The latest installment in the franchise, Assassin's Creed Valhalla is one of the most ambitious and expansive iterations ever seen within the Assassin's Creed formula. Possessing an impressive array of different locations, a penchant for historical accuracy, and a deeply detailed story, the game is some of the best that the new formula for Assassin's Creed has to offer.
Outside of the impressive base-game, there are equally strong expansions and DLCs available to further satiate the need for Viking combat and Norse mythology. The most recent of these expansions is the Dawn of Ragnarok DLC, which upholds Assassin's Creed Valhalla's track record for densely packed content.
The Previous DLCs of Assassin's Creed Valhalla
In all, Assassin's Creed Valhalla now has three mainline DLC expansions, each focusing on a different geographical location and aspect of Viking history or mythology. The first major DLC that the game saw came in May 2021 with Wrath of the Druids.
Wrath of the Druids sees Eivor go to Ireland in battle of a druidic cult known as Children of Danu. This DLC gave Assassin's Creed Valhalla a holistic portrayal of the entire British Isles, with Wales, Scotland, and especially England featuring prominently within the base game. This DLC is on par with the rest of Valhalla with its portrayal of beautiful landscapes and richly detailed environments, saturated with main-line and optional content to give a fully informed experience of Ireland.
The second of the three mainline DLCs for Assassin's Creed Valhalla was The Siege of Paris, released in August 2021. This DLC sees players travel to the kingdom of West Francia to battle the forces of Charles the Fat, based on the real life attempted Viking expansion into Paris in the year 845. Players must forge alliances within this strange new land in preparation for the iconic siege, with the sprawling lands of France offering a fresh level of variation.
Dawn of Ragnarok
The third and potentially final major DLC for Assassin's Creed Valhalla is the Dawn of Ragnarok DLC, which was released on March 10. This DLC is billed by Ubisoft as the most ambitious in the history of the franchise, a statement that is hard to argue with.
The DLC itself is a whopping 15 GB in download size, with Ubisoft boasting that Dawn of Ragnarok can take up to 35 hours to complete. As can be imagined when regarding this unprecedented scale, this DLC has a plethora of content to offer players, much more so than its two predecessors.
The Setting
Dawn of Ragnarok sees players relive the coveted annals of Norse mythology, taking control of the Norse God of Battle and Wisdom, Odin. The primary setting of this fantastical DLC is Svartalfheim, the Norse homeland of the Dwarves.
Svartalfheim is a sprawling and magically imbued location, containing golden mountains, icy plains, and lush forests. Within the story, however, Svartalfheim is actively under siege by the combined forces of the fabled icy blue giants of Jotunheim and the flame-ravaged monsters of Muspelheim. The presence of this attacking force directly imposes itself upon the large map of Svartalfheim, with fiery Muspelheim tendrils ominously lingering upon the skyline.
Links to Main Story
As ambitious of a setting this is for a DLC, the element of Eivor taking control of Odin/Havi is actually a direct factor of the main storyline for Assassin's Creed Valhalla. Within the main story, players could drink a psychoactive ritual concoction that would transport them to Asgard through the eyes of Odin.
Playing as Odin within Asgard in Valhalla saw players travel to Jotunheim and grapple with the chaotic plans of Loki, with the prominent figures of Norse mythology that are featured mimicking the actions of the characters in the main story. This surprisingly comprehensive side-story eventually established a serious plot point, in that the main characters of the game's story were directly tied to and destined to follow the fates of their ancient mythological ancestors - a plot point which is expanded upon in Dawn of Ragnarok.
The Story of Dawn of Ragnarok
The primary contingent motivation behind Odin's intervention of the invasion of Svartalfheim, is that Baldr, one of Odin's many sons, has been kidnaped by the fire giants of Muspelheim. The main antagonist of this DLC is the Muspel warlord Surtr, a deeply powerful and mythical warrior whose might rivals that of Odin himself.
The story begins with Odin fighting alongside Figg, the mother of Baldr, with the two putting aside their differences for the sake of their endangered son. The player is almost immediately thrown into an overwhelming boss fight with Sutr, who quickly overpowers the player and Figg, killing her in the process. Upon being rescued by the Dwarves of Svartalfheim, Odin is gifted the Hugr-Rip. a powerful and enchanted bracer that allows the player to utilize new abilities befitting of a God. With the bracer, players can infuse Odin's weapons with ice elemental damage, disguise as Jotun giants or Muspel monsters, raise the dead, and even transform into a bird.
The player must then work alongside enclaves of refugee Dwarves within Svartalfheim to re-establish dominance of the realm. Using the raid system of Assassin's Creed Valhalla to acquire the necessary materials to upgrade the new array of God-like powers available to Odin, the player must build their might to be able to face the upper rankings of the intimidating threat of both Jotunheim and Muspelheim, saving Baldr before it's too late.
One of the first major boss battles within the game is with Glod, the son of Sutr, with Odin killing him as recompense for the capture of his own son. Odin goes on to form a tentative partnership with Eysa, one of Sutr's daughters, after it is revealed that Sutr is sacrificing his own kind indiscriminately with rituals concerning an ancient artifact known as the Salakar.
Sadly, Baldr has already been killed when Odin finds him, with Eysa also being killed for her treachery. After fighting Sinmara, the wife of Sutr, Odin is set for the final battle against Sutr himself.
Sutr uses the Salakar to harness its intense energy in preparation for this final battle, but the strength of the transformation leaves Sutr in an overpowered but extremely vulnerable state. Odin capitalizes on this by driving Sutr's sword through his heart after an intense fight, killing him and enacting vengeance for his late son, drawing the story of this expansive DLC to a conclusion.
Assassin's Creed Valhalla is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
