Players will have the ability to switch between a stealthy and hulking protagonist when Assassin’s Creed Shadows launches later this year, offering two distinct modes of play. Say what you will about Assassin’s Creed , it must be a nightmare for the developers at Ubisoft to find new ways to make each new entry distinct. Assassin’s Creed Shadows is evidence enough of this, given that it’s major ‘innovation’ is the ability to switch between two different protagonists that play distinctly – a prospect already attempted in the series before, in 2015’s Assassin’ Creed Syndicate.
In fairness, from what I saw during an hour-long hands-off demo as part of Summer Game Fest , Shadows looks to have the dual protagonists of Yasuke and Naoe handle much differently than Evie and Jacob ever did. Coupled with an undeniably jaw-dropping rendition of Japan’s Azuchi-Momoyama period to explore, this year’s stealth-em-up could be great. Just don’t expect this to be a bold new step for the franchise.
The first thing that stands out is just how bloody and brutal the combat is this time around. Last year's Assassin’s Creed Mirage purposely discouraged entering direct fights by primarily offering tools for stealth, so seeing Yasuke use his club-like kanabō weapon to repeatedly pound out spurts of blood from his enemies took me aback. Being the hulking samurai that he is, his brutality makes sense, so it’s good to see this well represented by the on-screen kill animations.
