Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is the twelfth major game in the Assassin’s Creed franchise from Ubisoft. The game was released to mostly positive reviews on November 10th, 2020. With the return of social stealth in addition to the new RPG mechanics of the Assassin’s Creed franchise, Ubisoft seems to have hit the jackpot here. However, poor seasonal content in The Yule festival and the River Raids made fans of the game disappointed as they were craving for more. Further, the first expansion of the game “Wrath of the Druids,” which was slated to release on April 29th, 2021, has been postponed now in order to “deliver a more refined experience.” In simple terms, the DLC was not ready by the 29th. Now, with the DLC coming up on May 13th, 2021, we bring you what to expect from it.
Story: What Ubisoft has given us till now is that Eivor will travel to Ireland and battle Druids and a cult called Children of Danu, which should be the substitute for Order of Ancients in this DLC. Based on this, we can be sure that Eivor would be traveling to Dublin, which was a battleground of supremacy between various factions of Vikings. So, Eivor must be pleading allegiance to a few of the factions as per the story. He/she might also encounter some important Viking figures from real life who fought battles in Dublin, such as Bárid Mac Ímair, whose brother was killed by Halfdan Ragnarsson who is a friend of Eivor, or Sichfrith Mac Ímair, who might be the son of Ivar Ragnarsson whom Eivor killed in the main campaign. He/she would be involved in helping one or many of them capture and develop Dublin, which the Norse people founded in real life. The Druids were powerful people during the Celtic times, and they were deemed to have mystical powers. The name Children of Danu might be referring to the “Tuatha Dé Danann” or Tribes of Danu, which is a cult of Druids who were the ancestors of Irish, and they were supposed to have mystical powers from their worship of the Goddess Danu. This would mean Goddess Danu was an Isu, and the Druids would have possession of powerful Isu artifacts and weapons against which Eivor could go up. In addition to Mjolnir, Gungnir, and Excalibur, we might also find new weapons of Isu as legend says that the Children of Danu had special weapons such as a sword which can cut through anything or a spear that never misses its mark. The story might also feature the Lia Fáil or the Stone of Destiny. The legend says that when the rightful King of Ireland keeps his feet on it, the stone wails or roars in joy. Again, this stone might be an Isu artifact that can fit into the story where there are already warring clans and a mystical cult! In the modern-day storyline, we can expect Loki/Basim to go into the Animus again to watch these happenings from Eivor’s point of view to find his son. However, we don’t expect anything else to happen on this front.
Gameplay: There should not be a major improvement in the Gameplay. However, Ubisoft has already dropped in new abilities into the game, which will help us battle powerful foes in the DLC. New bosses, even more difficult than the ones in the main campaign, can be expected, and even the normal soldiers would be slightly harder to beat than any average soldier from the main campaign. The reason for this should be that Eivor is now powerful and a seasoned warrior. He/she should be challenged now by others rather than everything to be a cakewalk. New maps will ensure that we have quite a few raids. Base building in Ireland is expected even though the size of the base should be probably smaller than Ravensthorpe. There would be new kinds of fish to catch in the rivers as well. New treasures, tattoos, probably hairstyles (old ones are boring now), books of knowledge, cursed artifacts, etc., are to be expected. However, new stories or side quests should be available, which will be exciting to play.
Last but not least, balancing the stones on top of one another should also be there and hopefully should be easier to finish than the ones in the main quest. We might also need to hunt down the Druids one by one in the Order of Ancients fashion by collecting clues about one another. In short, abundant side quests and a fairly lengthy campaign is expected.
Go for this DLC which is releasing on May 13th, 2021, if you loved playing as Eivor. The story should be interesting, and there should be at least 20-30 hours of content to play with. New cosmetics and weapons should also be exciting. Above all, the AC lore would continue in the DLCs, and you don’t wanna miss it! You can get the main game here! 🎮
Nikhil is an optimist who believes that tomorrow is always a better day. He is a nerd who loves books, games, comic books, and movies in the same order. He aspires to be an author of fiction someday.