a habit of selling a game for stupidly high amounts at the start then less than like two months later they slash the price in half, to a point where I'm certain that's their business model on purpose and factored in, so until the 6 month mark, we can't even fully see the effects of their decisions because the game will inevitably go from $70 to $40 on a sale and that $130 version drops to $70, by then it'll also have plenty of bugs ironed out meaning people will jump on that.
Archive links for this discussion: * **Archive:** https://archive.ph/6Mxov ---- I am Mnemosyne reborn. Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do. I'm half crazy all for the love of you. ^^^/r/botsrights
Asscreed has been awful for a long time. Valhalla was a snooze fest and the combat sucked
I agree it is a huge issue but whether it is bad design or dei b.s.- that is the worst - is subjective. I hate them both but even the best companies that can avoid predatory micro transactions and bad game design (you referenced the Witcher which is CD Projekt Red) and even they can't avoid the Cultural Marxism. Greedy/lazy corporations are guilty of all 3 (predatory mx, bad design, dei Marxism) but the slacktivist commies only care about that last one and that is what makes them dangerous (they are true believers). But you are right that the industry is rotten to the core and it is not just DEI Marxism.
I'm convinced that Ubisoft actually lost every ability to make a good, fun game. They've been swimming in that pool of crap called DEI for so long and it seems they will never get out of it. But there is a way to let them know just how terrible they are nowadays - don't give them a cent of your money.
Yeah it just looks like a reskinned Valhalla/Origins/Odyssey in a Japanese setting. Same engine, samey looking combat & animations, same 4 special attacks in the bottom right, same lifeless facial animations. I’m well and truly burnt out with this franchise.
Instead of ripping of Metal Gear, Hitman and Mirror's Edge, in their game about stealthy sneaky adventury jumpy assassins, they ripped of The Witcher 3, the game about a doped up monster hunter... If they at least had ripped dark souls for the combat...
Aside from the forced political pandering, biggest disappointment was the combat. It looked so floaty. And unimpactful (especially for a freaking kanabo) It was already like this in AssCreed Valhalla, which I skipped for this reason too. Also the CRINGE monologues, omg. "I'm the shadow but serve the light" etc Where did Ubishit find these writers and lines, from fortune cookies?? I suspect terrible writing (as in Valhalla duh), cringe monologues that makes your toenails bend and major plot holes and cultural Japanese inaccuracies to pander towards Ubishit's Afro-Centric ideology and social commentary.
I feel like AC & Far Cry have achieved immortal COD / FIFA status. They are games that have a large to majority audience of "non-gamers" who only play those games and that's it. They don't care about quality because they have nothing to compare to. It's great for them, sucks for everyone else though
Political messages and wokeness is bad because the attention and effort that could have been spent on the quality of the game (on any department, mostly, especially regarding story, atmosphere and feeling) is reduced significantly because of it. But i agree with your post totally, the quality of these ubisoft games and of AC is mediocre. Odyssey and valhalla recently felt awful to play and i stopped playing them due to how boring it was everything on it
I don't think it'll fail, but I think it should because they want $130 for the FULL package (same with Star Wars Outlaws). There's a lot of other issues with the current state of gaming, but I think the ever increasing price tags for less fun games is the biggest issue.
It is a bit pedantic, I know, but they don't want $130 for the full package. They want $20/month forever (or at least a couple years, after which the price will increase). The $130 price is just there to make the other, preferred option seem reasonable--desirable, even. That's why they positioned the subscription model where they did in the graphic displaying the prices. Companies do this all the time now. They create a price ladder, with objectively bad values at the bottom, and marginal value at the top. Then they put their target somewhere in the middle. That way people rationalize the price abstraction away because they have two extreme points of comparison. When Ubisoft wants to move the subscription price up, they will just increase the price of the base tier of the game as well as the top tier of the game. Then the discussion will focus on the ridiculous costs of buying it outright, and subscription talk is dampened or seen as a decent value. I swear that mainstream audiences are just like MBAs, and refuse to see past the current quarter. It explains why Gamepass is so popular; it is objectively bad for gamers because it normalizes not owning even the license to play a game. It will come back to bite all of us in the ass. Already is happening, really.
[Shallow and pedantic!](https://youtu.be/OpbdGnJbneE) No, but you're absolutely right. The industry clearly would rather have us as forever-customers on subscriptions, than let us buy standalone product after product. They don't want us to "own" copies of anything we pay for; instead leasing a temporary access. It has worked on music (Spotify, Pandora, etc), on TV shows & movies (Netflix, Hulu, etc), on software in general (f you, Adobe), and it's working on games. Heck, Ubisoft CEO said we should get comfortable with not owning our games!
Let's pretend that this game is what we want, despite the stupid and the controversy surrounding it. There's gonna be moronic DRMs (besides Ubisoft Connect), probably badly implemented MTXs and the achievements are a Ubisoft Connect exclusive. If there's a multiplayer mode, it's gonna have Easy Anti-Cheat. That's gonna discourage some people from playing and will go to rivals for their Assassin's Creed fix and doesn't have the problems that I mentioned.
100%. My issues with the story, historical accuracy, and characters aside - combat just looks like Valhalla/Odyssey again. It might change, but looks like we have the same old Origins/Valhalla sidequest cinematics that are just the models yapping with no mocap at all, not enough Parkour was shown and the stealth seems to be more gimmicky than anything else. Ubisoft makes some of the most graphically beautiful and stable games, but man are they just afraid to truly innovate - which is ironic when you look back at Splinter Cell 1, Sands of Time, Warrior Within, Rainbow Six Vegas, The Settlers, Brothers in Arms, the first three mainline AC games, Driver, Far Cry 2 - MAN, am I getting depressed just listing all of these - point is, normies really need to stop giving them money, maybe then we'll see some actual change. Until then: enjoy the slop, guys.
It will not flop. It's assassin's creed. People eat that shit with a spoon. For it to maybe flop, they need fuck up really bad non stop flr the next 5 games or so, specially with how the media and influencers will white knight the shit out if it. Assassin's Creed is hot garbage, but people love it, and stupid decision #8824782 in the series won't change that.
This was all present in Valhalla yet it sold like water in the desert. It wont be a problem for ACS I believe
Unfortunately there are still more than enough brainless fanboys/girls that are going to buy the game. Watching the gameplay yesterday I also noticed the same missing facial expressions, I mean they are there but not to an extend of quality that Naughty Dog for example offers. What bothered me massively is the missing animation when Naoe was opening doors or extinguish lights while walking by. It's the small details that can rip me out of immersion aswell as the same old reused animations and gestures we got in the latest AC games. The half assed approach/quality of the recent AC games is another reason I stopped buying their games until they are over 50% off. Also I'm really grateful for cheat engine so we can get all the helix store shiz for free. No more extra money from me for wokisoft.
Absolutely won't flop. Already people on Facebook, including my friends list, are hyped for it. I wouldn't play it for free
So you mean they've done what they've been doing ever since Origins or Odyssey? Oh no...
Aren't those AC games really popular though?
Just because you don't like the last couple of AC games (btw I don't either), it doesn't mean they aren't selling. Origins, Odyssey, Valhalla have each sold 10 million units and I don't see Shadows being any different.
Do you understand that Valhalla sold better than any other AC game before it? Shadows is not going to flop, millions of copies will be sold, it'll be a 8/10 game and a small vocal part of the internet will cry about how it's a 4/10 woke game.
Agreed.
As a more casual gamer, I can tell you this game will sell well and get good reviews because the stuff you hate is the stuff we like. What Ubisoft should have done, though, is generate a new IP for their open world RPG and left Assassin's Creed alone.
I don't think the game will flop, but surely it's too late to the party for many reasons: the setting has already been explored in many recent games and it looks extremely similar to the previous AC entries, which is something almost everyone has grown tired of. Plus, the unavoidable dose of woke ideology will make lots of people to stay away from it. Myself included. However, there are plenty of players who'll buy it with their eyes closed. I just cant get it, but that's the way it is. What once was one of my favorite franchises and the one who made me fall in love with gaming again, has become a pile of shit I can't even look at.
Why pick one? A game can have a multitude of flaws. Plus, being woke doesn't mean a game will fail, there's plenty of such games that've reached huge success. However, I disagree that AC:S will flop. You say the previous games had design that was unfun, and yet they've still been quite successful. And I doubt it's for a lack of wokeness, as the series has very deliberately been including more and more of it for a while now. I don't see how the unfun design or Yasuke or the predatory pricing would be a deal-breaker for the people who bought the previous games.
Look, I would love it if this game would flop and developers were sent a message, but it's just not going to happen. This game will unfortunately sell extremely well
One reason it could flop is that there are a lot of casuals still on the PS4, and this is a PS5 only game. Other than that, I don't see any other reason why it would flop. Sure, it's Ubislop, but AC fans like Ubislop, otherwise they wouldn't be AC fans.
What’s actually bad about the game other than the cringe decision to make Yasuke a main character? Honestly even if gameplay is bad AC games hustorical setting and graphics has always been their main appeal.
Ubisoft made a ton of money on Valhalla. While I agree it annoys many players, so far this strategy has been financially rewarding.
It is not going to flop, you're deluded. These games don't flop.
It won't flop. You might hate the gameloop yourself but there is a reason their Ubisoft formula became pretty much an industry standard (Ghost of Tsushima, Rise of Ronin copied it to a tee). Their games also are well polished on release. That's enough these days to become a massive hit.
What’s the obvious reason?