When comparing Assassin's Creed Odyssey vs XCOM: Enemy Within, the Slant community recommends XCOM: Enemy Within for most people. In the question“What are the best singleplayer games on Steam?” XCOM: Enemy Within is ranked 44th while Assassin's Creed Odyssey is ranked 133rd. The most important reason people chose XCOM: Enemy Within is:
The gaming genre of turn based strategy lends itself very well to touch screen devices. It is actually easier to interact with the characters on screen with ones fingers instead of a mouse.
Specs
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Pros
Pro You can choose between a male or female protagonist
For the first time in the Assassin's Creed series, you can pick whether you want to play the entire game as the male protagonist, Alexios, or the female protagonist, Kassandra. Alexios and Kassandra are siblings living in Ancient Greece -- they used to be spartans, but now they live out their lives as mercenaries, taking down mysterious plots or just killing whoever's necessary for the money. Through dialog choices, you get to choose their personalities: whether they're funny and sarcastic or more serious and to-the-point. While the main story mostly plays out the same no matter which sibling you go with, certain scenes read differently depending on whose point of view you experience them from, so you might want to play through the game a second time to see the changes for yourself.
Pro Intense combat that relies on your skill and strategy
The combat in Assassin's Creed Odyssey is really up-close-and-personal. Wielding weapons and shields, your skill with blocking and parrying is as important, if not more, than landing strong blows. Enemies are relentless and aggressive in how fast they attack; parrying them is especially satisfying because of how tough they are. Chaining your defensive moves into attacks that take your opponent off-guard is great, rewarding you with some awesome finishing animations. Taking your time to read your enemies before going after their weaknesses pays off in the end.
Pro Cool naval combat against rival ships out on the open seas
You get to navigate out in the open waters to get from place to place, getting hands-on with the full mechanics of steering your ship while firing off cannons at surrounding enemies. Using the directional indicators to line up the perfect shot is incredibly satisfying as you take down one ship after another, sending them sinking in flames. There's a full crew aboard with you, helping to give plenty of liveliness to your surroundings as they shout in anger and cheer in victory as you go along, with dynamic weather like raging storms that adds to the realism and intensity. It's a lot of fun and serves as a nice way to break things up from normal missions on-foot.
Pro Massive open world set in Ancient Greece
The in-game map is absolutely gigantic. There are so many places to go and so much to do in the world, easily giving you over 70 hours of content. Exploring the rolling hills and ancient cities of Greece and the nearby Mediterranean Sea is such a joy because of how lush and beautiful everything is. Wandering around often surprises you with new side quests to find off the beaten path, with new characters to meet and history to learn about in whichever area you find yourself in. And there's just a ton of other mythological secrets and fun diversions to discover as you adventure throughout the world.
Pro Your choices affect how side quests play out
There are some well-done instances where your decisions have real consequences with the side quests. Depending on how you interact with side characters, if you're polite to them, or if you choose to be mean and uncaring, this will change how they view you. If you cross the wrong people, it could have dire effects on certain locations, and some of the characters can outright die if things end up spiraling out of control. It's up to you to find out how everything plays out depending on how you role-play as Alexios or Kassandra.
Pro Turn based strategy works well on touchscreen devices
The gaming genre of turn based strategy lends itself very well to touch screen devices. It is actually easier to interact with the characters on screen with ones fingers instead of a mouse.
Pro Enjoyable gameplay
XCOM sets the standard as to what to expect in turn based strategy gaming. Players use soldiers to fight off an alien invasion by utilizing cover, flanking and other strategy tactics to defeat the alien baddies on each level of grid based environments.
Pro Hardcore strategy gaming at it best on a mobile platform
For a series that is regarded as hardcore gaming even on PC, to see this franchise come to mobile is a godsend.
Pro New upgrade resource
There is a new resource known as Meld that allows the user to purchase upgrades.
Pro Cheaper than PC version
Epic game, same as PC version, for lower price.
Pro Expansion on what was already a fantastic game
Enemy Within is and expansion on the classic Enemy Unknown. With Enemy Withing players are given new options such as maps, missions, enemies and of course the new Mech Suits.
Pro Ethical choices effect long game
The choices the player makes from what kind of upgrades to use to what soldier to send where on a battle map will effect later game play.
Pro Online multiplayer
There is support for asynchronous online multiplayer built into the game over Google Play Services.
Pro Unexpected storyline
A strategy game such as this is often not expected to have a storyline, or if so, a good one. But this game has an interesting and surprising one.
Pro Many upgrades
Many possibilities for upgrades are available in the game, which is impressive. Cybergenetics and genetics mods are some of the options you can use as upgrades in the game.
Cons
Con Other than with side quests, your choices don't mean much
It's cool that Odyssey offers plenty of dialog choices, but they don't have as much of an impact on the game as a whole. The choices you make don't fundamentally change what happens during the main story. It would have been nice to see the side quest variations on a bigger scale, with more drastic changes and consequences depending on how you handle things. Beyond those side quests, any other choices you make feel like filler: too many lost opportunities.
Con Leveling up can be a chore, bottlenecking exploration
The one thing that may keep you from adventuring as much as you want: levels, including your own and your enemies. It can take a while to gain enough experience points to level up, cutting you off from that one area you want to explore that's filled with higher level enemies. Going on side quests is one of the best ways to level, but you may find yourself questing for hours just to gain enough levels, especially in the late-game.
Con Voice acting sounds weird at times
The voice acting is usually pretty solid, but when it isn't, you will probably notice. Some of the side characters' accents are really bad and obviously fake, to the point where you might not even understand what they're saying. Alexios' voice acting also isn't as strong and consistent as Kassandra's, with times where he sounds off compared to his sister. It can be quite distracting when someone just doesn't sound right.
Con Many crashing bugs
It may crash often when loading missions.
Con Too expensive
Con Second half of game lacks as many options as first half
The second half of the game feels a bit lack luster in options when compared to the first half.