If you enjoyed previous large, open world RPGs but hate everything that made them great, this may just be the game for you. The following is a list of what Assassin's Creed Odyssey seems to be, to put it lightly, severely lacking:

•An engaging, well crafted, character driven narrative that works hard to put you in the character's shoes, making you care about the character and the world surrounding them
•A visually diverse world, reasonably sized world that emphasizes quality over quantity
•A world with more than four bases that are copy-pasted all over the map
•Supporting characters that will have a meaningful impact on the world around you
•A world that feels alive
•A consistent tone throughout the main story
•Side quests that go beyond just being fetch quests
•An engaging modern day storyline that does a good job of tying itself into the original games
•A USABLE Hidden Blade
•Enemies that are weaker than an US Army M1 Abrams MBT

I'll balance this out though, let's look at what Assassin's Creed Odyssey got right:

•The ship combat, though not nearly as engaging or rewarding as Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag, is relatively fleshed out and fun up until you start boarding ships

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That's right, there is only one pro. Just in case you couldn't tell, I can't even write a pro without criticizing something. Assassin's Creed Odyssey is anything but an odyssey. It tells a story that has been told time and time again. It has many characters, all of whom are lifeless and forgettable, that seem to serve no real purpose to the game's story other than to add extra "content" to keep the player engaged.

Why is the word content in quotation marks? Well, that's because the majority of this game's quests, as mentioned above, are fetch quests. Guess who needs 5 plants but will pay you some inordinate amount of money to get it; that's right, some random dude that definitely wouldn't realistically have the money that he ends up giving you at the completion of the quest. Now don't get me wrong, I don't need realism in games. I don't even want realism in games 99% of the time, I would generally prefer engaging gameplay that isn't inundated by repetitive animations or an over explanation as to why I'm completing a task all in the name of realism. That being said, a random healer in a village won't just have over 1000 Drachma and one of the best weapons in the world just laying around to pay some random mercenary to go frolic in the woods and pick some plants. Now, if this was today's exchange rate it would be like 3 cents worth of Drachma to that healer so I'd understand it, but historically 1000 Drachma hasn't always been worth the same amount of money as a single fettuccine noodle. It's distracting and downright lazy. The same reward. For every quest in the game. Every quest in the game generally plays out the same. If you've done it once, you've done it a thousand times, so why even bother?

So, why then do I have 95.7 hours in this game? Well, the honest answer is I have no idea. It was a battle of attrition to say the least. Throughout my playthrough I kept asking myself why this game had such high review scores. To this day, I still cannot figure it out. The world is full by random ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, and by "♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥" I don't mean stuff, I mean actual ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. There are generally only two types of locations that are unique: cities and forts. Beyond that, you've got the hundreds of bandit camps and animal dens littered throughout a world that emphasized quantity over quality, and that's just about it. And the best part? Once you clear out a camp or fort, give it enough time and they repopulate, so why even clear them out in the first place? Where's my sense of progression? What's the tangible effect that I'm having on the world around me?

So, let's get down to one thing that still irks me; I made a choice early on in the game, probably about 40% through the main story. This choice ended up influencing the fate a certain character in about 20 hours. If you made the wrong choice, too bad. You can't talk your way out of it; you can't try to reason with this other character. Their mind is made up, their fate was decided hours before you even knew them. Why? I don't know. I've been trying to figure this out. Assassin's Creed Odyssey is billed as an RPG but I continually fail to see how it's anything other than a generic 3rd person action adventure button masher. Let me at the very least have a chance to reconcile a poor decision I made hours beforehand. Don't punish me because of lazy writing. Give me chance.

Why is it that everyone give Assassin's Creed Odyssey a pass on giving the player so few dialogue options? Let me sum up 90% of the dialog options for you when talking to a quest giver:

1. Yes, I'll do the quest
2. No, I don't feel like it today, maybe tomorrow

That's it. That's all. Two options. Yes, you can always ask for more information from the quest giver earlier in the conversations, but you really can't barter and try to make the fetch quest worth your while. Who has ever heard of a mercenary in a game that will always do everything that is asked of them without bartering first? JUST GIVE ME THE OPTION. ALL I WANT IS OPTIONS AND A SENSE OF TRUE FREEDOM.

I did beat this game through and through. Cleared every area on the map and finished every quest in the base game. As I said earlier: battle of attrition. Then I got to the DLC. I finished the first episode of the Legacy of the First Blade DLC and thought "thank god that's over, it was basically just the main game but rehashed in a smaller area of the same world." As I worked my way to the next quest marker I was thrilled; I was finally done with this DLC that I didn't enjoy what-so-ever after about 4 hours of gameplay. It seemed too good to be true but I was so elated I didn't even give it a second thought. I got to the next quest. Then the quest after that. The whole time I was thinking "huh, this is a weird epilogue that seems to be building to something." Then it ran in large font across the screen:

LEGACY OF THE FIRST BLADE
----------EPISODE 2----------

Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope.

I will not subject myself to another second of this game's mind-numbingly boring combat. I will not subject myself to another basic infantry unit that is able to withstand more hits than a US Army M1 Abrams MBT that is being shot by a marshmallow shooter. This is it. This is where I leave off. I won't even get into the in-game store; at this point I'm defeated and cannot fathom using any more brain power to think of the plethora of other issues I have with this game.

Assassin's Creed used to be a series created with heart. It wasn't trying to be yet another open world RPG, it was trying to create a cohesive narrative that left the player thinking. It laid the groundwork for what many consider to be basic elements in open world games today. I'm not angry, Ubisoft, I'm just disappointed.

Overall rating: 1.5/10

Unless this game is given away for free, I would not recommend this to anyone for any price.

EDIT: Added a word that's been missing for years and driving me crazy.