Instigator / Pro
7
1266
rating
119
debates
15.97%
won
Topic
#160

Assassin's Creed Odyssey is the best game of 2018

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
0
6
Better sources
4
4
Better legibility
2
2
Better conduct
1
2

After 2 votes and with 7 points ahead, the winner is...

Imabench
Tags
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
Three days
Max argument characters
30,000
Voting period
One week
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
14
1485
rating
6
debates
50.0%
won
Description

No information

Round 1
Pro
#1
Just to be clear, I don't give a fuck about popular opinions and what reviewers have to say. I want to see real arguments, not appeals to popularity or what some critic who may or may not be payed off by this or that company has to say. If I remember correctly you are the one who relied entirely on ratings when debating about the OT vs prequel trilogy of Star Wars, if that is how you want to approach things you may as well say Lil Wayne is better at music than Mozart because he's more popular.
That aside, There are a few good reasons I can think of why Odyssey is the best game so far of 2018 off the top of my head. It offers a vast and detailed open world in which you get to explore a virtual ancient greece, which in itself makes it a unique and fascinating experience. But on top of that, it also surpassed my expectations (and the expectations of many AC fans) in a very crucial way. They did not entirely butcher or ignore the story opportunities, they took advantage of them to a fairly decent extent, shedding light on the origin of the Templar order among other things. Odyssey is not the best RPG game by any means and it's not the best AC game, but by mixing RPG elements with a relatively elaborate open world and other key gameplay features such as naval combat, it is one of the most diverse and engaging games of 2018 and in my opinion it is the best game of the year. In a gaming market saturated with cookie cutter shooting games, ACO is a breath of fresh air, it gives you things to explore which are relevant not only to a fictional world but the real world as well, rather than merely offering you waves of enemies to shoot. ACO has it's weak points and is lacking in many areas, but considering all of the elements it has to offer, there is not a single game in 2018 that can drain my time and my life force like ACO.
Con
#2
I don't give a fuck about popular opinions and what reviewers have to say.  I want to see real arguments...
Lol. Bold strategy to claim that the opinions of people are largely unimportant and irrelevant considering that your entire argument is based entirely off nothing except your own opinion, but best of luck either way. 

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Pro's opening argument boils down to two main points. The first is that it has an interesting open-world design, and the other is that it blends story, RPG elements, and its open world together very nicely. These are hardly arguments to begin with and are more long the lines of pure opinion, opinions being that very thing Pro says right from the beginning that people shouldn't care about. 

I'll split my counter arguments into two types of arguments. The first is a selection of games that are superior to Assassins Creed Odyssey, the other are arguments focused against Assassins Creed Odyssey. 

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A1) Games better than Assassins Creed Odyssey

Pro's opening arguments about ACO themselves make huge concessions to the idea that ACO is not the best game of 2018. 


"They did not entirely butcher or ignore the story opportunities, they took advantage of them to a fairly decent extent"

"Odyssey is not the best RPG game by any means and it's not the best AC game"

"ACO has it's weak points and is lacking in many areas"
So what are some other games released in 2018 that are arguably superior to ASO? There are a bunch of different candidates depending on the metric you use, but if you want to weigh games based on how many titles are sold (Demonstrating how much the community as a whole likes the games, rather than game reviewers and critics), then several candidates emerge:

 - 1 - God of War 4

If you want to look for a game that directly contests the 'arguments' pro makes for Odyssey, then look no further than God of War 4.... A bit of a linear game with similar RPG elements and unique location (Norse mythology), God of War 4's narrative and characters received universal praise from everyone [1], in comparison to ACO where Pro admits that the game only takes advantage of story opportunities to a 'decent extent'.... Unlike other criticisms against Odyssey for being too centered around microtransactions and grinding to advance the story along [2], God of War received almost no criticisms from reviewers or gamers alike, making it one of the strongest Game of the Year candidates for 2018.... The sales also back up the pedigree of God of War 4, As the game was the #1 highest selling game upon release by all metrics DESPITE the fact that it was a Playstation exclusive [3]

So for a game to have many of the same elements as Odyssey (RPG, Unique World), while also being better than Odyssey in several metrics (Story, characters, grinding and microtransactions) while also breaking sales records DESPITE being available only on Playstation, God of War 4 has a much stronger claim to be the 2018 Game of the Year based on these stats alone, and thats not even considering the fact that critics universally praised the game more than people did for Odyssey. 


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 - 2 - Spiderman

Superhero games have not always been particularly good or successful. All you have to do is ask someone to name a non-Arkham superhero game that was memorable to get them to scratch their heads. When Spiderman came out earlier this year, it was hailed as one of the best superhero games ever made, and the reception it has garnered puts it in contention for game of the year. 

Literally open world since its a Spiderman game, Spiderman 2018 received exceptional praise for the design of New York City (open world), its gameplay and mechanics (RPG), its characterizations and narration (Story elements) as well as setting several sales records upon release despite also being a Playstation exclusive[1]. For many of the same elements that Pro talked about regarding Odyssey, Spiderman 2018 was equally dazzling in the same categories, while exceeding Odyssey in other areas Pro admits Odyssey performed weakly at. Sony, the company behind the game, saw the game actually BEAT OUT GOD OF WAR 4 in terms of sales during its opening week [2], meaning that Spiderman has a legitimate claim to be the best game of the year, not just better than Odyssey. 

So while Odyssey isn't even the best Assassins Creed game by Pro's own admission, let alone the best RPG game, Spiderman has arguably become the defining game of the superhero genre, meaning it stands at the top of the category is made for whereas Odyssey doesn't


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 - 3 - Monster Hunter World

If you want to examine a game being exceptionally well crafted that you cant attribute its success to having a built in fanbase, then Monster Hunter World is your 'wild card' candidate for best gae of 2018.... While other games on this list including Odyssey itself have built their popularity on fanbases over years by being the third, fourth, or even seventh sequel in a franchise, Monster Hunter World by Capcom is not largely known outside of Japan. Despite that, the game broke several records in terms of sales, was universally praised, and made a killing in western markets like the US and UK where in the past the franchise was relatively unknown. While other games that are gems of the gaming world could attribute part of their success to being part of a franchise, Monster Hunter World went almost from 0 to 100, which is an incredible feat itself....

Monster Hunter World sold 5 million copies in 3 days [1] which is well over the 3.3 million that Spiderman sold in its first 3 days [2], and thats a game built off of the biggest pre-existing fanbase in the world: The Marvel Cinematic Universe! For games on this list, only God of War 4 has sold more games, and the God of War franchise had a much larger built-in fanbase than Monster Hunter ever did [3]. As for the game itself, critics praised how it retained its core functions while expanding its world and accessibility to new markets in the west, which is something that no other game on this list has been able to replicate. Monster Hunter World is the only game on this list that arose from virtual obscurity to becoming one of the best games of 2018, while other games such as Assassins Creed Odyssey had to repeatedly craft its games to reach new heights, and could bank on a pre-existing fanbase all along the way. 


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 - 4 - Red Dead Redemption 2

Red Dead Redemption 2 on this list is interesting because the game technically hasn't even been released yet, but everyone still assumes it will likely be one of the best games of the year. Based on gameplay trailers alone and the greatness that was the first Red Dead Redemption game, it will be a masterpiece of an RPG game set in an uncommon yet beautiful open world setting (the American West) with fantastical story elements that rivals that of any other game on this list.... The game hasn't been released yet, but there are already indications that the game will probably be the best of the year based on the following events:

A) Simply by changing its social media logo's to the color themes associated with Red Dead Redemption, the stock of the company behind the new game increased 6% https://www.businessinsider.com/take-two-interactive-stock-explodes-red-dead-redemption-2-2016-10

B) The game is still expected to outsell games that have already been released such as Black Ops 4, Battlefield 5, Far Cry 5, and NBA 2k19 despite the fact that there will only be 2 months left in the year of 2018: https://gamerant.com/red-dead-redemption-2-best-selling-game-2018/

C) Early reactions to the game all praise the game as "Groundbreaking", "Unprecedented", "Something very special", "Like nothing we've played before", "likely to be one of the biggest games in several years", "I'm ready to kiss goodbye to the end of 2018",  "If the opening hours of Red Dead Redemption 2 are any indication, is a bar-raising effort that will be remembered long after this console generation ends"

If any game is going to be the best game of 2018, the title may go to the game that hasn't been released yet that EVERYONE who is a true gamer knows about. No other game except Grand Theft Auto 5 has had this much anticipation and hype leading up to its release, and that game was truly great, and Red Dead Redemption 2 is made by the same company. 

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 - 5 - Forza Horizon 4

If Racing games are your thing, then Forza Horizon 4 did for the racing genre what Pro admits Odyssey FAILED to do for RPG games. While Pro concedes that Odyssey is not the best RPG game, which it's kind of meant to be, Forza Horizon 4 is meant to be a racing game, and is regarded as one of the best ones ever [1]. It has garnered reviews and praise similar to that of any other game, and did so in spite of it being a racing game rather than any of the far more popular genres that most games try to aim for these days. If Odyssey isn't even the best RPG game by Pro's own admission, while Forza is the best racing game to come out this year and is receiving praise comparable to other types of more popular games, than one can argue that it is the best game of 2018, since it manages to stand shoulder to shoulder with other titles that do not have the genre handicap of being a racing game.  


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 - 6 - Far Cry 5

The Number 1 video game in terms of overall sales in the year 2018 [1], Far Cry 5 is made by the same company that made Assassins Creed Odyssey (Ubisoft). Its release holds the record for second biggest launch in the history of Ubisoft, earning the company over $300 million within the first WEEK [2]. It has an extensive open-world setting not normally explored in other games, with only its story and characters attracting criticism from reviewers. The parallels between this game and Assassins Creed Odyssey are very close together, but considering that Far Cry 5 has undeniable sale numbers while Odyssey is factoring in revenue gained from microtransactions into its total sales [3], Far Cry 5 seems to be a step above Odyssey. 

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There are many games that are the best of their kind or do things better than Assassin Creed Odyssey does them. Then there are games not even released yet that are already lauded by people as an industry-changing event. If Assassin's Creed Odyssey is not even the best at any one category of gaming, its completely illogical to conclude that it is somehow better than all other games that came out in 2018, especially when there are games that outperform better in certain areas that Pro admits Odyssey only does half decent with. 

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The previous arguments highlighted games that are/likely will be better games than Assassins Creed Odyssey. These next arguments focus specifically on why Assassins Creed Odyssey is not the best game of the year. 

2A - "Vast and Detailed Open Worlds" are not that unique anymore...

Pro proclaims that Odyssey's setting in Ancient Greece is unique and fascinating, but there have been other games with other open worlds set in unique locations as well. Ubisoft themselves are known for putting out a ton of sandbox games, including but not limited to Smallpox infested NYC (The Division), Futuristic Chicago (Watch Dogs), Futuristic San Francisco (Watch Dogs 2), The land of Ashfeld which is home to vikings, ninjas, and medieval knights (For Honor), Rural Montana (Far Cry 5), and even ancient Egypt (Assassins Creed Origins)..... Thats JUST the games made by Ubisoft which owns the Assassins Creed franchise. If you look at other video game companies, you also get open worlds in Norse mythology (God of War 4), the wild west (Red Dead Redemption), Magical medieval earth (Skyrim, Lord of the Rings), post apocalypse (Fallout), and fantasy worlds built entirely from scratch (Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Metal Gear Solid)

The point is, open world settings are just not that unique or impressive anymore. Open worlds have been built into just about every setting imaginable, including ancient Greece as well, where most of the God of War games have taken place.... To credit Assassins Creed Odyssey as being the best game of the year for having a vast and detailed open world is about as credible as crediting Fallout 4 as the best game of 2015 simply because the character design options are really in depth.... Those features are all basically built in to AAA games these days, its nothing special.



2B - "They did not entirely butcher or ignore the story opportunities, they took advantage of them to a fairly decent extent"

Having a 'decent' story or at least not 'butchering or ignoring' story opportunities does not make a game the best of the year. If story and character development is the biggest decider of a game of the year, then games more centered around action-adventures like God of War 4 have a leg up over open world RPGs that are built more for players being able to do whatever they want.... In fact, the biggest criticisms of Odyssey was the grinding and micro-transactions that exist within the game which make it uneven and difficult for players to stay immersed in the story, because instead of following the story along you have to periodically take hours of time off to do other things just to keep going. 

One of the biggest weak spots of Assassins Creed Odyssey is its narrative form and character construction. By Pro's own admission it was only used 'fairly decently', which in a world where other video games go far and away in telling gripping narratives means that Odyssey simply does not have the objective qualifications to be considered the best game of the year. 



2C - "Odyssey is not the best RPG game by any means and it's not the best AC game"
If its not the best story telling game, and its not the best character construction game, and now its not even the best RPG game or the best Assassins Creed game, then what is left? A game of the year isn't something whose individual qualities don't stand out in any way at all, but then suddenly when combined together turn it into something that is somehow better than everything else, especially when other games do many of the same things Assassins Creed Odyssey does just as well or even better in the first place. Pro fails to make a single point about what Odyssey excels exceptionally well at, and instead argues that because it does a bunch of different things half-decent, that somehow qualifies it as the best of the year.... Objectively it doesnt



2D) - Odyssey is just a re-skinned version of Origins with some gameplay tweaks

Assassins Creed Odyssey was released about a year after the last Assassins Creed game to come out: Origins. Like Odyssey, Origins is also set in an ancient world (Egypt) and is basically designed the entirely same way as how Odyssey ended up. Movement is the same, tactics are the same, the graphical assets, UI, combat, and inventory system are all identical....  


The biggest change made from Origins to Odyssey is that Odyssey is more RPG than Assassins Creed has ever been before. Besides that, its essentially a reskinned version of Origins. Pro laments that there is a saturation of cookie-cutter types of games cranked out one right after the other, making it incredibly ironic since Odyssey is dangerously close to being a copy pasted cookie-cutter version of the Assassins Creed game that came out just one year earlier: Origins. 
Round 2
Pro
#3
Lol. Bold strategy to claim that the opinions of people are largely unimportant and irrelevant considering that your entire argument is based entirely off nothing except your own opinion, but best of luck either way. 
I don't mind you using your own opinions or the opinions of others to bolster a point, what I don't give a fuck about is what the majority thinks, how well the sales did or what payed critics think. Popularity has nothing to do with quality.

Pro's opening argument boils down to two main points. The first is that it has an interesting open-world design, and the other is that it blends story, RPG elements, and its open world together very nicely. These are hardly arguments to begin with and are more long the lines of pure opinion, opinions being that very thing Pro says right from the beginning that people shouldn't care about. 
I'm talking about the quality of the game, not merely spitting out statistics about how well it sells or how popular it is.

Pro's opening arguments about ACO themselves make huge concessions to the idea that ACO is not the best game of 2018. 
I'm merely acknowledging that it's by no means a perfect game. My point is that while it does many things averagely it's the combination of everything it has to offer which makes it stand out as a diverse and engaging game.
if you want to weigh games based on how many titles are sold (Demonstrating how much the community as a whole likes the games
How many times do I have to tell you that this has no bearing? By this very same standard Justin Bieber is a musical genius and Oprah is a wise and insightful person. Both of those things are the exact opposite of the truth, by the way. 
The fact of the matter is popular things are absolute trash in a vast number of cases.
God of War 4
One thing that God of War lacks that ACO has is traversability i.e par cour mechanics and an open world type world structure. It is the type of game with invisible walls you might bump into from time to time whereas in ACO you can go anywhere and climb anything. Also GoW Has an interesting setting but it is almost entirely fictional whereas in AC you can literally explore a virtual representation of ancient greece.
Spiderman
Spiderman has pretty much no RPG elements just for the record. It's a good game, but exploring NY city is just not fascinating like ancient greece, and it lacks the spectrum of gameplay elements that ACO has.  By your own admission super hero games tend to suck, AC on the other hand is a legendary franchise. Being the best of a shitty genre does not make it better than a good game from a great genre. 
Monster Hunter World
All of your arguments for this one revolve around sales. Once again that is completely irrelevant to me and anyone with a brain. Jake Paul is a great rapper because he got a lot of views, right?

Since all of your arguments revolve around a similar appeal to popularity fallacy, I am just going to leave it at this. Hopefully in the next round you make more actual arguments.

Con
#4
what I don't give a fuck about is what the majority thinks, how well the sales did or what payed critics think
By refusing to agree to any sort of metric to analyze games outside of his own personal opinion, Pro essentially concedes any and every argument made so far in the debate. If the quality of a video game cannot be evaluated based on the collective opinions of actual game critics, nor by the number of sales or profit the video games make, then there is no other quantitative metric to judge the quality of video games. 

For this reason, voters should immediately award argument and source points to con since pro only recognizes his own opinions as valid arguments, which is simply not the case. 



I'm talking about the quality of the game, not merely spitting out statistics about how well it sells or how popular it is.
How many copies a game sells and what the collection of professional reviews of the game are hold greater authority on the quality of a game than just your own opinion. The better performances in terms of sales of other games in comparison to Odyssey, along with the consensus about where the game falters by game critics, indicates that Odyssey is not the best game of 2018. The only reason you try to dismiss professional critics and sales terms as valid arguments is because they completely negate your 'arguments' that Odyssey is the best game of 2018. 



My point is that while it does many things averagely it's the combination of everything it has to offer which makes it stand out
1) Doing a number of things averagely does not somehow equate to being the best game of the year, that 'logic' in of itself is purely nonsensical

2) Other games listed in the previous rounds have done the very things that you admit Odyssey only did averagely on a much better scale, which you do not dispute, and based on your very 'reasoning' would make those games superior and better candidates for best game of the year. 



1) God of War 4

Pro's main argument is that God of War lacks the open world setting. Because God of War is an Action/Adventure game, the story is designed to be more linear and focus more on combat and character development than the role-playing elements that other games focus on. Because God of War 4 is designed to be an action/adventure game, it should be evaluated on how well it accomplishes that. God of War 4 is universally praised for its combat mechanics, characterization, and narration, which is what it should be, while Pro concedes that Assassins Creed Odyssey is not even the best RPG game, which is what the game is supposed to be



2) Spiderman

exploring NY city is just not fascinating like ancient greece
Unsubstantiated opinion.... You can make the argument that swinging through New York city with superhero powers is more fascinating than traveling through an ancient civilization on horseback. 

Being the best of a shitty genre does not make it better than a good game from a great genre.  
A game that raises the standard for how certain types of games should be/what they should aspire to is a cornerstone for what makes a best game of the year, because a game that does not raise the standards of a genre in any way or shape is not going to be remembered for very long, and therefore isn't a logical selection for the best game of the year...... Assassins Creed does nothing to break barriers for RPG games, open world games, or even Assassins creed games, since by your own admission it only is average at all of these. A game of the year should not only be average at everything, it should raise the bar in some way that other games in the future will have to compare to in order to gauge its own innovation and overall success..... Superhero games will have to try to meet the standards implemented by Spiderman from this point on in order for their success and quality to be gauged, whereas no RPG or even any Assassins Creed games will be judged based on how well their comparison is to Odyssey, since the game is for the most part unremarkably average by your own admisison. 



3) Monster Hunter World

Pro concedes all arguments


4) Red Dead Redemption 2

Pro concedes all arguments


5) Far Cry 5

Pro concedes all arguments


6A) Odyssey's Open World is not very unique or groundbreaking

Pro concedes all arguments


6B) The story/narrative/character-building elements of Odyssey are not very good

Pro concedes all arguments


6C) Odyssey is not the best RPG game, and isn't even the best Assassins Creed game

Pro concedes all arguments


6D) Odyssey is just a copy-paste version of Origins with minor gameplay tweaks

Pro concedes all arguments 


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Pro concedes an overwhelming majority of the arguments made in the previous round, refuses to recognize any sort of qualitative way of analyzing the quality of video games, and continues to only use his misguided and warped opinions to make arguments. Because his round 2 submission essentially amounts to a full forfeit, I extend all the valid arguments that were made in the previous rounds and encourage voters to vote con. 
Round 3
Pro
#5
Remind me never to debate you again, and do me a favor and don't enter any of my debates. Your debate tactics are sleezy and all you do is make appeal to popularity and authority fallacies. Instead of  countering my points with your own arguments you simply label them opinions and compile a list of games that happened to have sold better despite me explaining numerous times that popularity does not equate to quality. You don't know how to form a fucking argument of your own and rely on fallacies and the assertion that I am conceding simply because I don't agree with your arbitrary metrics based on what a multitude of witless fucks decide to spend their money on. Notice which of these songs is mindless garbage and which one has quality then take a look at which one has millions of views and which one has only a few thousand

If something is popular and sells well, chances are it's complete trash. Because most people are fucking idiots. Put that in your pipe and smoke it you cunt breathed weasel.

Con
#6
Pro appears to go back to the only argument tactic he has of being a complete dipshit and ignoring everything else that has been said up to this point (which has worked out so well for him and his 3-24 debate record)..... Perhaps he should go back to his strategy of forfeiting every round on his own debates, since blank space seems to be more convincing than anything he actually puts thought and effort into. 

Pro forfeits all arguments, and I encourage voters to award all points to con.