When it was first revealed, Assassin’s Creed Shadows was pegged for a 15 November release. The game has since had its release date pushed back twice, initially to February, and then to 20 March. But prior the the most recent delay, Ubisoft had already extended an invitation to us to visit its Singapore studio, and get an early look at the game while we’re at it. That happened earlier in the week, and here are some of my initial thoughts based on the hands-on session.
Worth noting though as considering the additional delay that happened between when the visit was arranged and when it actually happened, this preview build may be one version further removed from the release verison of Assassin’s Creed Shadows. So while there’s the usual disclaimer of what I’m sharing here not necessarily being representative of the final product, it is doubly so this time around.
With all that out of the way, let’s go over a general overview of what it’s like to play Assassin’s Creed Shadows, preview build issues notwithstanding. The biggest takeaway for me was the fact that the two playable characters Naoe and Yasuke play very differently, which is a massive improvement over the dual protagonists of Syndicate. In fact, it’s so different to point of being jarring when you first start out.
For instance, it’s only a small exaggeration to say that parkour is beyond Yasuke in Assassin’s Creed Shadows. Which is fair, considering a full suit of samurai armour can weigh up to about 20kg. In practice, this means he’ll struggle to climb up or make jumps of 2m or more, and whatever he can climb, there’s visible effort being exerted to do so. On the flip side, he can take more hits in combat, and have more options that doesn’t rely on item consumption.
On the other extreme, you have Naoe, which you’ll likely use during your explorations. This is because not only can she climb walls with much higher proficiency – comparable to protagonists of older titles – but also because she has other tools that’s more suited to scouting, like the old Eagle Vision. Of course, this means she is a lot frailer in combat, taking half the hits Yasuke can take before going down, and will be pretty reliant on smoke bombs when massively outnumbered.
While we’re here, let’s talk a bit more about movement in Assassin’s Creed Shadows. Overall, the parkour systems feel pretty similar to the more recent entries, with parkour-up and -down still being a thing. Naoe also gets a grappling hook which she can use to immediately climb up to low roofs without having to scale its walls, swing off certain tree branches, or extend her jump, like a massively improved hookblade from Revelations. That being said, its use seems a tad limiting, as you can seemingly only hook onto a roof above you while you are grounded or climbing, and not while airborne.
New to Assassin’s Creed Shadows though is the ability to go prone, which unlocks more possibilities like hiding in not-so-tall grass in addition to crouching behind tall grass. But more importantly, this also allows for crawling under the engawa, or veranda, which is this game’s equivalent of crawling into vents in Metal Gear Solid. To sort of balance this, enemies who are searching for you will go a bit further to flush you out of hidey holes, such as cutting grass of any length.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows also gets day and night cycles, dynamic weather, and the cycling of seasons. Like many stealth games with these features, it will affect the ease or difficulty of sneaking, such as rain masking the sound of footsteps, and night time leaving a lot of dark spots to hide in. There’s also the ability to blow out candles to create more darkness, which is reminiscent of the old Splinter Cell games. Though you’ve probably seen this in the gameplay trailers.
If you’re like me and are among the apparent minority that still holds the first entry in higher regard than, say, the Ezio trilogy, then you’ll probably enjoy having to do your own scouting and investigation before attempting to take out your contracted target. The way synchronisation works in Assassin’s Creed Shadows has also changed a bit, so rather than simply unlocking more map markets, question marks appear on the map instead, and you’ll have to go to each one to discover what they are. This does encourage some more exploration, but with the preview build being restricted to only one section of the map it remains to be seen what sort of impact this will have on the game.
Speaking of impact, you have the option to play the game in what is dubbed as Immersive mode, which will have the Jesuits speak in Portuguese while the other characters speak in Japanese. Of course, the alternative is to have all of the characters speak in your chosen language, which will probably not be as fun if you value your immersion. That being said, even with this mode turned on chances are most of your gameplay experience will consist of Japanese dialogue, with Portuguese only being featured in Yasuke’s prologue.
Unfortunately, on the flip side Assassin’s Creed Shadows is another victim of chronic dubtitle syndrome, which completely ruins immersion once you notice it happening. This is most obvious in Naoe’s prologue where the subs actually spell out “Chichiue” (父上) rather than use “father” or “dad”, when the actual Japanese script has her saying the antiquated “Otou” (おとう). Then there are other changes that seem to be for change’s sake, such as one Naoe’s own father’s name and the name of her horse.
From the short time with the preview build, the elements of Assassin’s Creed Shadows that I’ve covered so far are likely to stick around until the game finally releases. But the preview build is also a pretty contained experience, in a specific part of the story with both characters levelled to some degree and provided some pretty good gear from the get go as well. So my opinion on the game from this point on will be a lot more subjective, and your mileage may vary.
And on that note, we get to character progression. Despite going back to the old school parkour where you have to look for crimps to climb, the RPG mechanics of Origin, Odyssey and Valhalla are here to stay. Which means that it’s possible for a stealth assassination to only end up tickling an elite enemy if you’re under-levelled or under-geared. I’m hesitant to be giving more of my impressions on these because of the reasons mentioned above, but know that if you want a simpler experience like Mirage or the classic titles, you’ll not be getting that in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
In the same vein, there’s the sort of base-building bit going on which was also locked as part of the preview, so not much to say on that as well besides that the mechanic exists. Though these convey the usual passive quality-of-life bonuses that you’d expect when you build it up. You can likely ignore it completely and still play Assassin’s Creed Shadows just fine, as I have with the preview build, but why would you say not to QoL?
Finally circling back to the immersion bit mentioned above, lip syncing for the Japanese lines seem a tad stiff. This is reminiscent of the Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut, which uses AI lip sync. I’m unsure if this is something that will be touched up in the additional month-long delay or if this is just what it is when Assassin’s Creed Shadows gets released, but it’s something I thought was worth mentioning.
The phrases “cautiously optimistic” and “has potential” have been overused to death and back, but for better or worse they are the perfect phrases to describe Assassin’s Creed Shadows, at least based on the preview build. The gameplay has been promising, considering the two protagonists have such vastly different strengths and weaknesses. And arguably for any video game, that’s the most important thing, so it has that going for itself.
I would go as far to say as the two protagonists make for a more interesting gameplay loop than even Ghost of Tsushima which, to be clear, I absolutely adore. Of course, the jury is still out as to whether the rest of the game matches up, but we’ll find that out once Assassin’s Creed Shadows launches on 20 March.
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