Eh, Valhalla,, Odyssey and Origins are clearly something different.
Not by much. I will give some credit to
Origins to introducing ideas that are "new for
AC", but they never refined on it, made things worse, or added in more bloat, unless you pay a hefty price to skip it all.
I don't think the "RPG" overhaul in AC was particularly needed or helpful to it (Given to my experience, it just came along with triple the bloat and repetition, but now with coloured item names and numers over enemies heads), but there's a clear switchover there.
Exactly my point. It went worse in the other direction, while still having the same problems as past games.
Origins and
Odyssey may be better than something like
Revelations,
Syndicate, and
Unity, but that is not a milestone worth praising nor celebrating. Plenty of games are better than all of the 5 I just mentioned.
AC, Far Cry, Ghost Recon and WatchDogs are also co-labelmates along with Just Dance, Trackmania, Mario Rabiids, the South Parks, The Division (which has some stylistic similarities but definitely does not play like the former group, even as someone who finds it a sluggish mess) and Rainbow Six. So even in their AAA offerings thats a less then 50% chunk.
FC has been doing the same thing since
3, but with less interesting villains each time.
Just Dance is nothing more than glorified shovelware that has been doing the same thing since
3 and
4.
Trackmania I can't comment on, as I never once played the games.
Rabbids really didn't get good until the crossover games with
Mario. Before that,
Rabbids were a huge annoyance Ubi shoved down peoples throats, when nobody wanted them (not the first time Ubisoft was shilling a character or franchise forcing people to like), and wanted new
Rayman. It took until 2011 for Ubisoft to do so and give the fan and gamers what they actually wanted.
Watch Dogs is just AC in modern day, with most fans only preferring the
WD2 over
1. The third game that takes place in Brexit, a lot of people don't like.
The Division just sucks in general.
Ghost Recon they turned a tactical single player 3rd person shooting games, into another uninspired sandbox games most
GR fans, didn't want nor give a shit about.
Rainbow Six Siege is a live-service started horribly and only got better through patches and balances, but it's all Ubisoft even bothers with now. They have not made another single player based
Rainbow Six game since the
Vegas games. I care more for the movie being developed by Michael B. Jordan, than I do about
Siege, or another game that is never happening. So there are huge problems. Let's get into the fact that Ubisoft can't commit politics for shit, more than happy to enable players acting like racists and sexists assholes (with assholes like that being in charge at the top in the company), could not give an actual shit about diversity and use it under the most shallowest terms, and said company let's sexual abusers/assaulters/rapist run free with little to no punishment. Can't blame a lot of people walking out on Ubisoft, and their games can continue to suffer from there own doing. I have nothing else to say on this part, and that is final.
Throwing FROM in as a comparison is kind of funny, since Demons Souls and AC 2 (the one that established the formula) came out in the same year and FROM has remained vastly more stagnant in their offerings, with only Sekiro to stand out. Change isn't success or inherently good, but if we're going by spending ~15 years stuck on one idea, FROM are the kingpins in this particular fight.
While FROM was stuck in
Souls rut, they at least respected players' time, knew how to mix things up, and didn't treat their gaming audiences like they're thundering dumbasses, nor think they only have to appeal to frat-jock assholes. Also,
Bloodborne plays nothing like
Demon Souls,
Dark Souls I & II.
Dark Souls III takes more from
Bloodborne any way.
Elden Ring is basically
Dark Souls IV, but you and your steed can jump with the grander open world exploration that puts many AAA sandbox games to shame. Not a
Souls fan, but I respect FROM far more than Ubisoft, and rather play the former's games, any day of the week than whatever Ubi shits out. I'm happy we're getting an
Armored Core 6, and it plays nothing like a
Dark Souls games. I have no complaints.