 What's up, everybody? I'm the hook and I'm the blade and to get them to this I don't know why I just did that And welcome to the together. We are you know Welcome to the spoiler blade spoiler cast a show about all things spoilers Particularly in regards to Assassin's Creed Valhalla. This is the episode in which we are finally going to discuss What actually fucking happens in the story Well, it's been two weeks and luckily this game only takes a hundred years to complete So hopefully some of you a few of you are done with it. Tim. Are you done with it? Yes? I finished everything the other night Clocking in so just doing all the essentials pretty much as all the essentials for the most part I clocked in at 80 hours, so Pretty pretty fucking absurd 80 hours for the essentials like Yeah, holy shit. I want to say with like about a Reasonable amount of exploration inside content. I Probably clocked in at 90 hours to finish the story But I can add a few if we count all the fucking time I spent Troubleshooting my game breaking bugs little update on that Technically, no, it's not fixed. I did not get to play the ending on my main save basically, I held a seance I drew a pentagram and that allowed my friend traviso to Transfer to my Ubisoft connect account a save that he happened to have at around the point where I was encountering my Gamebreaking bug and so technically I was able to play through the ending But I'm I have to be specific here because I'm talking only about the ending to the modern-day story I never got to play the ending of the Order hierarchy because I got another game breaking bug that did not allow me to find and kill the father so There's that and that's just two of the several Crazy fucking ridiculous bugs. I've encountered by the way guys case you didn't know When I introduced this is the spoiler blade spoiler cast we are gonna fucking spoil everything everything We're gonna start by spoiling the biggest thing so if you have not finished the game and Keep in mind you may not know whether or not you finished the game I thought I'd finished the game and then someone told me because I asked that there was an entire other arc left to do in Hampton Shire Make sure you finish the game and then we can talk about it and then we can all talk about it as buddies as friends acquaintances colleagues as fellow Vikings all right, so the ending the modern-day ending here's kind of my If I were to try and sum up my problems with it in the sentence I would say that it is an ending that is more concerned With being surprising than it is with being satisfying Yeah, I think so because I definitely was surprised. I Was messaging you while I was going through it and I wasn't being like whoa, what the fuck I was just like what the fuck Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know that obviously the centerpiece of the ending the big point of it is that now our favorite character and most fleshed-out character Bassem has Been brought to life in the modern day He's kind of an Isu guy Kind of not really but kind of and he's like I'm gonna be using the bleeding effect. I'm gonna learn Avor skills I'm gonna eventually fight the Templars now There's a lot wrong with this just on a consistency and plot logic level When you actually start thinking about it for more than 30 seconds All right problem number one, okay We're supposed to believe and accept and appreciate that Bassem is the new modern-day protagonist basically I mean, I guess they could just as easily Ignore him from now on but I don't think that they will necessarily I think the idea that he's the new guy is pretty clear So why don't we get to know and care more about him in the main game? Why is he not a more important character? Why do I feel like I really don't know who he is especially when he's not very consistent with himself My the biggest inconsistency of this for me the thing that like I've talked to a lot of people about and nobody has a really good Explanation for I would love to hear Darby's explanation for this if he has one, okay? So think about this Avor just like probably Sigurd and probably Bassem is Somehow the byproduct of this process by which certain people in the issue have Propagated their genetics across the future. They've created a descendants almost or or maybe clones maybe Just I mean it feels like sages it's basically like sages Sean even says it's the same technology as like what they do with sages So it's it's not exactly the most original thing because in Jotunheim Hierokin is Juno and Hierokin is getting the same me to that Odin is and she's talking about using it to save her husband So it's the same stuff. They're basically sages. That's cool but Bassem is acting like at a certain point like he just is Loki and I suppose That is consistent with how sages Could behave right sages were their own person more or less But the more they learned and understood their background the more they felt like we hear John Standish and AC4 talking about like I'll be reunited with you my love like okay, so they kind of feel that they're sure of their heritage but couple things if Avor is a woman if Avor is Canonically historically a woman who looks and sounds Nothing like Odin how can Bassem at once recognize that Avor is the reincarnation of Odin and Not recognize that Sigurd looks and sounds exactly like Tyr Yeah with with missing arm and all yeah, well that the follow-up question What's Bassem really looking for if Bassem is talking to Sigurd and talking to Avor and working with collaborating with them Because I don't know Bassem is has a hunch that they are that they are Reincarnated the same way he was What is he actually trying to get like does he think that Sigurd is is Odin? If he spends the whole game thinking Sigurd is the chosen one and Sigurd has these powers and Sigurd has this this lineage We at least know that he doesn't suspect it's Avor until their their Confrontation because he's like oh it was actually you I was looking for all along How he knows this right, but that's exactly the thing that that choice of words It's like oh it's you were the one I was looking for so like is Bassem just full-on Loki in the in the 900s in 873 AD looking hunting down Odin because he's still mad about his wolf son and Just thinks that this guy who clearly is Reincarnated tier might be Odin or that it might lead him to Odin. There's really no Means by which we are allowed to understand how Bassem figures out that it's Avor in the end anyway Bassem just shows up just shows up like did Bassem know they were gonna go there? Does he have the same visions that leads them there or whatever he shows up and he's like aha you I Found you but but how And why? How and why does that happen? Well? Also, it's like how does he realize it's I don't get it dude Bassem spends a lot of time in the story with Avor He lives on their settlement. So if he's like oh shit Avor is the reincarnation of Odin Shouldn't he realize that Avor is seemingly nothing like Odin and then that it's okay, you know, but he is so determined to kill Avor as if that is just For all intents and purposes, that's that's Odin today doing Odin things. It's just I don't see it Yeah, I would think Bassem would realize like oh well clearly There's there's there's something about this process that didn't make Avor one-to-one Odin Oh, and yeah, I mean that's the other thing too is that Odin Odin is visible to Avor in these visions That's not how we've understood sages to work That's not how we're understanding Bassem to work Bassem talks like he is Loki Bassem's like hey, Aletheia It's you boy Loki. It's not like he's being influenced by a vision of Loki at least that we can see right right and and if he was It would still be kind of a stretch for him to then be like talking to Aletheia through the staff and being like The plan worked. It is I your loved one. I'm I'm it's me I'm Loki and then you know Avor again is just having these visions of Odin and Odin just shows up And he's like the devil on her shoulder and and she's just like hey Odin fuck off, you know Like she's not about to start talking to people like what's up guys? I'm actually the all father reincarnated Yeah, it's Avor's being you know influenced in part. I guess by her Odin heritage, but she's definitely not Odin She's she's not yeah the updated version of Odin clearly. It's just it's all very inconsistent I have an issue with even viewing like Bassem as a victim in a lot of this like I Don't exactly see Javi as like the hero in his story, but I don't exactly Figure Loki for like, you know the the underdog either. You know sure just from our common knowledge of Loki He's not the best of dudes so it's difficult for me to be like on Bassem side at all Especially in the context of okay It's he's he's now the modern-day protagonist like he's already off at a bad foot for me because he just said fuck you Laila Goodbye. Yeah, he makes more sense as a modern-day villain than as a modern-day 100% 100% and maybe that'll be the case But they've put themselves in an odd fucking place by having him also having been The assassin right he's the hidden one in the story more or less. He's like a really high-level hidden one He's you know, he's on he's all about that shit. He's all about that life So he's the idea is he's popping into the modern day and he's like Assassins you call them, you know, he's like we need to get rid of these Templars, but it's like dude I mean You seem like a huge piece of shit. I I don't like Templars. I would like to kill Templars I'm cool with the idea that there's a modern-day protagonist now and a modern-day story where the priority is to End the Templars and we're working towards that goal and we're using the bleeding effect and the animus the way it was originally meant to Be used that's all fine and cool but the game did not do and nearly enough legwork to make me actually be excited about the idea of Basin being at the center of all this there could be a lot with his meeting with William Miles That is telling watch that should happen in a comic book dude watch just watch I don't know why we didn't see it in this game though And you said it in a previous episode that if this game doesn't end the doomsday plot You're gonna be you're gonna be upset. It didn't not even a little. Um, yes and no It slowed the machine down So there's no more like there's no more like radiation, I guess but she didn't find the pressing issue They've probably got a few more years before it comes back But I guess the idea is Layla is in there with the reader Figuring out how to actually end it permanently now. Okay. I have some issues with that whole thing, too Okay, it's already kind of a stretch to imagine and I guess they're playing kind of I Mean is it Desmond? I guess I guess it's supposed to be Desmond. It's no one North But he doesn't talk like Desmond. He doesn't seem to be Desmond. He talks about Desmond like he's a different person I'm okay with that being vague because you can just go. Oh, it's Desmond and move on or you can be like It's kind of Desmond. It's not he's in the gray. It's he's a glowing dude. I don't know The other thing is this though. Why is it a helpful idea or a brilliant idea as the reader describes it For Layla to be like what if you went back and did calculations from 2012 when Desmond ended the world? I Don't get how that is going to help you unless time travel exists It's not like you can go back and have Desmond make a different choice You're stuck now with the timelines you have left, right? Like it's all those hypothetical calculations like the the Sure, the chance that she was going to even get there was very slim in the first place And so her idea is oh well What if we just plug in this hypothetical scenario that Desmond let the the cataclysm happen and So yeah, what if those people or are figured out, you know a remedy for what happened And so it's it's all hypothetical. Yeah, nothing is concrete But we're gonna operate with the assumption that whatever solution they find and they try it's gonna miraculously work That's my assumption going for sure and it's I mean that's a fun It's kind of an interesting way to write Layla out of things It's kind of an interesting way to bring Desmond back a little bit, you know in this sort of strange interesting way I like I prefer this this out come to them just being like hey It's me Desmond Miles alive in the gray, you know what I mean like that would have been kind of for I do feel like the way that he says Desmond like he's like that like it doesn't say Desmond in the way of like Oh desmond, that's right I think he says it like he's that I think I think they've left it vague enough to where this could be like the Like like the ascension of Desmond Right like he is Desmond, but he's been he spent so long in this right simulation He's forgotten what Desmond was are we assuming though that the reader has always been in the gray Like why is he now all of a sudden Desmond, you know like or why is there a reader in the first place? Why is there an artificial intelligence of any kind in the tree of life in Yggdrasil figuring out Calculations, so obviously like the whole asgard stuff is just Avor's interpretation of these like isu visions Yeah, are we assuming that instead of a giant wolf child, which is consistent with like Norse mythology that it's actually like just a human Well, so the best explanation I've heard for the relationship between say the Aesir and the and the frost giants is that Because keep in mind, you know someone like Juno who we know is an isu is also a frost giant So it's not like frost giants are meant to represent humans per se sure instead It seems like they just represent isu who were outside of this asgard bubble of isu culture So I guess we're supposed to assume that Fenrir is just supposed to be a son between two Isu people but then it doesn't really track for instance that Odin also an isu person is like ah This son you have had is faded in my visions of the future to kill me eventually It's not like a wolf thing. I don't know. It's a little It's a little sloppy. I don't know It might be just a detail They had to sacrifice in exchange for having this this storyline that tracks just as easily on to Norse mythology as it would on to isu characters and plot lines I feel like there's a lot of in this and a lot of this game's isu development It's a lot of I don't want to say it's retconning anything, but it's a lot of recontextualization So now we're gonna assume that along with Juno Minerva that you also have Loki and Odin running around which I think is fine I mean Juno and Minerva are also names of yeah Roman of like Roman gods, but I just what the anomaly ended up being and everything I don't know if I was super satisfied with it I feel like it convoluted a lot of the isu like human war and The solar flare and all there's definitely something to be said for the fact that part of the story of this whole setup is like You know how we've talked at length about how the isu tried six things to stay alive Well, here's the seventh that we didn't mention at all before now You know yeah, and they could and they could do that infinitely but keep in mind considering Juno is directly involved in this plot and and only obtains the need by way of What Odin is doing the fact that Juno explaining all of the plots by which people tried to save their lives and Doesn't know that this one existed. Maybe doesn't track really well for me So I think you're you're on to something there like it is convoluting things in a way that Makes it far far more challenging as it goes on to remain consistent to itself With with with the anomaly I was like, oh awesome We're getting like some first-ive stuff and it's and we're actually getting like new first-ive mysteries dope And like it kind of feels like it's just Recontextualizing things that like it's filling in gaps that I don't know we're super interesting to begin with I don't know. I just I can't I can't quite put my finger on it. There is just Convolution I think that's a fair point because what we have to ask at the end of the day of this whole mystery is What is the dramatic question that this anomaly video was answering? To some extent there is a question. It's answering. It's talking about I mean, it's contextualizing how these Asgard visions exist for Avore in the first place. It's contextualizing how Avore has visions of Odin at all How Avore is able to as we play in the simulation we can switch the genders it kind of gives you an explanation for that But I think your point is not does it answer the question, but did I did I care about the question? was the question interesting and To some extent I would say yes Like I was certainly waiting to figure out why Avore had visions of Odin in the memory corridors I was waiting to figure out why Odin or Avore could switch genders Not because I cared why Avore could switch genders mind you But because Darby and other people on Twitter kept talking about how cool an explanation it was going to be Which let me address that real quick I said in a previous episode that if the explanation for gender switching was so interesting that it went beyond being a Just a working backwards from the idea of we need to be able to play as both genders Like if it was so cool on its own that it felt like better to have gender options than to just have a single gendered character No, that did not happen. It's a cool explanation, but it's not So cool that it isn't completely transparent as This was a reason we came up with to let you play as both genders There is this something about the whole issue thing that like we are 13 14 games deep now is Still like so awesome because it was because it was new information to us I don't feel like a lot of this version of the truth was necessarily new information It was just recontextualizing so oh, hey Hey, remember that remember the cataclysm that you saw at the end of revelations Well, guess what in a building next to that there was Loki and you know, it's just like I don't know if that's super interesting Whereas showing me Adam and Eve getting the apple from the issue like that was brand new Well, okay, you know let me comment on that I think it's a question of what is the priority and what is the of the use of the issue mystery because in those early games It had very little to do with what SEO was fucking worried about It was about creating stakes for the modern-day story and helping us understand the world of the modern-day story Now we're 13 games in we know what's going on in the modern-day story We know who the assassins are who the Templars are who the issue were and we know about that shit throughout all of the Fucking history of the world. There's little left to explore It was shocking and cool and exciting in ac2 when you could see shit in the truth or in brotherhood about like how they were involved in the assassination of JFK because Other than the implication at the end of AC1 that like hey, the assassins and Templars still exist You just didn't know to what extent they were involved in most of the pivotal moments of history That stuff trickles out over the next few games through revelations, right? They you go, oh shit, they were at the center of every single fucking thing that's ever happened That's kind of interesting that was new to us then now the function of this issue story in this game is entirely pertaining to Avor and the historical story and I Do appreciate that and I recognize that like there's not a lot that they're ever going to be able to tell us About the issue or the assassins are hidden ones or the Templars or the order of the ancients In a truth-like context that's going to be surprising or new to us There's just not a lot they can say about it anymore. It's been explored too Heavily too deeply now. We just know all the info so I appreciate that They've taken the idea of having these these broad mysteries that those games used to have and they've contextualize it within this is a historical character story and It just happens to have this these tendrils of this Ancient issue mystery that are pulling it along that that works for me. That's the part that I like about it What I don't like is that it just doesn't I feel like hold up to much scrutiny in terms of making much sense But also I have problems with Avor's Historical story beyond all this modern-day stuff anyway that definitely feed into how I feel about that That is kind of what I'm getting at is like it was new information to us in ac2 and because we are so many games deep There's just not much mystery that you can provide with the isu anymore and so right giving us a Truth that's based on the isu again. There's Too little there. I think that what I'm saying is that the priority of this story was not to Give you information about the isu in general or the conflict in general It was just about giving weight and and motivation to this historical Narrative but that's a great segue into let's talk about why we don't like the historical narrative. Yeah Now we've talked at length in the last couple of episodes end on Twitter about how like Avor story right is Really really really long and bloated and full of unnecessary garbage, you know I talked about how it's all side content instead of main content that is probably the number one biggest problem because any good storytelling or satisfying You know emotional stakes or or emotional impact that might have existed in the Avor and Sigurd storyline it just gets it loses all of its momentum It just gets the life sucked out of it by this aggressively over a long story if We were just to examine it on the level of what it is and and what those moments actually add up to It is not a very well-told story We start the game by having Avor have these visions talking to Valka and and essentially being told that You know one day you're going to betray him and then the dramatic question that the entire story revolves around at that point is How will Avor be driven to betraying her very cool and handsome nice brother and the the answer to that is pretty Unimportant because it becomes like you know, okay. Well now Avor and Sigurd are going to conquer England They're mostly doing separate shit and in the two or three arcs where their stories really do intertwine It's it's weird to have a story so long Also feel so rushed like we go from Avor and Sigurd our best buddies and they love each other very much To the very next arc that we see Sigurd. He's a complete asshole. He is just the worst He goes from I you should bow down to me because I'll be your future king and I'm I'm this, you know first civilization Bad-ass God boy. He like he goes off the fucking deep end immediately And at that point while you've sucked all of the the question out of the dramatic question now It's not about why would Avor betray Sigurd? I know why Avor betray Sigurd I want to betray him right now Now it's just a question of fucking fucking when when will Avor betray Sigurd because I have 40 more Map locations to visit and most of them don't involve Sigurd thinking about the like Asgard visions and how clearly Javi like kind of fucked over tear and then loses arm Avor doesn't make Sigurd loses arm Avor doesn't betray Sigurd in a way that makes him lose his arm Sigurd gets captured neighbor does everything that she could have to to to get him back if Avor had made a decision that Resulted in Sigurd losing his arm and that betrayal even if you could say that Avor is responsible for what happened to Sigurd Get with the Asgard context. I'm not like oh, so that so that's why Sigurd hates me What you're getting at I think is actually something that I was going to observe as well where there was a moment in time In this game where I thought it was really smart how they had the Asgard stories and the historical stories Mirroring each other. I liked that. There was the loss of the arm that essentially You could kind of see the parallels between the character relationships and I just thought that was always going to be was this Asgard story was going to be this subtle thematic reflection and So that led to the moment where Bassam Attacks Avor for killing his son My thinking was ooh, this is really interesting because if Bassam is is you know connected to Loki and Avor is connected to Javi Then it makes sense that as a reflection of that story Maybe Avor really did kill Bassam son. We know Bassam son died. He talks about it at the campfire, right? Maybe there's an interesting connection there where we didn't even realize Avor didn't even realize that someone he killed in some instance was Fucking the son of Bassam and that that becomes part of the story So once I realized once it fully said in that like Bassam is just talking about Fenrir like Bassam is just straight up on crack and thinks he's Loki and That's all he's talking about. I was so disappointed because Like that just felt like the least interesting way right to have conflict between those characters And so we're not seeing Avor and Sigurd and Bassam repeat that pattern again in this in this time We were just seeing Bassam kind of know what's going on Yeah, if we assume that like Avor was just doomed to cause Sigurd to lose his arm Then that's there's kind of like a tragedy to that because Avor doesn't want that Yeah, and exactly as you're saying like it would be neat if the Asgard if the Asgard story was like Oh, so that's why Certain things that have happened in the story have mirrored it so so closely It's because they're they're doomed to repeat these things because they're reincarnate of their issue counterparts And it's in this whole conversation that you have to get to well at the end of the day What theme is the story trying to convey and of course as I've talked about many times You know, you can start to dissect theme by figuring out The arcs of the main characters and where they end up on a certain question or a certain issue And what's interesting is it seems like there are these things that imply certain arcs for Avor in the beginning You know, I thought maybe this as sort of the full case story was starting to kick off I sort of think maybe the story was going to be about Avor learning about the issue and learning about This thing that is clearly affecting their life and that she doesn't know about or doesn't believe in and that that's going To cause character change and growth But like that never happens Avor can be as deep and egdrasil the tree of life and she'll walk out of that temple being like That shit's crazy, huh? You know like She's not really interested in engaging with the fact that like she fucking has visions of being or interacting with Odin Still at the end of the day, she's gonna be like that's all pretty weird. Anyway on to the next thing Well, that's the thing is like Avor isn't really the key to much They just need no they just need to follow her to get to Bassem pretty much She's not the answer to any too much at all You would miss out on the Odin and Harvey like like parallel and mirror thing I can't help but think though that the at the very least the Bassem Reveal would have in in that portrayal would have been more realized if we played as as Sigurd or as Sigurd's part in the story you would lose out on the Odin stuff But at least you would spend time with Bassem and Constantinople and you would spend time with Bassem whereas with Avor Hardly ever sees the both of them or just rewrite the story so that Avor and Bassem have to spend more time and work together Or that character relationship, you know, that would be that'd be ideal But um something else I wanted to point out is that you know at the end of the game Which can I just say you know that whole vahala simulation part? Yeah, where you're walking through vahala you kill the people I've had to play it about 20 times Just think about that you've had to play it how many times of all the sections of gameplay to have to replay The one that is a groundhog day of repeating Gameplay segments is the one I had to do 20 times trying to troubleshoot my fucking game breaking bug But anyway, I digress the thematic statement of the story comes at the end when Avor is escaping Odin Odin is trying to draw Avor to stay in the simulation All of this is a little weird to me because Okay, why does Odin want Avor to stay in the simulation so bad if Odin has tried to propagate his You know dna across time to have reincarnations of himself Why does he now want one of those reincarnations to spend the rest of their life in a vr headset? I'm not sure why but That's because the the story doesn't really care. Why they want to create the moment That all of it all of it is contrived to create a moment where Avor has to choose family and friends over The idea of eternal glory in Valhalla. This is the game's thematic statement This is their attempt at saying something profound Is that Odin says what more could you want than glory? And then Avor looks behind herself and all of her friends and says everything else everything else but It's not like on any level We were expected to see or believe or interpret that Valhalla simulation as like actual Valhalla they're like it's obvious to anybody that there's no real glory in a simulation of glory that shouldn't be a shocking or revolutionary idea for Avor to have But it's also not about like okay if Avor had to choose between something that would be genuinely glorious like if Avor had to choose between something that a Norse person in that time would have considered Glory worthy of Valhalla worthy of being dead now in the real life and sent to live in the hall of heroes and instead said My life that I'm living right now and the people I care about are more important to me than dying in glorious battle Maybe that gets the theme across that they're trying to get at but this Contrivance this situation that Avor is in It doesn't say what it thinks it's saying at all. It's not impactful. I I have a very similar issue with it Yeah, the whole her leaving it is not nearly as punctual as they may think Because there's there's nothing about the the place that Avor even enjoys She fucking throws a knife in her dad's fucking skull She immediately rejects her the apparitions of her friends and comrades and whatnot immediately If I feel like if they really wanted me to feel Avor attached to this place And thus her leaving it was impactful. She would have had to settle in So maybe she reconciles her relationship with her dad Perhaps she reconciles like a relationship with a fallen friend there And she actually is interested in staying until something happens But the entire time she is like, yeah, I don't really know about this place, man Can we get out of here? Yeah, so rather, you know, I I feel like What they had opportunity here to do is as well as So she settles in and she's like, hey, this is actually not too bad and then Her actually having to leave behind what she feels is like, you know, this vahala Situation for the people back at the settlement It doesn't it doesn't exactly work when she's immediately like this is lame. I want to I want to leave Well, there's also the fact that Avor has always been Advocating for and motivated by caring for the people at her settlement It's not like Avor spent the whole game being a shitty leader and just trying to achieve Viking glory No, every decision Avor has made from the beginning has been what's best for her people So the idea that at the end I'm supposed to be blown away by the thematic punch of you know what? I actually care about my people is ridiculous For all that Avor knows that could be what vahala is and there should be something impactful there about her Her deciding to leave it behind because for all she knows that is vahala She knows something's weird about it But how is she supposed to know that vahala isn't actually this mechanical fucking thing that puts you into a An infinite simulation for as far as Avor is concerned that could that is vahala and she's leaving it behind That yeah, that you're just saying that maybe vahala shouldn't be the clearly shittiest place to be Well, yes, if it was supposed to care that she's leaving but not only that though But the whole time, you know, they're always discussing about glory in and how vahala is Is where it's at and where we're going to end up and and that's all that matters Oh, and there's also the fact that she talks a lot about how You know, there's no real reputation in this glory is about reputation Well, that's still just as like Silly is the idea of liking this version of vahala building her entire life and existence about around what people are going to think about you And you're dead is maybe just as silly a pursuit as This simulated vahala. So still not getting really a big idea across I just feel like they could have had a situation where Avor's entire like Pursuit in her life is now challenged like for for all she knows this is vahala and she's there now Yeah, she doesn't like it. And so now now she's like, well now what now, what do I do? That could have propelled her to fucking join the assassins or something, you know Like find a different purpose a better one instead of instead of Shooting for this this like if this is what I'm going after then I don't want it anymore They could have done that. Yeah, it could have been like if this is what vahala really really looks like Maybe I shouldn't care as much about making it to vahala. That could have been interesting Yeah, and maybe I should care about other things like my like my clan and like Perhaps joining the hidden ones or whatever like which right and and even that would have been Underwhelming in the context of this story because again like she even if she doesn't join she still is practically a member of the hidden ones and just Does all the work for them And she loves her clan and and defense her clan constantly So it's like there was just there was just no way with the the way that they set things up for Avor That this particular thematic purpose and direction was ever going to pay off interestingly. It's the same thing This is a common struggle with video game protagonists Even some of our favorite ones like etio etio is a pretty flawless dude But you know Darby himself has shown us that you can have edward a perfectly understandable and relatable power fantasy type character And still have a fatal flaw like in his case being greed And the the pursuit of glory would have made perfect sense as Avor's Flaw but it's not a story about that at any point other than the ending We just never got the storyline where Avor You know chose personal glory over the well-being of her clan We never saw that happen when when dag spends all of his time being upset with Avor It rings really hollow because if you're playing the game and you're looking at the story objectively Avor has not done anything wrong. Avor is not worthy of dag's ire How interesting would that have been though if dag was actually being legit if dag said You're actually doing things that are wrong and that that here's why it makes sense that they're wrong Or even calling you to task for choices you could have made Choices you could have made that prioritized your glory over the settlement and then you face those consequences Then you've given us a character who is actively Hurting the people they love in their pursuit of glory and at the end they go. Oh, you know what glory is not as important as my friends And then that's that's a classically satisfying Character arc and that that could have been beautiful that could have been flawless But unfortunately Not what happened Yeah, the entire time Avor is completely selfless and a great leader and on all this and that and I never felt like Avor was ever like making the Worst decision possible or the selfish decision and and that kind of speaks to the inconsistency of Avor's Avor's character I feel like is because she's obsessed with gory and vahala But also she's like the perfect leader and she's very compassionate and and selfless and I don't know like like yeah Like Ivar was an example of being too focused on glory and and being a bad person and being selfish And Avor is none of that Avor's in and antithesis of that We had the same sort of thoughts about connor, you know connor Obviously he has he gets punished pretty heavily and a lot of things go very very wrong for him But he never makes a bad decision. He's always in the right. He's always Completely justified and there's no learning or growth that has to happen for him And and same thing for shea right like like all three of them always are making like the best possible decision You know like they're never they're never making a a selfish decision A fucking shea is is deciding to do all this stuff to save the world. I mean, could you have a better justification? Regarding the choices I wanted to talk about I guess how you get the good or bad ending I wanted to discuss that with you. Yeah, it seems to me like There are maybe three tentpole choices All of them pertain to how you interact with cigarettes. So like if you punch him in the face and you deny dag vahala and you fuck his wife And you that might be it No, also if you if you side with him in the very beginning about keeping dad's money or not Well, here is here's something funny about that because I I didn't deny dag vahala But I did get with randy. I punched him in bass and in the same conversation So it gave me three different things the randy the punching him and the Refusing to side along with him when he sentences holger to like pay her for like 30 times the the worth of a sale or whatever Yeah, and I think most people probably didn't side with him on that because he's being an asshole But you know what's really great is he's like, hey, I'm not gonna come back with you, you fuck And you know what all it takes is one dialogue option And I say no, please and he's like, okay fine Is that really the the the difference in the bad and the good ending is is me was one dialogue option Actually tim, this is interesting. I think it's a little bit more complicated than that. Here's what I think they did And again, people will probably tell me what the comments if I'm wrong, but this is my understanding If you make every bad choice You are getting the bad ending. You can't convince sigurd to stay with you But I think if you make even one good choice You get that that last but the only choice is that they that they highlighted were the ones that I made the wrong Decision for the ones that they're not talking about that. I apparently made the right decision for I have no idea They are impacting this this ending because they don't mention it the the good or bad ending I just think it's also ludicrous that sigurd is chewing me out for For sleeping with his wife for punching him in the face and for not siding with him when he's giving a A punishment and then and then all I have to say is But please and he's like fine. Geez. I'll come back. That's kind of ridiculous Yeah, if you assume that I made one pro sigurd choice versus three other bad ones I shouldn't be able to get him to come back with me. All right. So here's what I see There are five choices in the game that affect what ending you get These are the sigurd choices if you make three choices against sigurd He will dislike you and leave england to go back to norway at the end of the game If you do the opposite and pick the choices in support of sigurd He will like you and stay with you in england at the end of the game What outcome you get only affects the final cutscene nothing else either way you still have access to everything So yeah, those choices are the prologue choice where you can either take the cargo or leave it behind The the ron v thing whether or not you punch sigurd whether or not you give dag is axe And lastly, yeah the holger judgment, but I made three bad choices. So why did I get the why was I able to get the good ending? It's also look at the end of the day It's very lame that those choices are what impact the ending for me Nothing about anything I did Otherwise with the alliances and whatnot just the sigurd stuff like is sigurd coming back with me the only thing that matters especially when He comes home and there's three arcs that I don't even talk to him in that's so ridiculous Your relationship with sigurd is the focus of the maybe first two arcs and then he disappears That is correct. That's so silly that like that is Oh these random ass fucking choices that oh, but by the way, I meant to mention this to you Ranvi does mention like the whole like hey does sigurd know about us stuff like there is some dialogue options about that So uh, you were curious. Oh, yeah, we talked for context guys, uh, tim and I talked about the ron v thing because I When I played this game, I I think I made every right choice for sigurd Because I just I knew from odyssey being that it's about a sibling that like And and the fact that the whole question is will will I betray sigurd? I was like, well, I'm sure the good ending is when I'm I'm good with sigurd and the bad ending is when I'm not So I'm just gonna do everything that's nice to sigurd and see what happens Which meant as as much as I might have liked to I did not romance The the best girl ron v I just I abstained I was I was the better man between tim and I Basically and I refused to cock my brother They make it so hard though to be on sigurd's side about anything there like they make it almost impossible Totally, it's like totally and and that's the thing too and that's what kind of Just sucks the the weight out of it is all right. So we go from moment one. Sigurd is the homie Moment two sigurd is an irredeemable asshole moment three. He's an even more irredeemable asshole moment four He's he's kind of fine now. He's all right by the time you're in horde of filki And he's taking you to the fucking tree of life. It's like none of the shitty things he did or said ever happened He's like avor. I'm sorry. I was such an asshole to you Let's see if I was telling the truth about it's all on avor's shoulders because it's like avor I can't believe you slept with my wife after I You know was a terrible brother to you this entire time, you know, it's like all on avor's shoulders Is if sigurd did nothing like that's that's so annoying how how sigurd could could call you ugly in Been pushing the ground spit in your and you have to just be like thanks sigurd and that's how you get the good ending Fuck off Yeah, that's a fair point Ultimately, yeah, if I actually cared about sigurd because the game didn't go out of its way to make me fucking hate him for a good majority of his meager screen time Maybe it would have been actually important to me That at the end of the game, I'm like, all right, sigurd. You're staying with me Instead he stays with me makes me the yarrow and I'm like well now I just live with this I didn't want him to come back with me But I also didn't feel like it'd be it would be right for me to leave him the fucking temple So it's like, oh, yeah, I was pitifully just like all right come back. Come on, please It's just Come on, buddy. We'll figure this shit out later. I guess it's also like it's just so absurd to me that like the good ending is The ending is not at all a consequence of any alliances that you made any decisions that you made within the No, and that's what's so Fucking ridiculous about the fact that you after this huge, you know modern day ending that feels so conclusive They have this whole other arc in hamptonshire And it's as if even if I did somehow care about the idea of pacifying england There was no way that final quest was going to be interesting to me after everything else like yeah, totally We've just had the sigurd plot resolved the modern day plot resolved Now this ending about we're gonna take on king alfred that shit just did not Matter to me and then I see okay soma dies. Well, I haven't talked to soma in 80 hours Hunwald dies Okay, I haven't talked to him in 50 hours I haven't talked to him in 50 hours. They were fine. They were fun characters But I it's not like watching blackbeard die and they try and emulate that with soma They give her a blackbeard moment and it's like I don't care. I don't care. I don't care Who are you? My favorite thing too is that at the end once you finish that arc You get a little pop-up that says congratulations Pacified england. Yeah, what a slap in the face I spent 80 hours doing that and you gave and you give me a little pop-up. Congrats. You pacified england I'm allied with everyone now. So what what was I actually working towards? I thought the whole goal of raven clan in england was to conquer england That's what they always talked about. We need these allies so that eventually sigurd can be the king of england We know that's not going to happen So that's another dramatic question of the story is that okay. Well clearly this gambit to To conquer england is going to fail because we know there's never been a king avor or a king sigurd, right? But instead they succeed but only kind of They succeed but but okay. Well instead of anyone being king instead of raven clan being the fucking capital of the the country Instead we're all just friends now really We're allied with everyone. Well, okay. Is everyone allied with everyone else Are are my allies friends with my other allies? Like what happens when two of my allies start fighting? Is england still pacified because it's gonna happen I have 20 allies. You think they're all gonna get along Yeah, I mean the whole like oh wow look at all my allies moment It's kind of pitiful because because it's a pop-up that says you have pacified fucking england You didn't get you you didn't make any choices to to get them the brit to come to this battle with you You just did what the game told you to yeah Like every everyone is going to have the same people there because you can't shoot between one region or another You can't make any choices within those arcs at all And like of course the ensuing batter really doesn't matter because what allies you bring to it doesn't matter soma's gonna die uh Hobgoblin's gonna die It's fucking whatever king alfred gets away go by the dlc you fuck fuck off. Just now uh One last battle to accomplish nothing One last battle i'm gonna i'll give my life and my friend's life for that pop-up that tells me i've pacified england Look, I think that the best approach for this game would have been You know give us the same arcs if you want and the same shitty stupid fuck off number of them But like give me you know give me two arcs right one right after the other where then I have to choose which one I ally with and You know repeat that process through the game so that eventually I only am allied with Half of the people and we have to fight the other half or we have to fight king alfred together And maybe those choices based on the the quality or strength of their leadership Or the sizes of their armies or other strategic considerations that I the player would have to think about Imagine that me playing an assassin's creed game and thinking about something. I know If that had to happen I could have actually given a shit about the ending of the that story I could have actually Felt invested in how did my choices pay off? What did this get for me at the end of the day? But this game really isn't interested in any creating anything meaningful. It is interested in stringing many many repetitive nauseating tasks That mostly revolve around the game's incredibly Fucking stupid combat system and and and all for the purpose of what well now the england's pacified we can we can wait Patiently for those dlcs where we go to fucking ireland or paris and we I don't know are we going to pacify that shit? Is that what's going to happen? Is that what we're supposed to care about? It's like gosh wouldn't it be cool if they just gave me a reason to care about anything in this game There's definitely like also I feel like a problem with they're just not being like a single antagonist I mean how could there be with a story this size, but you know king alfred I guess you could say is the Pregnant antagonist was a fun villain, but it's like enjoyed full case presence the fact that like you know Then she was gone. Okay conquering england whatever like that's the goal But if if the goal started to become like go kill king alfred or go take his crown Then you have a tangible goal That you can work towards But if I'm just trying to put my little raven sticker on on every region of the map then I'm just going there talking with new people and then I leave that's it That could potentially isolate me from other from other alliances if I'm like, yeah, I'm trying to kill king alfred and they're like Excuse me. Well, I don't really want to kill king alfred avor. It's a question of how well does this game achieve? What it was setting out to achieve does it capture the feeling the emotions the The game feel all of that that it was setting out to I think the answer is no, it's it's also just really just Shocking to me that in a game that's all about yeah, you better get those alliances You better go conquer england and that the end of the ending is actually all about if you punched your brother or not What the fuck? And you know what they couldn't have done an ending where it's like Hey, I I hope you got all the good alliances because you don't make any choices with the alliances They just happen You know, it's like yeah seeing soma show up at the end of the battle It's like great every other player had this happen Even if you fucked up with soma, even if you made the wrong choice you got one of the people she loves Most in the world to die. She still shows up with she still shows up And she's still gonna show up for you in the end of that battle and be like You know what's going down where we're homies for life me and avor Yeah, it's guys i'm starting i'm starting to feel like maybe vahal is not a very good game Yeah, I mean, I I know that you like black flag, but i'm still just over here Saying that revelations is the best darby story and we haven't gotten one like it since out It probably won't at this point. I mean, that's that's fair So here let me let me put a button on my whole experience with this game This is something that amuses me now Like I said, you know, I borrowed a save from travizo It allowed me to experience the modern day ending Then I killed the the few ancients that were left on his hierarchy And I went to go kill the I went to go track the final target and it just didn't work It was another game breaking bug that just I did not get to experience the ending to the hierarchy story I did eventually cave and watched it on youtube then as you know I was getting ready this morning and you know playing some vahala to try and just get back into the headspace Not that I've been gone from it for too long. It's a fucking hundreds plus hour game I've been playing it like it's my like my life depends on it for the last two weeks I heard on twitter that something really interesting and cool happened If you went to all the bureaus tim, do you know about this? No, I don't so if you go to all six bureaus and you collect all the codex pages And you bring them back to hyphen Something cool is supposed to happen. That's what I was told something something that was like a nice moment I heard maybe a particular voice actor was involved Maybe we're gonna get a you know a flash forward or a flash back of something interesting I was I was like, you know, I'm just I'm gonna get on to vahala Oh, no I'm gonna go to the last remaining bureaus I have to find And I'm gonna get this because maybe this will be the closest thing I get to An ending that I get to genuinely experience on my own save. So I do that. I go collect the pages I take them back to hyphen Hythem's like, hey, you know these the the writing in this kind of reminds me of you know that merchant boy redda Are you shitting me? He's holding. He's got a scrap of paper with some words on it. You might want to look at Oh, it gets worse. So I go over to to redda and he's like, oh, yeah, I was friends with this guy named bayek And I'm like, uh-huh. Oh, no No, no, no, no, just wait just wait I go to read the letter I press the triangle button read It's a letter That's it. It's just a letter. Now, let Let me be clear. I thought at this point I was going to hear bayek do a speech While i'm reading this letter And that that was going to be it. I'm just going to hear bayek But I don't even hear bayek. I'm just reading a letter and I'm going Well, hold on. What is so cool about this? Because it's bayek, dude. I I had to get here by reading Six codex pages some of which quote iya directly. How's this? Any cooler than that? So I'm a little suspicious at this point. I go, you know, what the fuck I google the the the shit on you I look it up on youtube and I go, is there supposed to be a bayek voiceover that i'm just not hearing Yes When you go to read the letter you're supposed to hear absy babsy abubakar salim Read the letter as bayek And that's what was supposed to be so fucking cool, but I couldn't even have that I couldn't even have that I couldn't hear in the game naturally by myself Bayek read the fucking letter. I had to read it with my eyeballs like a chump and that That is now the the third Ending of sorts that I was supposed to have in this game That I just that is broken in its own unique and special fucking way Fuck this game, you know just as a little aside Speaking about returning voice actors There's no fucking way that it doesn't there's no way that that's roger craig smith in the asgard section But where when when was roger craig smith in the asgard section? I'm saying there's no way that it was roger craig smith But they it was supposed to be is what i'm saying who what do you mean who? when they you go and Uh, griffle door to the fucking the guys the the she she has the big nearer. Yeah She's like prophet. Are you there and it's like who are you and it's supposed to be etzio It is who who are who are you i'm trying to do i'm trying to do how they do it That was that was supposed to be etzio Portal said anything to me. Yeah, it was like it like she says she says prophet, you know It's just and then it's like they like walk. She's like, uh, I guess he's not awake today And then you know in the net say I was like, who are you? Oh my god, you should have seen it. I want to I want to watch it on you. I'm trying to pull it up You should have seen it. I remember what you're talking about. There's no way that it's roger craig smith Though it's for you're saying it just isn't it just doesn't sound like him It's it it's like it's like if you were me did an etzio impression. It sounds better than the show you What's the chick's name? What's the what's the frost giant lady's name? She was kind of cute griffle door guan guandelor Gwen Gwen Gwillard door Let me look it up. It's like it's like Gwen Gwen Stefani Gwen pool I can't find her name anywhere playing as etzio an assassin's creed valhalla. I don't think so You have sex with her. You have sex with her apparently Yeah, anyway, so I mean who else who else who else would what is it supposed to be if it's at first because it Wait, what's up guys? Perfect hold on Who are you? All right, I'm it's totally etzio. It's supposed to be at least and I I remember hearing the voice and I was like Who was that supposed to be? And I I like went back and I tried to interact with the Portal hoping something interesting would happen If it really is just like roger craig smith saying who are you and like That was the best they could fucking do for that. I I kind of hate it because just leave etzio alone. Just leave him alone Leave him leave him there leave him in his assassin's creed prime. Okay. Okay gunloader gunloader. That's her name that yeah gunloader I thought she was kind of bad not gonna lie This is no profit in it. I leave them words Little packets of possibility waiting for unknown ears Many ages. Oh, you know what though? Okay, is that minerva? She literally is creating the messages for etzio to look at in acp We already knew that All right, I mean I gotta hear this etzio voice They speak of things to come I was not making the connection to to the fact that that's what minerva was doing But even I didn't realize gunloader was minerva until now. He cannot turn the tide of ragnarok Can you hear me? There you go. It happens. They walk away and it happens Yeah, that's not roger. That's not him. It's definitely supposed to be etzio. Yeah, you're right. It is We fit we answered the question. We hate it. Just leave etzio alone. Leave him alone Also, why did I feel like there should have been a moment now in like ac2 or something Where like just minerva just pops up for like one moment and then he's just like who are you? They never speak of it again. Yeah, he's like he's he's yeah, he's he's a fucking christina He's like he's like, who are you a friend? Oh my god, dude, I just that just I have to say this on the podcast though Asgard and yotenheim are the are the best thing about this game by far It's all that's all I need to say, you know, I hadn't been thinking that before But I have kind of come around to accepting That somehow it's like the most story relevant part of the game somehow more happens in asgard and yotenheim That actually builds towards a conclusion that actually You know creates plot information that's meaningful to me then the rest of the 60 70 hours of gameplay in england Yeah, totally somehow I initially was like no asgard was stupid. I didn't like it It didn't mean much but at the end of the day, you're completely correct. So Yeah, I guess the whole idea of asgard is that they're It's all the isu and there's just how he's interpreting and so that was minerva, you know juno was hero kin and the other chick was alethea and Yeah, that's fine That's fine You know, you know what it's fine. It's fine But even even just as like I kind of like it, you know indulging into like the north stuff and the in the asgard stuff like Just that on its own It's it's actually very palatable because I don't give a fuck about asgard stuff and I and I enjoyed the asgardian Stuff that was in there my frustration with the asgardian stuff is because I feel like that that there's something to the nature of myth That's like so random and strange that I just if it's hard for me to hold on to things like for sure Like okay now Loki's really upset because he banged a frost giant and they gave birth to a wolf And that shit just doesn't make sense to me. I'm like, why is he a wolf? And all the prophecy stuff like it's just all very kind of like It has the sensibilities of an actual myth which I appreciate about it But also makes me hard to actually care about the idea that havi is trying to Uh, is this arrogant bastard who's trying not to get got by the apocalypse You know, I didn't really like care that much whether or not he succeeded for instance. Yeah, it's fine. It was interesting I guess it was interesting. It was more interesting than most of Yeah, I gotta say too in terms of like the best like actually like oh, this is darby You know like cutscene is actually bassum around the fire with avor Yeah, like I felt like I felt like the performance was great Everything everything about that was great And it was like a little it was like a little glimpse into what this game could have been if it wasn't Unimaginably long and bloated darby does well with distinct Characterizations like he's he's always across all of his games good at making characters unique and interesting and likable Like that's something he can do in revelations with, you know Uh, sulamon and usuf that's something he can do in black flag with hornigold and vain and thatch And steed and certainly that element is present in vahala. There's certainly a lot more distinct characterization with you know Sigurd and dag and and some of the people he meets even soma and hunwald and haftan and Ivar all of them are very darby characters in that sense where it's not like you're playing odyssey or origins and it's like Fucking socrates or barnabas and they're just a bunch of fucking jokes or or origins where cleopatra and And fucking caesar are about as boring as you could possibly imagine They're they're recognizable distinct characters, but where where darby I think did not come through in this game was Creating a story with momentum and character arcs and stakes that actually mattered to me Uh, like he did in those other games I mean in black flag I cared about edward in revelations. I cared about etzio I just don't care about avor that way avor does not earn that level of Empathy and investment in the story I want to say that like a solution would have been like, oh, we'll just play a sigurd or or play his bassoon But really there was no reason why avor couldn't have seen these things happen It was just the inconsistency of the story that that made that happen The fact that you don't even speak to sigurd for like three arcs after he comes back to you kind of absurd who decided that like They should just make all the side content main content that they should just Make a game this long like who said in the creative process What if we had 24 memory sequences and they were all three hours long like what why did that happen? I don't feel like I got anything beneficial from that process I I really just felt like I enjoyed the story less if there was one thing that you're going to make me like few like playing through your story as a chore is to make it With all the essentials 80 fucking hours long Yeah, that is ridiculous in if I blew past the anomalies and asgard guess what I have no fucking context to go off of anything And if even yeah, that's the other thing I pointed this out on twitter and I should say this again here If you just miss the anomalies you don't do them or you decide not to do asgard You literally will not understand the ending of the game Now I can get the logic that someone working on this game would say well, that's all main content So you can't really be upset that you don't understand the story if you don't finish all the main content And I think that's probably why it's all main content so that there is an obligation That if you come out of the main story ending and you go this doesn't make a whole lot of sense That it would be partially your fault for not doing everything in the game But when so much of it feels so inessential Like if I can play a main arc in the game and have it be entirely throw away and add nothing to the plot How am I then supposed to believe that by fucking off to asgard or grabbing every mystery collectible that i'm gonna have a meaningful experience If you tell me your main content isn't really that good And then well, you should have done all the main content to understand the story It's like it's not my fault. That's not on me. But at the same time It really fucks the pacing that Yeah, I could reach the bassem revelation in the main story and never know about loki Or know about what the fucking isu people did and then I would just be going Who's whose son did what what son did avor kill? When did avor kill bassem's son and I can I already told you this if that had happened to me If I wasn't told by someone, thank you. Noah and staff 13 that I needed to go myth worlds followed by Anomalies followed by cigarette ending if no one told me to do that I would have blown through the main story seen that whole scene with bassem I mean, well just kidding. I wouldn't have seen it because my game would have still been broken But if I had I would have googled it I would have been like What what did I miss about bassem's son? Where did I miss that part? Yeah, and then when googling it I would have been spoiled On the asgard story. Let's just say hypothetically you played as bassem in this game I feel like you could have had like a would you kindly type ending where it's like Holy shit like avor is my mortal enemy somehow and you know speaking on that I do feel like there was the opportunity Especially with a lot of the asgard themes that were going around while you were there There was the opportunity to do like an overcoming of fate Kind of story here. Yeah avor like because avor has autonomy and avor is an actual person not just odin 2.0 She is able to overcome the fate of of having to die and betray sigurd and And even maybe to like betray loki Like there could have been an ending here where you Can can patch things up with with with loki in a way and And where you overcame your programming to betray sigurd I feel like that could have been a thing. I don't know how you feel to some extent It seems like they're not even trying to say that you could have overcome fate because what's funny is Even if you'd get the good ending and you never betray sigurd at all You'll still have this conversation where where avor is like, I guess in a way I did betray you By I don't know what it is. She says like second guessing your leadership or not letting you Have the glory and pursue the dream that you want And it's like that is the kind of mental gymnastics that that I see people do when they read a horoscope But they're like, oh well my horoscope says i'm gonna meet someone and then oh, I had a pleasant interaction with my barista at starbucks So I guess I kind of did meet someone like You're just retroactively Recontextualizing the events of your life to fit a prophecy that never existed or had any power. That's fine I was expecting the big emotional betrayal moment to happen I was waiting for it the whole game and I'm kind of glad it didn't because that would have just been too predictable But predictability isn't inherently bad if I'm seeing it coming There's a tragic irony to it that if they can make it so that when it happens I'm choosing to do it or I want to betray sigurd Then that's a little bit more interesting than if I'm forced to do it And I don't want to or or what have you but it's still just not something this game is really interested in doing That's what I was suspecting what was going to happen was that like You were bound by fate to betray sigurd somehow and then you overcome that and and choose not to or maybe choose to And then you become odin 2.0 and you're a jackass. I don't know It's it's it's also difficult for me too because The the bassem part of the historical story completely ends with him being a like a jackass and a villain So yeah, it's hard for me to then be like, oh, well, he's totally cool enhance him in the modern day now You know, so yeah, I understand that you needed bassem to stay in the temple forever but I don't know. I would have liked to see maybe like I don't know Maybe bassem fucking just realizes that his fucking life purpose of killing avor isn't actually what he wants And he just plugs himself into the fucking machine and stays there for eternity. I don't know can someone explain to me how the whole staff thing worked because So so is he just he's in the simulation and that's his corpse up there. It's super dead And he's just like all right release me from the machine He does when he falls. Yeah, he happens to so if if bassem's corpse Didn't land directly on the staff It would have been fucked when he had just stayed there dead Yes, his whole plan was to fall on the fucking staff in a position in a position He was hoping that layla dropped the staff to where he could fall on to it and use it That was his whole plan Because he basically did he was like, all right. I'm out of here. I hope I fall on the staff or else. This is all fucked Elithia the plan worked I also like now the implication that it doesn't just keep you young It actively makes you look like your young self which is inconsistent because again when you meet Pythagoras He's old as shit. I don't know if it's just the implication that No, it wouldn't it still wouldn't make sense It's not like Pythagoras found the staff when he was old So it kept him old because bassem didn't ever touch the staff and then he touched it as a corpse and it made him young Well, well, uh, but uh, Cassandra wasn't old and she had it right but Cassandra was young when she found yeah That's true. So my question is Why is Pythagoras a wrinkled ball sack holding the staff? Maybe he had it for a very I don't know. I don't know dude He only had it for 150 years and Cassandra still looks 23 when she brings it to leila in the present Thousands of years later. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Also. I don't I'm not convinced that I like leila at all So darby you're wrong Yeah, no, I don't think she's particularly. I don't think you made me like her She's not as actively unlikable as she was in odyssey Even though I appreciate that they said let's give it some apocalyptic stakes again because it definitely needed that shit I don't appreciate that it did that by saying Oh, you know that apocalypse we thwarted in 2012. It's back It's the it's the modern-day storytelling equivalent of when oscar isaac looks in the camera and says Somehow palpatine has returned. I thought you were going to say they fly now I don't know why I just thought that I I wasn't sure the correlation there, but They fly now All I'm saying to you lassen is for all we know she could have relinquished ownership of the staff and put it in the little box And then took the ownership back when she went into the cave. That's all I'm saying. Oh, that's possible. Anyway, I've been the hook Guys, thank you for going through this journey with us. If you love assassin's creed vahala. I'm I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry. We shout on the thing that you loved for the last Hour and whatever it ends up being we've been recording for almost two hours now. We'll see how it ends up actually coming out on the episode I Would like you to Say nice things about us in the comments and on twitter at hookblade It would be really nice if you did do it would it would be lovely if you did that It would be very pleasant delightful. It would really Really turn around the bad experience of having every single ending in vahal would be broken for me. Anyway Fuck ui soft. Fuck darby mcdevitt. Maybe assassin's creed vahala. Maybe the next Uh, maybe the next darby game won't be good They fly now Well, I've been the hook guys. It's just assassin's creeds over man. I've been the blade All right. Well, we will see you next week My parents have entered the room. Hello. All right. Well, we will see you next week