I’m really loving Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, even if it took me a while to get to it. One of the features that is unexpectedly enhancing the game for me is being able to see all the pictures other people are taking with photo mode.
When it comes to games, I usually know what I don’t want to experience: Other people. When I first open a video game, I tend to turn off all the features that would alert me to the existence of other players. For the most part I only use photo mode to take screenshots to use in articles, such as this one:
Last night when I was tooling around in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey before bed, I accidentally hit the controller button that turns on pictures other people have taken. When you’re on the map, you have the option to display the photos you’ve taken, the ones your friends have taken, everyone’s photos, or no photos.
I usually stick with that last option, but as I scrolled through strangers’ photos, it kinda blew my mind. My first thought was, “There’s so much of this game I haven’t seen.” My second: “Holy crap, I want to go to all these places.”
More than just showing me a quest in a far off land, a picture — especially one that another player took of something beautiful, interesting or just funny — motivates me to actually visit that place.
Seeing pictures of other people’s Kassandra or Alexios standing atop the mast of their ships made me want to get back on my boat. Seeing other people’s pictures of sweeping vistas or sunsets made me want to look for my own.
I also stumbled on a picture from Kotaku video producer Paul Tamayo — his assassin was doing a leap of faith, the camera angled so that it looked as though he was diving into a pool of stars.
This feature turns the game into a travelogue. The game even has an Instagram-esque feature where players can “like” others’ pictures, and the total number of likes on that picture is displayed.
I like the idea that someone, maybe far away from me, is getting a little token of appreciation for their photography skills. It makes me excited to post my own pictures and see which ones other players like best.
Assassin’s Creed Odyssey does a lot to make me feel as though I’m really uncovering a world bit by bit. Part of that is showing me what other players have discovered, tracking their progress through the game at the same time as I make my own way through it.
Playing video games can be a lonely experience. And it’s nice to be able to know that there are hundreds of thousands of people out there playing this game at the same time. Even if we’ll never meet, we can share a tiny bit of this experience through our photos.
Comments
9 responses to “Other Player’s Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Photos Inspire Me To See Its World”
while I like the photo feature, I think it needs some fixes to make it better.
1. most important, have the vantage point icon be always on top of everything else
2. have a storyline chapter block for photos so it cannot spoiler some locations and gameplay
3. or have a location block for photos so it cannot spoiler some locations
1. most important, have the vantage point icon be always on top of everything else
This!!! There are morons out there that put a photo right on top of the fast travel / sync points, making it almost impossible to fast travel without disabling photos on the map.
with a few thousand likes on each of the bastards
In Origins I remember taking a few photos of the topless women and cats.
Are there still cats in Odyssey?
I’ve seen a few cats. Not as common as Origins, but some of the Greek islands have big cat populations.
Yes on cats no on boobs. Obviously those Egyptians knew how to party
The mystery for me is how there are some of the most mundane pictures you’ll ever see getting upvoted like crazy, while some really nice artistic shots with obvious care taken sit on like 1 upvote.
I found the same thing in Origins. Its a mystery how the images are moderated. I don’t think my shots ever got a like… they weren’t *that* bad 🙁
Alot of the time they are/were amongst the first people to get to those locations. So the likelihood pf them showing up in other peoples games is huge.
I’m kinda getting over origins at the moment. I don’t really like the characters much, so the story isn’t pulling me along. I like the direction the games are taking, and I hope they eventually ditch the modern day stuff, but I still struggle to like any of the stories they have to tell. What’s the story like in odyssey?