Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will feature some story choices that can impact multiple regions at the same time.
Speaking with VG247, Assistant Level Design Director Laurence Letalien talked about story choices like the one that has been seen in yesterday’s gameplay showcase. These choices will have an impact on the world, but it is not yet clear if they will lead to big story changes.
So, there are definitely territories or sagas where your choices will impact. Here is a good example of, if you kill someone, will he take power after that? Who will take power after that? We do have those impactful choices that can impact the world afterwards. I can’t really go into too much detail, because I don’t want to spoil it, but players will be able to do that.
Some of these Assassin’s Creed Valhalla story choices will be more impactful, as they will not just influence the territory the events have taken place on, but multiple ones.
LL: So, there’s both. It depends which territories you’re in. But the thing is, let’s say you’re in one of the territories like East Anglia, when you’re done with that saga, you come back to your settlement. Maybe it impacts your people, maybe it impacts the world itself, England itself. Like, who becomes the leader? You have those political decisions that you have to make. So, there’s meaning behind those decisions.
Laurence Letalien also talked about Assassin’s Creed Valhalla narrative structures, highlighting how each territory will be its own saga with its own theme and story. Players will also be able to play through them in any order they wish.
The way that it works is we have this overall narrative structure of the game, and what happens is that all the territories – so, East Anglia as an example, is a part of this overall structure. And the way that it works is that Eivor can embark on these sagas. They’re each their own, they have their own theme, their own stories, and their own characters that you can meet and build relationships with. And you can choose the order in which you want to embark on those sagas. So, that’s mainly the big structure that we have.
Placing so much focus on choices and how they can impact the world, it’s clear how Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is building on the RPG mechanics introduced in Origins and Odyssey. The gameplay formula of the older entries in the series seems to be a thing of the past, even though Valhalla is bringing back the Hidden Blade and Social Stealth, two of the mechanics that made Assassin’s Creed what it is.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla launches on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X on November 17th.
