Oh Ubisoft, Connect Me Now To Your Sweaty Greek Love
Part one of a series on Immortals: Fenyx Rising
On Friday I ran home from work at 8, copy of Ubisoft’s Immortals: Fenyx Rising in hand, ready to fight against cyclops(es) and evil demonic underworld Gods. I had watched the trailers. I had read the reviews. Excitement swirled through me as I rushed home, climbing up cliffs and dashing through bright green fields and depleting my stamina bar. I knew it would be like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild because everything about it screamed that it would be like Breath of the Wild. The open expanse! Climbing! Floating through the sky! But how much would it be like Breath of the Wild? Would the differences be good? Bad? Unlike the critics of Immortals’ previews I did not find it problematic that it might be TOO MUCH like Breath of the Wild. How could it be bad to make a game TOO MUCH like one of the greatest of all time? It’s like complaining that the guy at the jam session sounds too much like John Coltrane. And so, these thoughts seeping through my brain from frontal lobe to temporal lobe*, I popped the cartridge into my Switch, expecting to traverse Ancient Greece alongside Olympian Gods.
Immediately after being told that this game is so awesome that it might give me a seizure, I was confronted with a seemingly immovable wall of bullshit asking me to create an Ubisoft Connect account. Why? What on earth could I possibly need an Ubisoft Connect account for in this ostensibly single-player game?
Well, apparently through the magic of Ubisoft Connect, I can…
-Keep my saves and progression across all of the different platforms I don’t have unless I conjure up a PS5 out of thin air and blow another 60 dollars to buy the same game a second time
-Unlock additional Rewards by completing Challenges similar to the ones in Ubisoft’s Rayman: Legends that somehow managed to exist without requiring you to sign up for some shitty service. Also worth noting that Ubisoft Connect has decided that “Rewards” and “Challenges” are proper nouns.
-Access the network of Ubisoft players, who you presumably won’t be playing Immortals: Fenyx Rising with because, you know, IT’S A FUCKING SINGLE PLAYER GAME.
-Finally, you can compare your game stats with your friends, because who isn’t playing Immortals like it’s Ms Pac-Man?
After figuring out how to click through this screen during my first few sessions with Immortals, I finally caved when I forgot how I had even done so. Or maybe there’s some kind of time lock where after a certain point Ubisoft just won’t let you play the game you paid $60 for without giving them your email address. Whatever the reason, I finally joined the “community of passionate players” that had also been cajoled into signing up for this shitty service that no one needs or wants. Signing up, I was filled with dread that Ubisoft might not be able to contact me. Luckily, after giving them my email, they made sure to check boxes allowing them to send me emails and share my information with select third parties. I had to make the effort to check the box saying I agreed to terms and conditions though. I figured that this would be the end of it, but no! Now every time I boot up the game I’m STILL confronted with a message from Ubisoft asking me to visit Ubisoft Connect, as if it’s a beach resort and not a data mining operation.
So I did! I visited Ubisoft Connect. I was told I could participate in the aforementioned proper-noun Challenges to claim exclusive proper noun Rewards, that I could spend golden coins with the letter U on them that I have never seen before to get other exclusive proper noun Rewards and that apparently I had completed two broken parries in my time with Immortals: Fenyx Rising thus far. This shit is what Ubisoft forced me to cough up my email for? I decided to leave and hit the B button on my controller.
“Are you sure you want to exit,” beckoned Ubisoft Connect, like a Mary Kay saleswoman whose home I had unwittingly found myself in. “Yes,” I said, and finally Ubisoft Connect shifted its weight away from the door I had been trying to go through for the past ten minutes.
And now, finally, I could soar through the Olympian vistas with a fire bird next to me, wind whipping at my wings as my stamina bar depleted. A loading screen appeared.
“Checking for additional content,” it said, and I hoped that in my second piece on Immortals: Fenyx Rising I would be able to write about the game itself.
*I don’t know how brains work but this sounds correct in my head