Assassin's Creed Valhalla Creative Director Talks About the Game's Parkour

While we now know an awful lot about the upcoming video game Assassin's Creed Valhalla from Ubisoft, there is still plenty we don't know. After all, we've only really see a couple trailers and screenshots at this point, alongside some broad interviews. Thankfully, it would appear that the developers are keen to continue talking about it, even if only broadly. For example, Assassin's Creed Valhalla Creative Director Ashraf Ismail recently spoke with The Washington Post's Launcher team about the game, including the "gameplay" trailer response from fans, and revealed a little bit about the game's parkour design.

The thing to keep in mind here is, previous Assassin's Creed titles have typically made a core pillar of its gameplay around climbing stuff, jumping from those heights, and so on. The question is: for Valhalla, what, uh, does that even look like given its setting? Will people be climbing and jumping from a bunch of trees? What does movement like this look like in Valhalla? According to Ismail, it sounds like there will be explicit opportunities to showcase this sort of movement.

"When it comes to parkour, the big reflection with parkour, but also with stealth and with combat, with a lot of our core gameplay in this game was we needed to craft locations that make those elements shine," Ismail said. "So there's a lot of effort that's gone into the level design where we have developed explicit purpose into whatever location or area that we're trying to build to say, yes, you can run on the ground, and you can do whatever you need to maybe from the ground, but you know what? If you decide to go up, if you decide to be a predator from the top, you're going to see the value, see the advantage that you have."

Here is how Ubisoft describes the upcoming video game on its official website:

"Become Eivor, a mighty Viking raider and lead your clan from the harsh shores of Norway to a new home amid the lush farmlands of ninth-century England. Explore a beautiful, mysterious open world where you'll face brutal enemies, raid fortresses, build your clan's new settlement, and forge alliances to win glory and earn a place in Valhalla.

"England in the age of the Vikings is a fractured nation of petty lords and warring kingdoms. Beneath the chaos lies a rich and untamed land waiting for a new conqueror. Will it be you?"

Assassin's Creed Valhalla is set to release Holidays 2020 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and PC. One store listing indicated that folks can expect the video game to release in October, but that has yet to be confirmed. You can check out all of our previous coverage of the upcoming Assassin's Creed title right here.

What do you think of what we've seen of Assassin's Creed Valhalla so far? Are you interested to see more of its level design? Let us know in the comments, or hit me up directly on Twitter at @rollinbishop to talk all things gaming!