Hello, Drengrs.
Kat Clay, here to talk to you today about
the ending of Assassin's Creed, Valhalla, or as I'd like to call this video,
what in the hellheim just happened to Norway then.
Good, good.
Lead on after 100 hours of gameplay.
I was so ready for this epic battle between Sigurd and Eivor fighting it
out after all that conflict that had been building up through the game.
And instead I got this.
I mean, what even is this?
It's Basim in a three wolf moon t-shirt. In this video, I'm going to try and break
down what actually happened at the end of Valhalla.
Now, I've played almost all
the Assassin's Creed video games and even I was confused.
So I'm sure there's people out there who are just as confused as I am.
So bear with me. It is a lot.
So Sigurd has been getting these visions through the game and as time goes on,
he keeps getting a little bit more erratic, a little bit more cray cray.
And it was like, look, you're my bro, but also stop talking about these weird
dreams because I'm getting a little scared for the fate of our clan, also England.
But then he's like, hey,
let's go back to Norway and go tell of my dad for being a sucky parent, OK?
And by the way, while we're there, we're going to do some sightseeing.
All right. She's like,Yeah, sure bro, I want to go to Norway too, because it's like frickin cold and your
dad's there and we can tell him what a bad parent he was to both of us.
And it's like actually so by the way, I had another motive for going to Norway.
It's actually not just to see my dad,
but to go to this crazy temple that's been my my dreams.
You want to come along, sister?
And she's like, Yeah, I would never betray you, bro.
But also, like, it's really cold and I'm really glad I bought my sweet as armour
and they'd go and journey up a mountain a la journey.
If you haven't played that video game yet,
I suggest you do right now because it is amazing and they literally find a temple.
And it was like what? You were right.
Good.
Like all your dreams and visions are actually true.
By the way, there is an awesome spear hiding in the cavern behind you.
It's like a glow in the dark spear with like a forcefield.
So you should totally go and pick it up if you're playing this game.
Now, Sigurd speaks this funny language,
which I think is actually the language of the Isu, the alien race that arcs
over the entire Assassin's Creed storyline.
So they are crazy machines down here in this Viking basement.
And of course, being Vikings, they think it's the tree of life.
And this is the gateway to Valhalla,
the heavenly realms of the Vikings, where they will fight and live.
Thank you, Momo.
Once they get close to these crazy machines, Eivor and Sigurd Jack into what
is essentially the Valhalla Matrix and get sucked into a Groundhog Day style fake
Valhalla, which is obviously a simulation that is very similar in look and feel
to the Animus, which is used in the future
by the Abstergo Corporation and all the renegades that seem to steal crap
from the Abstergo corporation in order to take them down.
Obviously, this is not real.
And after a few goes through
the Groundhog Day style simulation, will gets shot in the eye with an arrow,
a la Odin or King Harald, depending on how well you know your mediaeval history.
Turns out the real culprit behind this
kind of psychological simulation is Odin, the guy that's been haunting her for so
long and posting her about her morally ambiguous decisions all game.
So you got a showdown with Odin.
And the thing is, you can't possibly defeat Odin.
He's a God, right?
So the only opportunity you have is to get away.
But every time you try to get away to this
door that Sigurd has conveniently provided to you, you get zapped back to the fight
with Odin through the acts that you're carrying.
Now, this might seem obvious to some
people, but I was like playing this for like five minutes,
trying to run away and then getting pulled back into the game.
And then I'm like, but how am I going to take down Odin?
Maybe I just slash at him a bit, but there's no bar.
And what's going on? Turns out you have to unequip the axe,
you know, it's a very wargames ending that the ultimate game is not to play.
So apparently you as a Viking, you need to lay down your axe and run away.
And that is the ultimate sign that you've
matured and grown up as a person and as a leader able.
I actually had to wait until the game spelled it out to me to figure out because
it didn't make any sense in the context of the game.
Nothing had been built up to this moment
and nothing had told me that this is that logical outcome that Eivor should do.
She really hadn't questioned enough of her
heritage and her Viking motivations and those certain times where I as
a player had made choices which were in line with that kind of violence
that she supports as a Viking, it didn't make sense.
And if a game needs to spell that out
for the player, then it's not a very good game design.
Once you're out of Odin's clutches, it's not over. Basim our friendly
neighbourhood assassin who is kind of a little bit suspicious about how he
ingratiated himself with the good, I got to say.
And he just rocks up out of nowhere in the middle of nowhere in some icy fjord.
And he's like, you killed my son, prepare to die.
And I'm like, what, dude?
Like, I'm Eivor man, your friend.
Like, I did not kill your son.
Like, I think you've got the wrong Eivor.
I think we're a bit confused here.
Like, we don't need to fight bro, but he's determined to fight you.
So you gotta fight back because you are a Viking and the battle ends with him
getting jacked up into the Matrix like machines forever and ever.
And all of Helheim or so we thought, cut to Leila Hassan in the near future,
still trying to bring down the Abstergo corporation.
It turns out this magic disco ball in the Norwegian vault is actually causing
lots of damage to the Earth and causing the temperature of the earth to rise.
This is going to cause the Earth to explode again.
Desmond dealt with this back in the day
by saving the world to sacrifice his own life to turn down the thermostat.
But the temperature has gone up again, and it's up to Layla Hassan to save the day.
Turns out there's all this really bad radiation in this boat.
So she's going to use the staff
she got an odyssey to protect herself because it's a magic healing wand.
Cue parkour over some magical Isu artefacts and you find this crusty looking
Basim dangling from those scary looking hooks.
He's managed to survive, you know,
a thousand or so years dangling from a hook.
Of course, the only way to save the world is to get jacked into the matrix and not
to just actually just go and touch this bowl and turn around or press a button.
So Leila Hassan ends up zapped into the projections.
Apparently, Basim has been faxing Leila
all these weird messages through the Matrix, using the wireless networks
and the Ethernet and the cloud because of science.
Then a glowing figure shows up and I'm
like, I'm pretty sure that's Desmond from the earlier games.
But you're looking at glory, like, did you realise that?
And he's in front of this magic kind of like astral projection tree that looks
like it's out of some slick corporate video about interconnectivity.
And he can see all the outcomes of all the choices in the world using this magic
science tree and Leila's like man, can we use that to save the world.
It's like yeah sure.
Do you want to stick around for a bit.
Like I've got some chips over here.
We can have a good time.
Watch some TV like figure out how to save the world.
We've got lots of.
And she's like sure bro, like,
I think that's a good use of my time because, like, I've had a rough time of it
and I think all of my efforts have led me here.
And she's like, oh, but I better go tell my friends that I'm not coming home.
So she calls them from The Matrix
and she's like, Oh, hang on, what happened to my staff?
He drops out of the Matrix,
grabs the magic wand and regenerates into middle aged.
I mean, you know, man, like,
if I had a magic wand that could change my appearance back to my young self,
I'd probably go a bit younger than what Basim goes here.
I'm really surprised also that his clothes survived, but clearly not because when we
see him next, he is dressed in a hoodie and a three Wolf moon t-shirt
that he basically looks like he should be a Melbourne barrister.
And we're back where we started
at the Viking grave, which happens to be Eivor's grave.
And she still hasn't yet.
Once you finish that section of the game, you can go back into the animus
with Basim playing as Eivor's brain, which is just like mind blowing.
And once you go back into that animus, there's a cut scene.
Now, depending on the outcome of the game,
whether you got the good or the bad ending, I could make a whole video about
how there's no such thing as a good or a bad ending in a video game.
If you got the ending where Sigurd likes
or at the end, he'll come back with you to England.
And Eivor's like, Yeah, thanks, bro.
Let's all be Vikings together and sing Vikings songs and feast and be merry.
So we're all friends now, unless you got the bad ending.
And I think Sigurd stays in Norway, but it's pretty hard to get the bad ending.
You have to be a pretty big douche to do
that, although I really was tempted to punch Basim in the face.
And then there's some Viking singing and we're all buddies and we chink our
glasses and hang on, don't we have to go and fight King Aelfred?
Turns out that's optional.
You don't actually have to fight King Aelfred to kind of finish this game off.
And this is a narrative problem because
the structure of the narrative kind of tapered off to the end.
I think there's a really great
acceleration of narrative while you're doing the first few story arcs,
especially the arcs that were leading up to rescuing Sigurd from Fulke.
But once that tapered off,
there was still about five to 10 extra quests you had to do.
Plus this norway arc.
And none of it really aligned with kind
of like that real arc of storytelling, which is you have those epic scenes
in those epic fights right at the end of the story.
So as soon as I finish the game,
I texted one of my friends and said what just happened?
And they texted me back and they, like you, played the Valhalla quests, right?
You know, the ones with the healer
woman who gives you drugs and you go up to Valhalla.
No, because they were kind of boring.
And I just wanted to go with the storyline.
Turns out all of this important information which explains the end
of Valhalla is buried in the Valhalla optional quests.
Why you would do that is beyond me.
I mean, if something is important
to the narrative and understanding of the conclusion of the story
and the meaning of the story, why do you make those quests optional?
Because the ending won't have the impact you want it to.
So it turns out Eivor is the incarnation of Odin.
And I mean, we got a little bit of that, a hint of that with the pokey eye arrow
Odin has one eye.
And the idea that Odin has been pestering her this entire game.
Well, it turns out that Odin is actually just a projection of Eivor's self.
So she's really just talking to herself
through all the moral decisions in this game.
But when it comes to the whole Basim
plot line, Basim is the incarnation of Loki.
Yes, that's right.
The trickster God and his son Fenrir was killed by Odin.
But unless you know anything about Norse
mythology, you're probably not going to pick up on that.
I needed my friend to explain this to me.
Hence the wolf t shirt.
Fenrir Wolf.
This would have been useful information
to make sense of why Basim was shouting about his son.
So if you're going to go and play
the ending, I would highly recommend you actually go and play the Valhalla
queslines before you get to the end of the game.
For me, as someone who's passionate about games, writing this to me is a massive
narrative and structural problem in Assassin's Creed Valhalla.
The problem that the Assassin's Creed
franchise has is that it's so epic and spanning that there's very few people
who are going to have played all the games.
I'm a long term fan,
so I've played most of the games, but even I haven't completed everything.
I don't know the entire backstory and I found this confusing.
Imagine what this would be like for someone whose first Assassin's Creed
game is Valhalla when I originally reviewed this game.
I thought it was a very strong RPG, but I felt like as the game went on,
the structure and the storytelling gradually fell apart.
It was kind of like that, really focussed heavily on that first half
of the game, but then tapered out as the game progressed.
So while I didn't enjoy playing this
for the most part, I did feel like it was too long and too big.
And compared to some of the other Assassin's Creed games,
like The Beautiful Syndicate, which has a lovely compressed world
and excellent storytelling or even origins, where all the missions
and the main quests really related back to the loss of his child.
This game really sprawled in that second half.
And the ending is a product of that kind
of I feel a little bit of pull planning and kind of stretch narrative design here.
The wacky ending does do one thing right.
It sets up Basen as a character
in the near future and for ongoing Assassin's Creed games.
And I think that's the kind of character Acey needs.
It's a trickster character and it brings
an interesting character into those modern day scenarios, which could be quite
intriguing, especially since he actually has assassin skills.
I'd love to see Basim in action and I also want to see what he does next.
So hopefully that's helped you understand the end of Assassin's Creed, Valhalla.
I know I was confused.
I hope you are less confused now.
If you have any feedback, if you have any thoughts on the ending you
want to chat about it just hit me up in the comments below.
I'm Clay.
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