I just play on normal difficulty, or whatever it is called.
I have long since realised that DKW’s sensitivity to difficulty levels in Assassin’s Creed is much greater than mine.
Well, it seems like it means a lot to him based on how much he wrote about the game. Truth it, I don’t blame him for being upset the game he was enjoying changed in a way he does not like.
If you search or are familiar with DKW’s posting history, it seems that he used to really enjoy video games, then a few years ago, suddenly began finding every video game insanely difficult. There are multiple threads in which people offered him suggestions, and he would try the games and then come back and report that he found them completely impossible even on easy mode. And even though everyone else tells him they’re not having this experience at all, they don’t know what he’s talking about, it’s like they’re playing a completely different game, instead of suspecting that something about him changed, he blames the video game designers for all waking up one morning a few years ago and deciding to collude together to make all video games impossibly difficult from that point on. I don’t know, his hand-eye coordination or reaction time or whatever must have just dropped off a cliff a few years ago for whatever reason, and he doesn’t realize it.
First off, I have no resentment against the very good people here who sincerely tried to help me with my struggles. They tried, it didn’t work, life goes on. (In the majority of the cases the problem wasn’t extreme difficulty so much as an annoying sticking point that I just couldn’t get past…I wouldn’t call Flower a difficult game by any stretch of the imagination, and the final level just flat-out had me stymied.)
But seriously, reaction times falling off a cliff? If it did, it happened literally overnight, as I went from carving up hordes of Saxons while barely getting nicks on Wednesday to getting roasted to within an inch of my life by a bunch of filthy bandits on Thursday. No doubt the specific wording got buried in all the rambling about “balance”, but enemy damage was jacked up. I know what I saw, dammit.
And if Ubisoft decided that I didn’t have a place at the table anymore, fine, but I ask you this: Why NOW? The game has been out for nearly half a year. Heck, at that point I’d finished the main game, destroyed the Order of the Ancients, and built up the settlement to the maximum level, so it didn’t even prevent me from accomplishing anything meaningful. The time to say “Bleed for us, Eivor!” would’ve been at the very beginning, so players like me would know to stay away. Same deal with the +51 level greenout thing. (To recap, when your level got to 51 or more higher than that of an area, the enemies in it would be bumped up to 51 less than what you were at the time.)
So screw it all. I give up. I quit. I’m done. The PS4 is in mothballs and it’s not coming out.
I’ll offer this parting note: If anyone’s playing the game and wants to take over this journal, be my guest. I’m actually a bit curious as to how to get some of the trickier trophies and if River Raids have anything to them. There’s also a festival going on now…egg hunt sounds fun! 
Can I have your PS4 if you are not going to use it?
(DKW, hope this isn’t hijacking your thread.)
I’ve started playing AC: Valhalla and so far I’ve found it to be pretty similar to AC: Odyssey, for better or for worse. I find the fighting system to be decent but not amazing, but I’m not sure how much replay value there is in the game; I think I had to play for several hours before I even had the ability to assassinate someone which is not really something I want to slog through again.
Pros: I like that I’m not constantly finding weapons that make my current weapon obsolete (like in AC: Odyssey) and I’m not constantly unlocking weapons that are worse than my current weapon (like in AC: Syndicate).
Cons: I’ve spent at least 45 minutes trying to figure out how to get into various buildings only to later realise that they can only be accessed by following the plot line. If I can’t get to a treasure, don’t show it on the world map!
Eh, don’t worry about it. Heck, you want to turn it into your journal, be my guest. It’s not like I have anything more to add other than “Damn, is Ubisoft milking this one or what?”
Some more impressions:
I’m not a big fan of the obvious Dark Souls influence in terms of hard boss (and mini-boss) fights. I tried fighting two of the (level 90) Zealots on multiple occasions and they both kicked my butt so hard it wasn’t even funny. I eventually managed to figure out the attack pattern for Goneril so I was able to defeat her (after dying a bunch of times, of course). At least these fights aren’t part of the main quest, so I’m OK if I stick to that.
I’ve considered turning down the difficulty (I have it set at one level harder than the base difficulty), but I find it’s a good level for regular non-boss fights. Maybe I just need to be over-leveled to succeed. It doesn’t help that I suck at parrying in most games and this one is no exception. So far I have been getting by on jabbing with a spear and then jumping away, but that doesn’t help with some of the hard fights.
I’ve also tried some of the river raiding side quests, but my jomsvikings seem like they’re made of tissue paper and they get knocked out really quickly. And the St. George’s armor that I got as a reward seems situational at best (a bonus if you do one particular impaling attack with one specific weapon type?).
On the plus side, I enjoyed the Boudicca’s Tomb puzzle; it definitely scratched my itch for old school Assasin’s Creed puzzles.
I struggled against them at first as well. One of them got super-cheesed as I chipped away at their health from afar. I can’t remember what the tipping point was, but at some point I got the Zealots and started going out of my way to hunt them down. I think it was a combination of level and just getting better at the game.
I managed to kill the weakest Zealot; she throws a smoke bomb that disorients you, but at least it doesn’t eat half of your health bar. I now have the upgraded wolf ability which helped a lot; it knocks down the enemy which lets me get in a free attack or two, and then it sticks around afterwards allowing me to get another few back attacks when the enemy turns to face it.
hogarth - Just for the record, I am completely done with console games forever, but I still have a fairly good memory of this game, so I’ll help all I can.
Think of the Zealots as “specialists”. They’re all tough fighters but are especially good in this aspect or that skill. One has a nearly impenetrable defense, one can launch debilitating area attacks, one is great at counters, etc. Knowing what you’re up against can help you fine-tune your strategy and prevent you from wasting health/resources/ammo on ineffectual tactics.
One thing you should try to do no matter what is go for the weak points. Not only does this do plenty of damage in itself, hitting them all will often allow you to get a stun attack which does massive damage, and if he’s still alive his defense will be reduced, making it much easier to finish him off. Focus of the Nornir helps a lot in this regard. Another thing that would help are special yellow meter attacks (again, memory!) that he can’t defend against. I used Dive of the Valkyrie most often and it usually worked great. You might want to experiment with them and see what appears to be especially effective.
“Overlevelling” is beyond useless. For the time I was playing, all enemies more than 51 levels beneath Eivor would get automatically bumped up to 51 less, and it might be even worse now. It may be a good idea to get it to or near +51, but it’s up to you to learn what works against these elite warriors. There’s no substitute.
Just in the interest of clarification, do you prefer not to make the game easier to deal with tough enemies, or do you absolutely refuse to do so? If it’s the latter…well, I’m sorry, but I’m not going to be much help. This mentality has always baffled me. I can understand never wanting to go below a certain level. I’ve never had this mindset, and I don’t think it’s particularly healthy, but I get it. But when you’re struggling badly, dying over and over, getting incredibly frustrated, and you can make things easier and you won’t…I just don’t know.
I’ve just started a second play-through, as male Eivor this time, though I might change back to female at some point if the dialogue errors are noticeable / annoying*. I’m enjoying it again, though the PS4 seems to be struggling a bit with it. I don’t know if it was always like that and I’ve been spoiled by the Xbox Series X, or if my machine is showing its age. I must say, having played a few Fromsoft games recently, I wish they hadn’t dumbed down the tutorial boss fight. How can I learn parry and dodge timing if you put the enemy in slow motion briefly? I’m enjoying it regardless though.
*I gather female Eivor is cannon and some dialogue still says she/her when playing as male Eivor.
One thing you should try to do no matter what is go for the weak points. Not only does this do plenty of damage in itself, hitting them all will often allow you to get a stun attack which does massive damage, and if he’s still alive his defense will be reduced, making it much easier to finish him off. Focus of the Nornir helps a lot in this regard.
I almost never use ranged weapons in combat (only for sniping, basically), so I’m not sure how I would aim for a weak point with a melee weapon. I’ve also never tried out Focus of the Nornir, but maybe I’ll take a look at it.
Another thing that would help are special yellow meter attacks (again, memory!) that he can’t defend against. I used Dive of the Valkyrie most often and it usually worked great. You might want to experiment with them and see what appears to be especially effective.
As noted above, I have started to have good results with the upgraded wolf attack ability (Man’s Best Friend) because it does an initial amount of damage and also distracts the enemy for a while.
I’m not sure what versions have this but my Xbox digital copy has detailed difficulty settings. “Scaling” is one of those and you can set it anywhere from no scaling at all to having all enemies at least 30 levels above yours. With no scaling you could definitely over-level.
I found the second set of Zealots (armed with spears) were ten times easier than the first set who had shields, at least for my playing style of “mash the heavy attack button”.
There’s a couple of things that have made combat much easier for me:
- Getting access to fabric so that I could improve my food pouch to have 6 heals per fight instead of 3.
- Taking the perk that gives “time slows down after a perfect dodge”. I didn’t realise that the timing was fairly forgiving (e.g. compared to parry timing which I have trouble with) and that the time slow-down effect lasts quite a long time.
I don’t think I’ve died in combat since I unlocked those two things.
I think my main criticism at this point is that the game seems too long. I’ve been playing for 80+ hours so far and it feels like I’m only half done. I’d much rather have a 60 hour game I can play twice (using different dialog options and a different weapon) rather than a 120 hour game that burns me out after playing it once. For pete’s sake, during loading screens I keep seeing a tip saying “Keep an eye out for legendary weapons!” and the only places I’ve seen legendary items are (a) in the Opal store and (b) in the Isle of Skye side-quest that wasn’t even part of the original game! (I’ve been ignoring the Treasure Hoard maps, so maybe there are lots of legendary items there.)
Thank you for such a detailed synopsis! 
I finally finished. Was it worth 140 hours? Not really. I liked that they ramped up the puzzle aspects of the game compared to AC Odyssey. But it was just way too long; I started forgetting what happened in Kent or Essex by the time I finished the game. I also felt the Zealots were kind of boring compared to the mercenaries who would hunt you down in Odyssey.
I also thought it was strange that there were so many endings to the game. First there was Eivor’s big climactic fight (which I found annoying because at one point I didn’t know how to get to the next phase of the multi-stage fight) and Eivor becoming jarl, then there was Layla saving the world, then back to the animus again for conquering the rest of England, then one more mission against the Order of Ancients (but not really).
[Hopefully my last word on this, because I’m not kidding when I said I was done 15 months ago…didn’t even keep up with new developments.]
I’ve always been a bit skeptical of the “too long” criticism. How long was it supposed to be? What exactly is your baseline? If the story is memorable, I can recall it no matter how many months or years have passed. In my experience, what this really means is that either certain tasks take too many attempts or the payoff just isn’t worth it. In the case of Valhalla, I’d argue that certain tasks (especially hunting/fishing and the cairns) could be considered way too long, but only if you’re actually foolish enough to go for them. They’re just horribly designed.
As for the extended conclusion, well, that’s kinda how this franchise is these days. Ubisoft doesn’t have a whole lot else they can rely on right now, so they’re going to milk this. I reached “disappointment” level far before learning Aelfred’s sad fate, so I didn’t get any ending fatigue.