Keeping up with theAssassin’s Creedseries is a tall order, but it’s one that I frequently get the urge to follow. While I haven’t played all the games, I’ve parkoured my way through a lot, from entering the series with the iconicAssassin’s Creed 2to trying out more sidelined titles like the PS Vita spin-offAssassin’s Creed 3: Liberation. I’ve started to fatigue with the scale of the modern open-world games, but after spending some time withAssassin’s Creed Shadowsat ahands-on preview event, I think it might just have the hook to get me excited again.
If there’s any one thing I want out of anAssassin’s Creedgame, it’s a sense of identity. While the hodgepodge additions and revisions to the series have always come together in imperfect ways, the entries that I find most memorable tend to have a big idea that the design actually commits to.InAssassin’s Creed Shadows, the dual protagonists of Yasuke and Naoe feel like that big idea, and the execution isn’t mired in the half-measures that lead to the franchise’s biggest disappointments.
Assassin’s Creed Used To Reinvent Its Protagonists
Connor Wasn’t All That Bad
Shadowsisn’t the firstAssassin’s Creedgame to feature dual protagonists. While the other open-world RPG entries have played around with male and female options,Assassin’s Creed Syndicateis the one that previously committed to swapping between playstyles. Even inSyndicate, however, the difference isn’t particularly pronounced, serving as a microcosm of a problem that’s been weighing the series down for a while.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows' Game Director Charles Benoit On Split Protagonists, Stealth & Breaking The Rules
Ahead of Assassin’s Creed Shadows releasing, Screen Rant sat down with Game Director Charles Benoit to discuss changes, split protagonists, and more.
Perhaps my biggestAssassin’s Creedhot take is thatAssassin’s Creed 3isn’t one of the weaker entries. While it introduced ideas that pulled the series away from its core strengths, it did so with thoughtfulness, launch bugs aside. I love how muchAC3is built around its protagonist, Connor, a step down from Ezio that does, at least, step somewhere.Connor acts very differently than Ezio does, but more importantly, he moves through the world differently. From his ballet of axe-based combat to weightier parkour that opens up pathways between trees, everything is rethought for the character at hand.
For all the strengths of later games,it’s been a while since characters have felt like pointed reinventionsin that way.Assassin’s Creed Mirage’s Basimis fast, but he’s fast in the way of a sped-up Eivor, the preceding protagonist fromValhalla.Although I knew thatAssassin’s Creed Shadowswas promising a big difference between Yasuke and Naoe, the history of decreasing distinctions was always dragging my expectations down. As it turns out, I didn’t need to be pessimistic.
Yasuke & Naoe Are Truly Different In AC Shadows
Real Strengths & Weaknesses
Yasuke and Naoe are, in practice, what Jacob and Evie were in theory. Yasuke has real impact, and not in the typical blend of strength and grace. By offloading the traditional joys of stealth and parkour to Naoe,Shadowsis able to take Yasuke’s lack of agility to real destinations, from teetering attempts at freerunning to Brutal Assassinations that give enemies a heads-up before Yasuke runs them through. I’m sure his limitations will prove divisive, but even if I don’t want to run around the map with Yasuke all the time, I find it refreshing to see trade-offs embraced.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows: Release Date, Protagonists, Setting, & Story
The first trailer for Assassin’s Creed Shadows reveals its release date, dual protagonists, and the first inklings of a story. Here’s what to expect.
Naoe’s traditional approach is still more my thing, admittedly, butshe also feels liberated by the dynamic. Unlike Kassandra or Eivor, she doesn’t have to be capable of wielding heavy weapons, and the game can punish her for entering brawls without locking off that avenue altogether. When I died to a group of suspicious merchants, I switched to Yasuke instead of playing smarter, and it’s nice to have that option for a more id-driven approach when the mood strikes.
Character Stories Matter As Much As Mechanics
I’m Actually Compelled By The Narrative Presentation
The playing field also feels more developed when it comes to the character narratives, even if neither are likely to become the new Ezio.Assassin’s Creed Odyssey’s Alexiosis a great character on the side, but he feels shoved into the role of being a protagonist option, enhancing the sense that Kassandra is the “canon” character.Yasuke and Naoe are both perfectly positioned to provide interesting, distinct angleson the main story, and the way that both engage with NPCs and story beats is satisfying.
For context,Assassin’s Creed Shadowstakes place in Japan’s conflict-filled Sengoku period, with Yasuke and Naoe initially positioned on very different sides of Oda Nobunaga’s quest for unification.
For the first time in a while,I found myself immediately interested in where the narrative is going, an area that’s been let down by the presentation of some recent Ubisoft games across the board. AlthoughBlack Flagisn’t one of my personal favorites — another hot take that runs counter to my personal love for pirates — comparisons between its bespoke cutscenes and lifeless modern alternatives strike a chord.Indiana Jones and the Great Circlerecently spoiled me to a degree that makes cinematic presentation in other games underwhelming, butShadowsfeels like a step in the right direction.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows Shows Some Reflection
It’s Not Just Full Steam Ahead
Maybe more than anything,I’m just happy to see anAssassin’s Creedteam really pay attention to some elements that have fallen by the wayside.Miragedid this with stealth, but it had an unfortunate number of compromises elsewhere, from the aforementioned lifeless cutscenes to stiff kill animations that lurch into motion. WhileAssassin’s Creed Shadowsobviously doesn’t deliver on every possible opportunity — I would have loved to see Naoe get a little closer to Connor’s adaptability in nature, for example — I found myself running into far fewer elements that felt underbaked in the preview.
I don’t thinkShadowswill be the miracle game that gets everything right for me, and there’s definitely a sense that it’s playing catch-up as the franchise’s innovations have been picked up and sometimes done better elsewhere.My biggest concern withShadowsis still that the world will feel more hollow than the smaller gamesin the series, a problem that has consistently plagued past entries of its scale. I do, however, feel like it’s finally managing to both re-establish past strengths and move forward with new ones, something thatAssassin’s Creedhas been struggling to synchronize for a while.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows Has A Few Major Features Being Added To Its Vast Open World
Ubisoft has revealed some new information for how exploration will look in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, introducing scouts and a new viewfinder mechanic.
I’m well-aware that not everyone is as enthused byAssassin’s Creed Shadows' approach to protagonists, but playing the game convinced me that the dichotomy presented by the pair is the obvious choice. I can’t imagine designing Naoe and not latching onto Yasuke as a historical gift of her natural counterpart, and I can’t imagine making a game with Yasuke and not building someone like Naoe to pull everything together. Playing around in historical settings is what usually draws me toAssassin’s Creed, but in the case ofShadows, who I’m playing in that setting as might be the best part.
