Assassin's Creed Odyssey - It's time to Greek out

[TheWombat]

And here everyone is saying they are boring and too long. D:

I only got through part of the Elysium stuff. It was MOTS, and fun enough in some ways, but by that point I was burning out on it all. And it seemed, well, narratively pointless, which normally I don’t care about, but this was particularly egregiously bland.

[Grifman]

Ugh I was hoping the Atlantis dlcs would be a good tight narrative experience that flesh out the main character more, like how Origins dlc’s were for Bayek.

And here everyone is saying they are boring and too long. D:

I loved the game, and I even love the First Blades DLC, but I dropped out during the first chapter of Elysium/Atlantis. I preferred the “real world” rather than the fantasy one, and as others have noted, it was just too much MOTS. It really felt bloated, and the story just wasn’t as interesting.

[ChiTownBluesFan]

I actually liked the second one (Odyssey’s version of Hell), since you get to interact with some of the characters from the main game. One character in particular.

[wilykat]

That post makes me think about how much more interesting Odyssey would have been if the fort takeovers fed into a meta-layer (instead of just gating a meaningless battle that changes fuck-all in a conflict it’s not interested in exploring).

I always meant to go back and see if something happened if you helped one side take over the entire map. By the time I was ready to consider that I was pretty done with the game though. It doesn’t do anything special, does it? Someone out there must have tried it.

[Telefrog]

The map takeover stuff does nothing special. It gets you some XP and loot at the end of the battles, but it doesn’t influence the game in any mechanical way.

[TheWombat]

Well, the real war sort of petered out with Sparta more or less on top, but with little to show for it other than a period of slow decline of the Greeks and the eventual rise of the Macedonians. In the end, maybe Ubi’s meaningless push-pull area control mechanic winds up being an accurate simulation!

[JoshoB]

Well, the real war sort of petered out with Sparta more or less on top, but with little to show for it other than a period of slow decline of the Greeks and the eventual rise of the Macedonians.

The narrative about Greece’s “slow decline” has come about simply because Thucydides – ostensibly the greatest of the Greek historians as per nineteenth-century discourse – didn’t write about the fourth century BC (because he was dead). Arguably, the Greek city-states were more prosperous than ever in the fourth century BC. Athens did better than ever. The “rise” of the Macedonians was Philip II deciding at one point to annex (most of) the city-states and modern historians shifting their perspective to what he (and Alexander) got up to, then reinterpreting the period after the Peloponnesian War in this strictly teleological light. There was no slow rise on the part of the Macedon nor a steady decline on the part of the Greek cities.

Culturally speaking, Classical Greece reached its pinnacle in the fourth century BC.

[Enidigm]

(because he was dead)

This is no excuse. Stop slacking Thucydides and die later!

[ooomalley]

I’m only maybe 2/3 of the way through, but I was hoping there would be more coverage of (or at least insinuation about) the Persians playing Athens and Sparta against each other. I guess the cult kind of took on that role.

[mrcjhicks]

Ugh I was hoping the Atlantis dlcs would be a good tight narrative experience that flesh out the main character more, like how Origins dlc’s were for Bayek.

And here everyone is saying they are boring and too long. D:

The Atlantis dlcs were my favorite part of the game as a whole. I skipped First Blades, though. I liked the mythological stuff in Odyssey more than I liked the main story, which I found to be a drag.

[JoshoB]

Just to be absolute sure, I was being sarcastic. Thucydides’ reputation as a historian is no doubt severely overestimated (cue those 19th century scholars, equally and fortunately as dead as the middling Athenian admiral), just as Xenophon is horrendously underestimated in modern scholarship. Xenophon, BTW, is worth reading if you’re interested in the history of the (first few decades of the) fourth century BC.

[divedivedive]

People had much cooler names back then.

[Papageno]

“Xenophon” --does that work out to be “foreign-language speaker”?

[TheWombat]

The narrative about Greece’s “slow decline” has come about simply because Thucydides – ostensibly the greatest of the Greek historians as per nineteenth-century discourse – didn’t write about the fourth century BC (because he was dead). Arguably, the Greek city-states were more prosperous than ever in the fourth century BC. Athens did better than ever. The “rise” of the Macedonians was Philip II deciding at one point to annex (most of) the city-states and modern historians shifting their perspective to what he (and Alexander) got up to, then reinterpreting the period after the Peloponnesian War in this strictly teleological light. There was no slow rise on the part of the Macedon nor a steady decline on the part of the Greek cities.

Culturally speaking, Classical Greece reached its pinnacle in the fourth century BC.

Interesting. Not my area of specialty at all, so I’m glad we have someone for whom it is. I always thought of the war in terms of a sort of less than satisfactory victory for Sparta, and I never really hear much about Athens after that (though that might be as you say because of the lack of an enthusiastic chronicler).

[JoshoB]

“Xenophon” --does that work out to be “foreign-language speaker”?

More: “strange sound”.

Xenophon gets short shrift by modern scholars, as this tumblr of a friend of mine (who is actually the expert when it comes to Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC!) documents. But that wasn’t always the case, as evidenced by the fact that he’s the only Greek author from the ancient world whose entire body of work has survived to the present day. And all of those books are well worth reading, including the Hellenika, his follow-up to Thucydides’ (unfinished) history. He was also an experienced military man, who had led an army of Greek mercenaries back from behind enemy (Persian) lines – the story is told in his Anabasis.

I always thought of the war in terms of a sort of less than satisfactory victory for Sparta, and I never really hear much about Athens after that (though that might be as you say because of the lack of an enthusiastic chronicler).

Oh, for the Spartans it felt like a decisive victory, and no doubt for the Athenians it was a grievous defeat. After all, the Athenians being forced to disband the Delian League and tearing down their Long Walls. (Of course, the Athenians almost immediately set about rebuilding the walls and later founded a new Delian League.) Also, the Persians continued to meddle heavily in Greek affairs, pitting city-states against each other by first favouring one, then another; something they had a great deal of experience in.

Athens continued to play an important role as a cultural centre, which was to become even larger during the Hellenistic period and after Greece had been absorbed the Roman Empire (by contrast, Sparta dwindled and became an ancient tourist attraction). The fourth century, especially the period ca. 400-350 BC, was, among other things, the Age of Plato – I actually used that to build an entire issue of Ancient History around it back when I was still that magazine’s editor.

[Soma]

That post makes me think about how much more interesting Odyssey would have been if the fort takeovers fed into a meta-layer (instead of just gating a meaningless battle that changes fuck-all in a conflict it’s not interested in exploring).

I actually like the fort takeover. It is like base take over in Metal Gear Solid 5, but easier (sometimes too easy). It showcases the combat mechanics in ACO: you can sneak, fight or snipe your way in, or a combination of above.

If it is fun, I don’t mind more-of-the-same. (Oops I used the eff word.)

[TheWombat]

The fourth century, especially the period ca. 400-350 BC, was, among other things, the Age of Plato

I’ve worked with Republic a bit, in teaching a first-year gen ed class, but am by no means any sort of authority on it. It always seemed to me that Plato (and Socrates, it’s hard to tell which voice your getting sometimes) was rather down on Athens and Athenian democracy. In much of Republic, he comes across as somewhat sympathetic to the Spartans, or at least to some of their world view. He certainly doesn’t seem to be very enamored of democracy, Athenian or otherwise.

[Grifman]

I’m only maybe 2/3 of the way through, but I was hoping there would be more coverage of (or at least insinuation about) the Persians playing Athens and Sparta against each other. I guess the cult kind of took on that role.

That is a part of the First Blades DLC,which I found interesting and fun.

[JoshoB]

It always seemed to me that Plato (and Socrates, it’s hard to tell which voice your getting sometimes) was rather down on Athens and Athenian democracy. In much of Republic, he comes across as somewhat sympathetic to the Spartans, or at least to some of their world view.

Aristocrats/rich people didn’t (and don’t) like democracy, no. Plato, Xenophon, and (nearly) everyone else whose writings have survived from ancient times were part of the elite who, of course, preferred to disenfranchise as many people from outside their own little clique as possible. “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.”

[divedivedive]

Well, Plato’s ideal (ha, see what I did there) form of government was rule under the wise hand of the philosopher king, so sure.