Assassin’s Creed Valhalla rings in its second year with a huge new addon. The DLC Dawn of Ragnarok brings its own open world and more.
Ubisoft famously loves patterns more than any mandala colouring enthusiast – and that’s why Assassin’s Creed Valhalla also firmly follows the template established by Origins and Odyssey over the years when it comes to its DLCs. On a larger scale, though. After the first year of DLC expansions focused on new historical open worlds – namely Ireland and Paris – Year 2 is devoted entirely to Norse mythology.
Like Origins’ DLC Curse of the Pharaohs and Odyssey’s Atlantis expansion, in Dawn of Ragnarok you’ll mainly be fighting fantasy creatures. And all this in a new open world with new enemies and an extensive campaign that should keep you busy for over 35 hours. Curious? Good, then let’s take a look.
What is Dawn of Ragnarok about?
If you haven’t played Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, you’d best lock yourself out now, because the new addon can’t be described without minimal story spoilers. All right. All gone? Yes? Good, then to the rest: glad you’re here.
In Dawn of Ragnarok you take on the role of Odin, Eivor’s alter ego, whom you already manoeuvred through the two worlds of Asgard and Jötunheim in the regular Valhalla campaign. So anyone who has played the main game knows the procedure: The real Eivor goes to the Seer’s hut, shuffles the guaranteed prescription elixir and dives into the realm of myths and legends. The cinematic trailer gives you a good insight:
In Dawn of Ragnarok you are transported to Svartalfheim (or Svartálfaheimr or Black Albenheim) or in short: to the realm of the dwarves. There, Eivor-Odin must stop a great threat – but in principle it means what it always means in Valhalla: an open world wants to be explored, monsters want to be defeated and treasures want to be captured. The environment, however, logically looks much more supernatural than Ireland or France:
What’s new in Dawn of Ragnarok?
The Open World of Dawn of Ragnarok is said to be about a third the size of England in the regular Valhalla – so it’s a pretty decent area. As already mentioned, the game time is just over 35 hours if you want to complete everything in the addon. To make sure you don’t get bored, there are also a few new features:
- New enemies: So far, we’ve seen new explosive fire enemies that blow themselves up when Eivor gets too close to them.
- New Arena: In the Arena of the Valkyries, you can test your combat skills against increasingly powerful foes to bag valuable loot.
- New Open World: Just for the sake of completeness, but of course the new Open World is the heart of the game experience. Coupled with this, there are of course also various new quests.
If you’re already licking your fingers for new details, it’s worth taking a look at the additional info on story, battles, game world, weapons or even abilities that dataminers have unearthed in the game. They have not yet been officially confirmed by Ubisoft (and should therefore be treated with caution), but they come from reliable sources.
The service idea behind the never-ending AC Valhalla also fits perfectly with Ubisoft’s grand plan to turn Assassin’s Creed into a living object that can be expanded over time with Infinitiy.
When will Dawn of Ragnarok be released?
You won’t have to wait much longer for Dawn of Ragnarok. It’s off to Svartalfheim as early as March 2022. We don’t yet know how much the DLC will cost and whether there will be another Season Pass. Until then, you can bridge the gap with the crossover DLC Interwoven Stories.
What’s the Crossover about?
The in-game event is coming as early as 14 December and delivers two new storylines – for AC Valhalla and the 2018 release AC Odyssey. The update is free if you own the respective game.
While Those Who Are Treasured focuses on the hunt for more Isu artefacts in Odyssey as Kassandra or Alexios, Eivor meets our former main character Kassandra in A Fated Encounter as part of the Valhalla storyline. The two work together to prevent an Eden artefact from destroying the Isle of Skye location in Scotland.
In Odyssey, you need to have completed Chapter 1 for the content, while in Valhalla you need the seer Valka and level 4 at the settlement.
