Worst story out of an AC game in the franchise?

[Artoriaz]

I finished the game 100% and the main story a few days ago and honestly, while I loved the game, I think this game has the worst story of any AC game to date. All the assassination targets are forgettable characters with no motives or reasons to make you hate them and the story telling feels rushed and predicable. Is it just me?

[AC Denton]

It's one of the best, honestly.
Though for the conviction against the targets, it's JUST like Watch Dogs 2, you need to do all the side content & really observe why this corporation(in this case, target) is so bad.

[Jynn]

Main story is a bit dull in places, though i enjoy it for the most part, but i really enjoyed the side quest stories compared to previous games where side quests were very forgettable

[Artoriaz]

Originally posted by Anthony Campbell:

It's one of the best, honestly.
Though for the conviction against the targets, it's JUST like Watch Dogs 2, you need to do all the side content & really observe why this corporation(in this case, target) is so bad.

I honestly don't see how its one of the best.

It has the most 1 dimensional villains of any AC game yet, and AC1 had some pretty bland ones. I finished the story 2 days ago and I cannot remember one of their names.

The story telling feels way too rushed, especially at the end, where you go from helping Cleopatra get into the palace to fighting with Caesar on a battlefield 10 mins later and then clio and Caesar being your enemies 5 mins after that. There are only 3 historical characters that are in the game for any length of time, one being Caesar who is only in the game at the end, cliopatras brother who is in the game for 1 cutscene before he is killed, and Cleopatra who is the only one who is actually present in allot of the story.

Non of the side characters are interesting or memorable besides clio either, and bayeks son's death is supposed to be the main drive for the entire story yet he is only in the game for one random flash back mission, and they expect us to care about him after 5 mins of screen time?There was no emotional pay off for killing the final target, no feeling of satisfaction for avenging his death, for once the main story felt like ticking things off a check list instead of the side content.

[Artoriaz]

Originally posted by Jynn:

Main story is a bit dull in places, though i enjoy it for the most part, but i really enjoyed the side quest stories compared to previous games where side quests were very forgettable

I agree. I enjoyed the side quests far more than the main story, which shouldnt be the case. Ubisofts new open world formula of doing story telling through the world and players experiences instead of through a functional linear story really hurt this game IMO.

[Jynn]

Originally posted by JonathanWhiting13:

Originally posted by Jynn:

Main story is a bit dull in places, though i enjoy it for the most part, but i really enjoyed the side quest stories compared to previous games where side quests were very forgettable

I agree. I enjoyed the side quests far more than the main story, which shouldnt be the case. Ubisofts new open world formula of doing story telling through the world and players experiences instead of through a functional linear story really hurt this game IMO.

Agreed, i tend to skip through the main game cutscenes because it just doesn't catch my interest that much, but i have been enjoying the side quests and the corruption, greed, and investigations that you stumble upon and have to deal with

[Mike]

Like most games its a decline in story and rpg elements as of late. I find the AC:O quite refreshing as its morphed from dull booring to an semi rpg where for instance FO4 fallen from RPG heavy to meeh rpg at best

[Artoriaz]

Originally posted by Turbo Nozomix:

Originally posted by JonathanWhiting13:

Ubisofts new open world formula of doing story telling through the world and players experiences instead of through a functional linear story really hurt this game IMO.

I strongly agree. Although, I don't think this is Ubisoft's new way of story-telling - that sounds to me like it's just sugar-coating PR to make is sound like the weak story aspect, which Ubisoft could obviously tell for itself wasn't strong, was intentional. I think that Ubisoft likely couldn't find really suitable or affordable writing talent for this game, and so they rationalized the absence of strong writing by making the ridiculous suggestion that it's up to the player's imagination to come up with stories. Why don't they just tell players to imagine having a decent combat system, or to imagine having good graphics? Lol.

The original AC writers have moved on. And Origins helps to reinforce a suspicion that I had, which is that Corey May essentially was Assassin's Creed. And that without him, Ubisoft doesn't know what to do anymore, and so are resorting to their trope of repetitive and formulaic scenarios.

The last AC game that Corey worked full force on is Black Flag, I think. Corey also provided some consultant input to Syndicate, I believe, which I'm guessing was the modern-day narrative part, which, although very sparse, still had the classic AC intrigue and progression that is absent everywhere else in AC since after Black Flag.

Without that good writing, AC is just as bland and repetitive as the Far Cry series, IMO.

Well they annouced there new story telling approach over a year ago, so I honestly don't think its a PR thing, I think Ubi are actually trying to reduce the ammount of story in their games and it has had a very negative impact on this game.

If you want to read more theres an article here about it:
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2016-11-17-ubisoft-moving-away-from-scripted-narrative

[Artoriaz]

Originally posted by Turbo Nozomix:

Originally posted by JonathanWhiting13:

Well they annouced there new story telling approach over a year ago, so I honestly don't think its a PR thing, I think Ubi are actually trying to reduce the ammount of story in their games and it has had a very negative impact on this game.

If you want to read more theres an article here about it:
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2016-11-17-ubisoft-moving-away-from-scripted-narrative

Yeah, I did see that before. But, Ubisoft would have had the story direction for Origins decided back then, to be able to start implementing it into the game.

I think the way Ubisoft described it is trying to put a positive spin on a negative thing. Otherwise, if it wasn't a negatively impacting change, why would Ubisoft be mentioning it at all? People would then just play the game, and feel stimulated by the story, and have no issues. But, it sounds like Ubisoft was preparing people's expectations for a downgrade in the story-telling, so that it wouldn't blow up on them as an unexpected discovery when the game finally came out.

Their choices for writers would have been made by then, and they would have known what they were capable to accomplish with that particular setup. Their PR would then follow that understanding of what Origins was going to be.

Well sadly Far Cry 5 is also going to have a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ story, with a protagonist that doesn't speak and story missions that can be played in any order. If Ubi continue in this direction they might just kill two of my fav franchises with one stone.

[SHODAN]

Disclaimer: AC Origins is a decent game that has its moments. Having said that...

This is the absolute worst AC has ever been in terms of quality of writing. Even AC3 is no contest here and that one had the most dreadful main character in the series.

Everything is disjointed. People go from talking about the weather to discussing family tragedies in one sentence. Emotional moments that should be the linchpins of storytelling get truncated to 10 second cut scenes. Scenes end abruptly with no payoff. Characters develop with no rhyme or reason. Interesting personal traits are never explored. The pacing, especially towards the end, is abysmal. Shades of grey do not exists in the world of AC: Origins. The bad are bad, the good are good and don't expect anything else to happen.

And the VA just drives the nails deeper.

I had no expectations, and still I left disappointed.

[Artoriaz]

Originally posted by SHODAN:

Disclaimer: AC Origins is a decent game that has its moments. Having said that...

This is the absolute worst AC has ever been in terms of quality of writing. Even AC3 is no contest here and that one had the most dreadful main character in the series.

Everything is disjointed. People go from talking about the weather to discussing family tragedies in one sentence. Emotional moments that should be the linchpins of storytelling get truncated to 10 second cut scenes. Scenes end abruptly with no payoff. Characters develop with no rhyme or reason. Interesting personal traits are never explored. The pacing, especially towards the end, is abysmal. Shades of grey do not exists in the world of AC: Origins. The bad are bad, the good are good and don't expect anything else to happen.

And the VA just drives the nails deeper.

I had no expectations, and still I left disappointed.

Well im glad im not the only one that feels this way. I really hope Ubi see the negativity around the story and change their ways otherwise the franchise is dead in the water.

[erekose_handy]

So, I disagree with a lot of this, but it's only because I know a LOT about ancient Egypt (though my area is Bronze Age Collapse, not Ptolemaic.)

A number of your Assassination targets and friends ARE historical figures, Septimus most prominently, but also Pasherenptah (the Priest in Memphis whose wife you save,) Additonally Pothinus the Scorpion, and Apollodorus are historical figures

I'm not sure abour Flavius because I am unsurprisingly not an encyclopedia on governors of Cyrenica during the late Republic, and it isn't enough to get a wiki page, but I suspect he is also historical.

Brutus of course makes an entrance, but not much of one, and we see Cesarion too.

One thing that does ♥♥♥♥ me about this game is that the Optimates in Rome are seen as this faction of Roman freedom fighters, rather than the entrenched corrupt aristocracy they were. Brutus even says "Land for the People", which is the exact OPPOSITE of what his faction wanted

Templars are much more interesting when they're opposing outright evil with enlightened Tyranny than when they're mustached villians.

[Eckoh]

The whole narrative is the main quests WITH the side quests. You learn why the "order" needs to be stopped.

[jasonbarron]

I have to disagree with the OP--this is easily the best story I've seen in an AC game to date. There were several times I actually got kind of choked up during Origins.

[Dominemesis]

Originally posted by JonathanWhiting13:

Originally posted by Anthony Campbell:

It's one of the best, honestly.
Though for the conviction against the targets, it's JUST like Watch Dogs 2, you need to do all the side content & really observe why this corporation(in this case, target) is so bad.

I honestly don't see how its one of the best.

It has the most 1 dimensional villains of any AC game yet, and AC1 had some pretty bland ones. I finished the story 2 days ago and I cannot remember one of their names.

The story telling feels way too rushed, especially at the end, where you go from helping Cleopatra get into the palace to fighting with Caesar on a battlefield 10 mins later and then clio and Caesar being your enemies 5 mins after that. There are only 3 historical characters that are in the game for any length of time, one being Caesar who is only in the game at the end, cliopatras brother who is in the game for 1 cutscene before he is killed, and Cleopatra who is the only one who is actually present in allot of the story.

Non of the side characters are interesting or memorable besides clio either, and bayeks son's death is supposed to be the main drive for the entire story yet he is only in the game for one random flash back mission, and they expect us to care about him after 5 mins of screen time?There was no emotional pay off for killing the final target, no feeling of satisfaction for avenging his death, for once the main story felt like ticking things off a check list instead of the side content.

^ Pretty much this. The only thing the story did well was Bayek's character, it showed him to have a personality. Otherwise, you are right. Its also worth mentioning that they built up Bayek and Aya's relationship quite a bit, and Bayek pining to be back with her, only to have it die fairly easily and pointlessly near the end without a good explanation, especially since there was nothing keeping them apart anymore after Aya and Bayek form the Hidden Ones. Although him dropping the eagle skull in the sand and it forming the AC logo was pretty damn cool. Also why didn't Caesar say,"Et tu, Brute?" which translates into and you, Brutus, but instead said, and you friend? Why not give the historic line properly?

[ClancyDamon]

Originally posted by Dominemesis:

Its also worth mentioning that they built up Bayek and Aya's relationship quite a bit, and Bayek pining to be back with her, only to have it die fairly easily and pointlessly near the end without a good explanation, especially since there was nothing keeping them apart anymore after Aya and Bayek form the Hidden Ones.

This. I double-checked the entire map afterwards because I was convinced I had to have missed some side mission that set that up. I have no idea where that development came from. It doesn't make any sense.