It seems like Ubisoft just made the first few months more exciting.
The Paris-based game developer recently announced the first roadmap for "Assassin's Creed Valhalla" in 2022 on Twitter, revealing various updates and expansions for the video game.
The roadmap revealed that the game would have a title update numbered 1.5.0 on February 22. Although Ubisoft did not elaborate on what the title update would bring, the inclusion on the roadmap means that it has significant additions for players to look forward to.
Next, the game would go free-to-play on February 24 to 28, meaning that people who haven't purchased Assassin's Creed Valhalla but would like to try playing it could do it for free within the time allotted. Although 4-5 days may not sound like much to experience the game in its entirety, it is enough to get a good look at what the game offers and more.
Finally, Ubisoft will be releasing the next and arguably the biggest expansion yet for "Assassin's Creed Valhalla", "Dawn of Ragnarok," on March 10. The expansion pack focuses on the journey of the main character, Eivor, through the dwarven realm of Svartalfheim in search of Baldr as the Norse god, Odin.
Details on "Dawn of Ragnarok"
Ubisoft previously announced the game expansion on February 10 and said it would feature "new godly abilities" and over 35 hours of gameplay.
According to PlayStation Blog's Kristen Zitani, a new mythical bracer, the Hugr-Rip, will be given to players to acquire abilities from defeated enemies that allow them to "open new doors to gameplay and strategy". However, these powers are not permanent and can be lost through exploration. Additionally, only two abilities can be active at any given time and are only active for as long as Odin's Hugr meter stays filled.
These powers allow players to transform Odin into a raven to get a literal bird's eye view of their surroundings and perform air assassinations on enemies. change Odin's skin into magma and travel across lava sections unharmed, use ice abilities to deal heavily damaging strikes, teleport into various places and resurrect fallen enemies to fight by Odin's side.
Aside from these powers, the game expansion also brings arena-style combat into the game called the Valkyrie Trails. In this game mode, players can go one-on-one with many familiar faces and defeated bosses in the expansion's story for various rewards. Players can also make the fight more challenging and rewarding using challenge modifiers or "Boasts".
Expansion Pack Turned to Standalone Game
"Assassin's Creed Valhalla" recently had one of its game expansions turned into a standalone game, per a report by Bloomberg. According to people with knowledge on the matter, Ubisoft did so to "help fill out its thin release schedule".
The new standalone game, known internally in Ubisoft as Rift, focuses on Basim, an assassin that Eivor met during the events of the base game. It won't be a massive open-world role-playing game like earlier entries and would have a bigger emphasis on stealth gameplay. It isn't yet known at what period the new stand would feature at the time of this article's publication. However, Ubisoft may be releasing the game sometime later in 2022 or early 2023.
According to a report by Polygon, recent workplace troubles may have had a hand on Ubisoft's "thin release schedule". According to reports, office sexism and sexual harassment have created an "exodus" of staff leaving the company.
This exodus includes alleged perpetrators such as former Ubisoft creative director and editorial vice president Maxime Béland, per a separate Polygon report.
