SECRETS, CULTS, AND BOARS

Catching Up With Assassin’s Creed

Well, I’ve never done a write up of my gaming nonsense, but I might as well start somewhere.  Got to get those writer fingers a-writing again.  As always, Spoilers abound.

Sparkles!

We start off in modern times, the two — archaeologist? women whose names I don’t remember are stepping into the portable maguffin machine that lets us travel back in time to see the memories of the olden times, as is the main conceit of Assassin’s Creed.  There’s a spear with two blood types on it and I get to choose which character I’m going to play.  I chose Alexios.  The other option is sister Kassandra.

So, stepping into the machine sends me to Greece and I awaken a mercenary, I guess, on this little island called Kefalonia or something.   It’s a place that everybody wants to get away from including me.  The first person I meet that is not trying to immediately kill me, if I remember is Phoebe, a fellow orphan who wants Zeus to bestow an eagle upon her just like my own eagle pal.  I want this too.  Make it happen, Z-man!   Obviously, since she seems attached to me, I am worried immediately for her continued safety.

Punching Sharks for Profit

  My other cohort is the dude who must have raised me, Markos.  He’s kind of a grifter type guy.  Like, he has big ideas and borrows money from shifty one eyed loan sharks called ‘Cyclops’, and the less said about the Cyclops’s eye, the better.   Let’s just say, I have a lot of goat pelts now.   

I spend the tutorial solving Markos’s Cyclops problem (which includes the amazingly terrible idea of stealing his fake eye) and punching sharks and priests who want to murder people because they maybe, might have the plague.  Whether this priest decision leads to Kefalonia’s viral downfall has yet to be seen.  During the course of all this, I meet a guy named Elpenor who I absolutely 100% do not trust right off the bat.  (He knows my name and is totally cool with me killing his own crew.)

I also meet Odessa, who is cool so far, but I choose not to flirt with her because she’s way too into being like her namesake and supposed relative Odysseus.  I recruit her to my ship later on after I help her dad though.  

Anyway, the game leads me to work for this Elpinor character, and he wants me to kill the Wolf of Sparta and bring him his head.  I don’t want to do this, because I do not trust this tool, but I guess I must.  

I rescue a boat guy whose name I can’t remember from the Cyclops and we sail off to other, non-sucky, islands.  I can now recruit people to my boat crew by knocking them unconscious.  (Some you can recruit via questing.  I did not KO Odessa for the record.  I also recruited a pirate woman whose crew got eaten by sharks in this manner.)

Revelations!

So, we learn in flashback form that the Wolf of Sparta (whose name I don’t remember) is my dad.  He used to teach me how to be a real Spartan.  I have a baby sister whom an Oracle told dear old Wolf Dad to throw off a cliff.  No!   My poor mom is crying and some dudes are holding us back, but I break free, try to save her, and in the process we are both thrown off the cliff.  And this is how I came to wash up on nowhere island to be cared for by Markos of the terrible ideas.

So maybe I will go after Wolf dad after all.

When I get to where the Spartans are warring with the Athenians I am met with —  my brother????   Okay, he’s the son that Wolf dad must have adopted after he threw all his kids off a cliff.  Bro doesn’t believe I’m Alexios because I should be dead, but I can go see the wolf if I help him defeat the Athenians and gain control of wherever the heck territory I’m on now.

I do that.

When I confront Wolfdad, I decide I’m not going to murder his ass & bring his head to Elpinor after all.  Like, I always end up trying to be as nice as a mercenary can be.   He also reveals that he is not my real dad and I have to ask my mom about it wherever she is.  I have to find her, but I am going to just assume I am a demi-god for now.

So, my two options are to go see the oracle at Delphi, or to meet up with Elpenor.  Obviously, I’m not down with Oracles after one’s vision got me cliffed.  My boat guy is down with it, though, and I just hate Elpinor more every passing moment.  I figure the Oracle can maybe give me some insight into this.

  That is how I failed a quest.  Elpinor doesn’t get his head, and the Oracle reveals that she is making shit up at the behest of a murder cult whose murder objective is my family in particular.  I can sneak into their lair if I steal the robes from a certain member–  Do you want to guess who it is?

  Yeah, it’s Elpinor.  I feel super vindicated!  Now we have reached the place where I started last night, more or less.

Ridin’ the Snake

I handily dispatch Elpinor, so now I don’t have to worry about his duplicitous ass anymore.  I forgot about Herodetos, my boat guy introduced me to him and told him way too many of my secrets for a stranger.  Him, I trust though.  We shall see how that turns out.  He goes with me to scope out this murder cult under Apollo’s temple.

I learn there that they are worshiping some kind of futuristic pyramid thing, and a bunch of other stuff I can’t recall.  I now have a bunch of cultists to end, and in my searching of their cult cave I find they are torturing the poor Oracle.  I can do nothing to save her though.  That is not sitting right with me, because I convinced her to talk to me about the murder cult.  Alas. 

When I return to the pyramid I am met face to face with my totally alive Sister.  She is now the cult’s main muscle and she knows there’s a traitor in the midst.  We all have to touch the pyramid now.  She sees our mingled memories when it is my turn.  I presume she knows I’m the thing that doesn’t belong, but she lets me go and kills some other dude instead.

Now that was something.  I decided to try and defeat the giant mega boar again to take my mind off this reveal, which doesn’t work at all.  I thought I might get to flirt with Daphnae, who gave me this pain in the butt quest, but alas.  We will never know, because this pig is not going down any time soon.

It is as tall as Alexios.  It will not die.

Now, since I lack the boar hunting gene, I decide to find some quests and level up.  There can’t possibly be any more world shattering reveals under this innocuous looking exclamation point in this little town.  I’m just going to have to fetch a thing, get some easy, peasy, xp–easies?  Let’s check it out.

What?  It’s a cute doctor!  Even better!

Just as expected, he sends me on a quest for some herbs.  Unexpectedly, I get to flirt with him.   Later, after fighting a pack of wolves for these stupid herbs, Lykaon (that is his name) suspiciously holds back some for his grandma and sends me on another quest to deliver the medicines to his patients.

All of whom tell me about how cute and single he is.  Okay, I get it town’s people.  Twist my arm.

Now, we learn about Lykaon’s dear grandma.  He wants to murder her because she is a former lying oracle that ruined lives by her lying.  I might just happen to be down with this plan if she’s the lady that told my Wolf dad to throw my sis off a cliff.  What do you think the odds are?  Unfortunately she’s been captured and must be rescued before we get to her.   I manage do this pretty easily and we find out that, yes, she is the one.

And she was lying to my Wolfdad about it, so nobody had to go over the cliff?  This snake cult has fully infiltrated Greece since way back then?  What is their game??  Why do they want to snuff out my fam?   I guess I will find out.

   Right now I am going to convince Lykaon to not kill his repentant grandma.  I know she did wrong in general and to my family specifically, but…   I can’t do it.   I don’t let him do it either.  We let grandma run away for now and instead make out under the stars and fade to black. 

How far will I travel next session?  Will I kill the boar?  Will I find my mom and find out Zeus visited her in the form of a ferret or something?  Will I dispatch some cultists?   Who knows.  Until next time!

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