Assassin's Creed Valhalla was first shown in The Division 2 over a year ago

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Leave it to Ubisoft to leak its own game

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Today has been an Assassin's Creed Valhalla reveal-a-palooza, but it turns out the game was originally 'revealed' over a year ago through a cheeky Easter egg in The Division 2. 

On March 25, 2019, Assassin's Creed wiki user AlifMorrisonudin shared a screenshot of a poster found in the JFK Center in The Division 2. It shows a warrior holding a spear and a golden orb, and it's titled Valhalla. The warrior in the poster doesn't look much like a Viking, but he bears an uncanny resemblance to the crusader-type soldiers that the Vikings are fighting, and the Valhalla parallel can't be ignored. 

(Image credit: AlifMorrisonudin via AC Wiki)

That said, the real smoking gun turned out to be the innocuous golden orb that the warrior in the poster is holding. At the time, many players speculated that this orb is in fact an Apple of Eden, a type of artifact seen throughout the Assassin's Creed series. Digging even deeper, a snippet of Assassin's Creed 2 lore confirms that the Nordic goddess Idun is regarded as the caretaker of the orchard of golden apples, and this connection lines up with the Nordic concept of the afterlife, namely Valhalla. 

Even in early 2019, there were persistent rumors that the next Assassin's Creed game would focus on Vikings, and multiple alleged insiders had supported the theory. To top it off, Ubisoft has a history of revealing games within games. With the Assassin's Creed Valhalla reveal trailer now out in the wild, it's amusing to look back on the wild goose chase Ubisoft prepared for fans. 

The Assassin's Creed Valhalla release date is set for this holiday season. Here's how to pre-order Assassin's Creed Valhalla at the best prices.

Austin Wood
Austin Wood
Senior writer

Austin has been a game journalist for 12 years, having freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree. He's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize his position is a cover for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a lot of news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.