Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey is known for having Patrice Désilets of Assassin’s Creed 1, 2 and Brotherhood fame as its director. It sees players controlling an ape in a Hominid clan during prehistoric times, surviving against harsh weather and predators while evolving. You can learn new skills, find items and resources, and even switch between clan members.

When it first launched for PC, Ancestors had several issues, including a harsh difficulty (which Désilets said is on the player). It’s improved over time and was released for PS4 and Xbox One. Check out our official review here. As for the future and a potential sequel, time will tell, so stay tuned.

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Patrice Desilets, known for Prince of Persia and Assassin’s Creed during the time he spent at Ubisoft, went on a new journey with his indie studio Panache Digital when they launched Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey in 2019, and the prehistoric survival title has now passed a major milestone.

The game has sold over 1 million copies since it launched, which is a pretty major milestone. It released for PC in August 2019, and for consoles in December of that year. Allowing players to play as a lineage of primates in prehistoric Africa and help the line evolve and survive the harsh wilds, Ancestors definitely offered something unique and fascinating, and though the game certainly had its issues, it’s clear that it has appealed to quite a few people.

Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey is currently available on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. You can read our full review of the game through here.

Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey can be a harsh game. One moment you’re traversing the jungle, the next you’re dying to all kinds of elements and wildlife. Forget reaching the point of evolution – it can be a chore just to survive.

Fortunately, there are a number of ways to ensure your survival like unlocking new skills, crafting new tools and much more. Taking on predators will come later though – let’s start with staying warm.

Light My Fire

Look near any water bodies in the Savanna for some red leaves. These are herbs called Khat. Keep an eye out for any “?” items near a river and it should be easy enough to locate. Khat will help in surviving the cold but can be used in two different ways.

You can eat it to fill the cold resistance bar but the effect won’t be as strong. The other method is to grind it into paste using a Granite Grinder and apply it on your body. This will lead to a larger cold resistance bar and uses less of the herb overall.

The Neuronal Chart and Unlocking Skills

The skill tree in Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey, referred to as the Neuronal Chart, doesn’t function like most games. While it can be used to unlock new skills, it can’t be accessed whenever you feel like. Instead, you need to find a spot to sleep and press Y. This brings up the Evolution menu and lets you check the chart.

You’ll need Neuronal Energy for upgrading skills and unlocking new ones. Energy can be earned by doing tasks such as crafting new tools, fighting enemies, exploring new areas and so on. This will all contribute to filling up the Neuronal Energy circle in the chart. Increasing the overall Energy capacity requires evolving into a new species.

Fun fact: Neuronal Energy cannot be accessed when away from a baby. If you find a different place to sleep outside of your home without a baby, the Evolution menu can still be accessed but Neuronal Energy can’t be used for unlocking skills.

One tip to gathering more Neuronal Energy is – no joke – to carry a baby. Press B near a baby to pick them up. This provides a bonus to the amount of Energy earned. Carrying a second child will further increase the bonus. It can be dangerous in the wilderness so exercise caution when taking babies with you – if you die, they’ll need to hide until another clan member can find them.

Skills are dependent on the actions performed in-game. Fight more and combat skills will become available. The game will also let you know when a new skill can be unlocked. To know what a skill does, you have to click on its node to unlock it, which should provide a full description.

Acquire the new ability at the cost of some Energy. Locked skills appear as black nodes – you can hover over them to receive clues on unlocking them. Keep in mind that certain skills require certain actions so focusing more on those should get you closer to unlocking them.

What about skills that require Genetic Mutations? First, you need Mutant Genes to actually appear. They have a chance of popping up after breeding and a baby is born. When a Genetic Mutation happens, they’ll appear as orange nodes on the Neuronal Chart.

You can find out what the Mutation does when the child matures but it will only take effect once your species has evolved. The Mutation nodes will then turn into a normal nodes for unlocking. Be warned – Genetic Mutations will go away if the carrier dies – whether from a wild animal, sickness or old age – before evolution takes place. Try to evolve as soon as a favorable Mutation emerges.

Crafting Tools

There are four main tools – the Sharpened Stick, Granite Grinder, Obsidian Carver and Basalt Chopper – that you should craft. Not only will they serve as weapons but can also provide essential functions like grinding herbs into paste. Let’s take a look at how to craft them below

• Sharpened Stick: Locate some dead branches in the jungle or in trees. Place a branch in your character’s left hand and alter it. Hold the button and go by the instructions provided to strip the branch. You can use this stick for making holes, fishing and lifting rocks. However, for combat, look for a good rock. Place the rock in your right hand and the stick in your left. Press the alter button again and follow the cues. Eventually you’ll have your Sharpened Stick.
• Granite Grinder: Find two rocks of granite – they can be found in a variety of locations in the Savanna. With the two rocks in hand, press the alter button while listening for cues and follow the instructions. Soon enough, you’ll have the Granite Grinder on hand, which is handy for making paste from herbs.
• Obsidian Carver: Look for obsidian in caves and hit a rock or some other tool against it to get an Obsidian Carver. This is useful for sharpening sticks, butchering corpses or even fighting. You can also use it to open coconuts for drinking.
• Basalt Chopper: First, locate two basalt pieces. Though found throughout the Savanna, they aren’t as common as the other materials so keep an eye out. Take the pieces and press the alter button, listening for the audio and going by the instructions as usual. Eventually you’ll get the Basalt Chopper which greatly decreases the time needed to sharpen a stick. It can open coconuts, kill predators and even chop meat effectively.

PREMISE

Ancestors isn’t just giving us a historic setting- no, it’s taking things a step further, and going full-on pre-historic. Players will begin the game playing as an ape, and will be tasked with ensuring its survival while helping it and its clan grow and survive. This is a game about charting the evolution of what would go on to become the early, early human, and ensuring your survival in the harsh, wild wilderness of pre-historic Earth promises to be a fascinating experience.

8 MILLION YEARS OF EVOLUTION

Let’s stick with that central premise for just a bit longer, because Ancestors looks like it’s going to double down on it in a lot of ways. The entire game, in fact, from start to finish, will chart eight million years of evolution of an ape clan’s evolution (more on this in a bit). By the time the game is finished, we still won’t have reached the birth of homo sapiens, though, so don’t expect to see the world change that radically.

APE CLAN

As we mentioned, Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey charts eight million years of evolution, but we obviously won’t be playing as one ape who somehow lives for eight million years. No, we will, instead, be taking control of an entire ape clan, and moving from ape to ape and going down the clan’s lineage as time in the game moves forward.

A WORLD FULL OF HAZARDS

Set in pre-historic times, you can probably guess that surviving in the wilds won’t be an easy task. It’s going to be just you versus the elements, and you’ll be faced with threats of all kinds- from the environment itself to predators in the wild to sicknesses, injuries, fatigue, starvation, and a lot more. Eating a new type of food for the first time, leaving your injuries untended and bleeding out, and not getting enough sleep are just a few of the ways you can get yourself killed.

CLIMBING

Coming from the guy who made Prince of Persia and Assassin’s Creed, it’s no surprise that climbing and parkour are going to be a major mechanic in Ancestors. You primary method of traversing the world will be by climbing trees and cliffs in the environment, which, given that you’re playing as an ape, makes a lot of sense.

INJURIES

Parkour in Ancestors is going to have some stakes though, and won’t be as automated as Desilets’ earlier games. Survival is a key element of the experience here, which means that even as you’re climbing trees, you’ll have to ensure that you’re doing it properly. Slipping and falling or misjudging a jump can lead to broken bones or other injuries, which have a lasting impact on the ape you’re playing as.

FEAR AND HYSTERIA

Keeping safe from predators will also be something you’ll have to be mindful of. When you’re being chased by predators, you’ll enter a state called the Fear Zone, leaving your vision hazy and impaired. While in the Fear Zone, if you cannot make it to a ball of light in the environment in time, you’ll enter a state called “hysteria”, which will have even more adverse impacts on your well-being.

SKILL TREES

What exactly does charting millions of years of evolution mean in terms of gameplay mechanics, though? Well, everything from standing upright to walking on two legs to learning new hunting techniques to building new tools and weapons, to gaining knowledge through things you experience during gameplay that will aid survival going forward- all of this is stuff that will count as progression for your ape. These new abilities that you unlocked are represented in a skill tree, in which you’re essentially developing the ape’s nervous system.

DYING

So what happens if and when the ape you’re playing as dies? Well, as we’ve discussed, you take on the role of another ape in the clan you’re playing as. All the knowledge you’ve gained and skills you’ve unlocked as previous apes are permanent unlocks, meaning that any and all progress will carry over to the next ape.

EXPLORATION

Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey takes place in the pre-historic jungles of Africa, and there’s going to be a lot to see in the game’s world. As you explore more, you’ll unlock new areas of the world and come across new threats and opportunities for gaining new knowledge. Once you’ve unlocked new areas, you can even begin a new game starting in that particular area.

GAME MODES

Ancestors will give players three different options in terms of modes depending on what sort of an experience you’re looking for. First Time Experience is what you’ll begin with, and it’ll come complete with tutorials and objectives. Survival will task you with surviving in the wilderness all by yourself. Meanwhile, Custom will allow you to start a new game in one of the areas that you’ve unlocked, while also being able to set the number of clan members that you want.

LENGTH

The real question is- how long is this game going to be? 8 million years is a pretty long time, and playing through that entire time period has got to be a pretty meaty experience, right? Right you are. According to the developers, Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey will be roughly 40-50 hours long in total.

EPIC GAMES STORE EXCLUSIVE

Like so may other major and semi-major releases these days, Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey won’t be available on Steam at launch. On PC, the game will be exclusive to the Epic Games Store for a year- which isn’t all that surprising, considering the fact that a whole lot of Take-Two games have been pledging their exclusivity to Epic’s storefront of late, from The Outer Worlds (also published by Ancestors publisher and Take-Two label Private Division) and Borderlands 3 (published by Take-Two label 2K Games).

CONSOLE LAUNCH

Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey will be seeing a fragmented launch. Though the game is due out for PC on August 27, which is right around the corner, console owners will have to wait a bit longer. On PS4 and Xbox One, the game launches later this year, in December. A more specific console release date hasn’t yet been confirmed.

Panache Digital Games’ Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey is out on August 27th for PC. It will release in December for Xbox One and PS4. The PC version will be exclusive to the Epic Games Store for a year. Check out the newest trailer below, which talks about expanding your territory.

Better known as the next title from Assassin’s Creed co-creator Patrice Desilets, Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey is about survival over an extremely long period of time. Starting in Africa as the ancestor of humanity, you’ll experience more than eight million years of history. Clans will be formed, families will be created, and mankind will evolve in the process.

As a result, any traits gained are based on the player’s choice. For instance, you’ll gain scars, which will carry over through time. All in all, it should be an interesting experience, especially given the journey that Desilets himself has had through the development process. Stay tuned for more information in the coming months.

The mysterious 1666 Amsterdam, the new IP by Assassin’s Creed creator Patrice Désilets, who started it with THQ, lost it to Ubisoft in a dramatic and ironic twist, before finally regaining rights to the IP, has long been an enigma- but just recently, gameplay footage from the game released, that indicates that it definitely was in active development at one time, and more than just a name or title.

Désilets also confirmed on Twitter that he does plan on returning to the game and developing it at some point in the future (which makes sense, or else why would he have fought so vociferously for rights to it?). Which is good news, because the unreleased footage we have is definitely intriguing.

You can check out this footage for yourself below. For now, Désilets is working on Ancestors: the Humankind Odyssey, his next game with Panache Digital Games- so even if 1666 does happen, you shouldn’t expect to see it any time soon.

@DracoADG pas vrai ça on le fera en temps et lieu…:)

— Patrice Desilets (@PatriceDez) April 26, 2016

It’s nice to see talented people strike out and build bridges in new directions. That’s exactly what Patrice Desilets is doing. That name may ring a bell, and it should too frankly, Patrice worked as the creative director for Assassin’s Creed and the Prince of Persia franchise.

He worked with Ubisoft up until 2010 when he left them to help establish the newly founded THQ Montreal, but following the sinking of that ship he was reintegrated into Ubisoft when they purchased THQ Montreal in the liquidation of assets auction.

Following some legal disputes over his still secretive game 1666 which was put on hold. Following this, with Ubisoft being such an upstanding bunch, Patrice was “dismissed”. Well he’s back, and he has a new studio. Panache Digital Games is located in Montreal and it sports a really rather excellent twitter hash tag. It’s #playwithpanache.

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