Might as well go whole hog they've been charging fans for what's essentially a F2P for a few years now. All the bullshit loot supported by their real money loot store, enemies that are spongy to start the F2P feedback loop in players mind making them want to use said store.
The AC story made sense at some point long ago, but it doesn't anymore, playing AC for the underlying story is like reading Playboy for the articles.
I watched my flatmate enjoy Origins and I think that one was straddling the line of the F2P bullshit since the enemies werent
too spongey but yeah they really went full hog on Odyssey (and I'm sure Valhalla, but I havent played it, just watched some) and made it so you will be conditioned to think its fun to take 8 hits to kill some trash mob and 24 for a fat guy, I remember murdering 10 people in seconds in old AC and I quite liked that, it got old obviously but now I want that fake power fantasy back ha, which shows how shit the new mode is really.
Your analogy is more appropriate than you imagine because Playboy actually used to have good writers/articles in the distant past but yeah, now not so much. Same with many mens magazines.
You can still enjoy the newer ones by using mods/trainers probably but you shouldn't have to ofc and if this "Infinity" live service game comes to pass you can't even do that. Thanks for monetising all the fun you bunch of bastards.