Assassin's Creed Valhalla will have Viking rap battles

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

The Vikings had all kinds of cool cultural traditions, from democratic councils and formal duelling rites to one of the earliest known forms of what we'd now call the rap battle: Flyting. See, the Vikings had rhyming insult-fights attested to in both historical record, myth, and semi-historical records like the Icelandic Sagas. There are flytings between the gods Odin and Thor, for example, or between Loki and literally every other god because nobody really likes Loki very much. (If you're like me, you know this practice from the old english word flite via Beowulf.)

Assassin's Creed Valhalla will include this rhythmic poetry in the form of flyting between game protagonist Eivor and other warriors. These are boasting competitions where warriors, often around the table at the mead hall, would playfully insult each other to a rhythmic scheme. Here's Assassin's Creed Valhalla creative director Ashraf Alsmail with the details:

So brush up on your rhyme schemes and poetic license, people. You've got sea-raider rap battles to win. Me? I'm just hoping for some good kennings out of this whole thing.

Assassin's Creed Valhalla will be this year's release in the historical series, set in 9th Century England and releasing "Holiday 2020." It deals with the Viking Invasions of late antiquity, when peoples from Scandinavia conquered much of the British isles. It'll see the new protagonist, Eivor, doing much of the same RPG-like gameplay we've come to expect from the last two games in the series. You can learn more about Assassin's Creed Valhalla on our extensive roundup of the details. 

TOPICS
Contributor

Jon Bolding is a games writer and critic with an extensive background in strategy games. When he's not on his PC, he can be found playing every tabletop game under the sun.

Latest in Assassin's Creed
Assassin's Creed Shadows promo image
Ubisoft scores a legendary ratio against Elon Musk on his own platform—which hopefully marks a final end to all the Assassin's Creed Shadows' culture war nonsense
Assassin's Creed Shadows immersive mode - Naoe holding a tanto in her hand as two guards fall to the ground behind her.
Assassin's Creed Shadows' first hotfix addresses stability issues and a photo mode crash
Naoe looking at the wrist blade in Assassin's Creed Shadows
Ubisoft says don't compare Assassin's Creed Shadows' success to Valhalla: The latter launched in Covid's 'perfect storm' and feedback on platforms 'less affected by review bombing' is stellar
Assassin's Creed Shadows change seasons - An upper-body shot of Yasuke looking cheerfully up into the distance.
Assassin's Creed Shadows is a hit and Steam played a 'significant role' in that: 27% of activations were on PC and it's the 2nd-biggest AC launch of all time
assassin's creed shadows review
Assassin's Creed Shadows streamer goes viral after confronting whining commenters: 'Normal people don't get upset about this sh***'
Assassin's Creed Shadows change seasons - An upper-body shot of Yasuke looking cheerfully up into the distance.
'This is just the beginning': Assassin's Creed Shadows dev team thanks fans for their support and promises more to come in the future
Latest in News
An Enshrouded player in a recreation of Erebor from The Lord of the Rings
Kings under the Mountain! 33 Enshrouded players spent 10,000 hours to recreate this iconic location from The Lord of the Rings
A mech awakens.
Mecha Break developer is considering unlocking all mechs following open beta feedback
Lara Croft Unified Art
Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics lays off 17 employees 'to better align our current business needs and the studio's future success'
A long bendy arm stealing money from people in a subway car
'You're a very long arm. You steal things. It's a comedy game,' explains developer of comedy game where you steal things with a very long arm
The heroes are attacked by monsters
Pillars of Eternity is getting turn-based combat to mark its 10th anniversary, and that means PC Gamer editors will soon be arguing about combat mechanics again
Image of Ronaldo from Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves trailer
It doesn't really make sense that soccer star Ronaldo is now a Fatal Fury character, but if you follow the money you can see how it happened