Assassin's Creed: Origins
Explore the Birth of the Brotherhood
Assassin’s Creed Origins follows Bayek, a Medjay whose personal search for justice draws him into a larger struggle across Ptolemaic Egypt. His journey reveals the foundations of the group that will become the Assassin Brotherhood, while keeping the focus on the people, politics, and rival powers shaping the ancient world. The PS4 release presents Egypt as a broad, connected landscape of cities, villages, deserts, oases, Nile waterways, temples, and tombs rather than a series of isolated missions.
How Combat and Exploration Work
Origins rebuilds the series around action-RPG combat. Attacks connect through range and positioning, so fights depend on timing light and heavy strikes, guarding with a shield, dodging, parrying, and choosing the right bow or melee weapon for the situation. Enemies have visible levels, varied defenses, and distinct attack patterns. Stealth remains important, but direct combat is a fully developed option rather than a last resort.
Bayek’s eagle, Senu, provides aerial reconnaissance. From above, Senu can locate objectives, tag enemies, identify their levels, and highlight resources, passages, and points of interest. This makes scouting useful before infiltrating a fort, approaching a quest area, or crossing dangerous territory. On the ground, climbing, horseback travel, boats, underwater exploration, and viewpoint synchronization keep movement flexible across the open world.
Progression, Gear, and Play Style
Completing story missions, side quests, discoveries, and combat encounters earns experience for Bayek. Ability upgrades support different approaches to melee fighting, archery, stealth, tools, and survival. Looted weapons and shields come in multiple types and rarity levels, with different speeds, ranges, effects, and tactical strengths. Materials gathered through exploration and hunting improve Bayek’s core equipment, so progression combines character abilities with practical gear upgrades.
The result is a game that supports deliberate stealth, ranged attacks, close-quarters combat, or a mixture of all three. A heavily guarded outpost can be surveyed with Senu, entered quietly after dark, attacked from a distance, or challenged head-on once Bayek is properly equipped.
Quests, Activities, and Additional Modes
The main campaign is supported by character-focused side quests, tomb exploration, enemy strongholds, hunting, gladiator arenas, and chariot races. Photo Mode offers a separate way to capture the landscape and its historical architecture. The free Discovery Tour update adds nonviolent exploration and guided tours curated with historians and Egyptologists; an internet connection and game update may be required to access post-launch features not stored on the original disc.
Presentation and PS4 Requirements
Ubisoft Montreal’s recreation of Ancient Egypt shifts between crowded settlements, open desert, fertile riverbanks, monuments, and hidden interiors, with a day-and-night cycle that also affects how inhabitants and guards behave. On PlayStation 4, the game supports one player, offline play, DUALSHOCK 4 vibration, Remote Play, and PS4 Pro enhancements. There is no multiplayer mode. Optional in-game purchases are available.
The PS4 game is also playable on PlayStation 5 through backward compatibility, although Sony notes that some PS4 features may be absent. Network access may be needed for updates, PlayStation Store content, or subscription-library access; the base campaign itself is a single-player experience with offline play enabled.
Quick Specs
- Platform: PlayStation 4
- Edition: Standard Edition
- Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
- Publisher: Ubisoft
- Release date: October 27, 2017
- Genre: Action, adventure, and role-playing
- Players: 1 player; no multiplayer
- ESRB: Mature 17+
- Controller: DUALSHOCK 4 wireless controller
- Features: Offline play, Remote Play, PS4 Pro Enhanced
