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Still faffing around with that godforsaken Animus storyline that never resolves, you aren’t exactly flung head-first into the action. There is a bit of bouncing around the timeline and a bit of highly emotional stuff that most people will get bored by. Shadows is generally trying to tell a more “mature” reserved Japanese story than a ninja version of pirates, Greeks, and Italians going to stab stuff. The dialog isn’t though, and what I think stands out is how Western the writing is in comparison to several other games set in Japan, like Yakuza or Rise of the Ronin.

Trying to portray this Western idea of Japanese characters being reserved, Naoe is on a typical revenge plot against several ronin collectively called The Onryo/Shinbakufu, presumably under daimyo Oda Nobunaga (a feudal lord). The Onryo rather quickly kills Naoe’s father during Nobunaga’s attack on Iga. Yasuke was part of that battle on the other side after becoming Nobunaga’s guard and samurai, ultimately renaming himself. The two have a story that intertwines following the events of the Honnō-ji incident. Like most Assassin’s Creed games, it is historical fiction that dances the line of reality as the series always has.

Another “significant” departure from what the series was to begin with, we’re still on this large RPG thing where you probably start thinking about level 15 that there is a bit of a grind. However, there are enough interesting additions/changes from the last mainline Assassin’s Creed I’ve found the time to play. Now events in the world such as random conversations, or traveling vendors being shaken down or near executed can be useful for Naoe and later Yasuke. While the two themselves are quite different in gameplay styles.

Naoe’s nimble and quick attacks offer her up to easier stealth, while… Listen Yasuke is a large Black guy clad in significant amounts of armor and has a katana about the size of Naoe, he’s not base-jumping off of anything with grace. The first time I fast-traveled to one of those Leap of Faith spots the series is known for with Yasuke and threw him off into some hay, I think I just about fell out of my seat. While Edward, Altaïr, Kassandra, and so on fly like Dick Fosbury at the 1968 Olympics, Yasuke is much more realistic, landing like a ton of bricks.

The two are diametrically opposed. Naoe is referred to as the Shadow of Iga for her ability to infiltrate, take down, and steal information or items, while most people sort of know of the only Black guy in the region. Yasuke’s actions, much like his landings, with a Katana are a bit more “brutish” using his height and weight advantage to tank and down anything. However, that does mean that for the first Assassin’s Creed game since Assassin’s Creed Nexus, you’re playing as a character who can’t jump and climb like a cat up the new curtains you bought for the living room. It removes some of the identity the series has always had.

Is it a bad thing? No, you can still do it, you just have to play as the young woman. I know, such a hard choice for the people who said they’re boycotting Shadows but secretly bought it anyway. I think Shadows is the Assassin’s Creed identity crisis at its peak: The RPG elements introduced by Origins, which I don’t hear armchair historians complaining about, are refined into the same tired tropes of tech-trees, numbers, and dialog options. That said, I’m not tired of them as fun gameplay mechanics in an otherwise fun “action-adventure” title set in Japan.

The clanging of blades isn’t that of Ghost of Tsushima nor the more delicate Souls-based attacks of Rise of the Ronin. Yet Assassin’s Creed Shadows is something of its own, with a story that is probably the most personal bit of it all. However, despite the angle-grinded production line-like gameplay that all feels so familiar, there are large swathes of Shadows that greatly divert from what we know of the typical Ubisoft title. I’m talking mostly about the exploration of this rather large and sometimes beautiful world, if you can put aside the lack of B-lines and the hours I spent running blindly through the night in bushes.

Sure you can activate a setting in the options to give you back those godforsaken markers over every objective, but you do yourself a disservice by doing so. Instead, Shadows has you launching Naoe’s hunt for the Onryo with directions: North of X landmark, but east of Y temple. It offers not only a more natural way of finding your objectives on a huge map (as has become common) but it also allows for Naoe’s spy network to work to her advantage. A spy network that is formed by freeing captives, saving people who are being attacked, and so on.

I’ve found myself liking this more as it opens up exploration and gives you a reason to go to some parts of the map you wouldn’t otherwise. Sure there are still those Leap of Faith vantage points that swirl around you once you activate them, but they don’t cause an explosion of fifty million map markers either. Instead, it highlights points to see something interesting and explore on your own. I’ll take that and having a set of scouts in a shinobi’s spy network than Far Cry 5’s offerings, as an example.

Though of course that isn’t the only thing that has been added into a game that will easily take tens of hours to properly complete. Be a naughty shinobi or samurai, killing clan members and those on the list of Onryo, you’ll get a wanted level like you stole a bike, shot 10 prostitutes, and went to the Vanilla Unicorn. The only way to get rid of this constant and not too threatening threat is to upgrade your “Animal Crossing-like” hideout, to which I want to know what some people are doing on Tom Nook’s island. Are you cooking meth?

Instead of going out into cities and finding people to upgrade your weapons or just letting you do it all the time, this is where you get more calm, heartfelt moments and a bit of respite before chopping heads off with ease. I don’t hate it, it does what it needs to in order to be part of the main systems. However, very quickly I found that having the forger in my hideout meant I was unstoppable.

Similar to Odyssey and presumably others of the later Assassin’s Creed series, you have items and gear based on common, uncommon, rare, and “Holy Jesus, this was touched by the Kami themselves!” As you level up you can (obviously) scale up these pieces with you, and very quickly I found quite a bit of legendary gear throughout the (lengthy) prologue and never needed to touch the gear of dirty peasants. I don’t know if that’s the review build, the luck I had finding stuff, or if that’s genuinely a common experience.

That doesn’t mean you’ll breeze through Shadows, of course. Despite Yasuke being highlighted throughout the initial trailer and thus all anyone spoke about for months, you hardly play as him for several hours throughout the prologue. With heavy emotional character beats coming one after another, there is a lot to be said (that would also be spoilers) about the story direction this time out for an Assassin’s Creed game. Is Shadows campy about its Assassins’ and Templars’ history? No, unless you’re the most die-hard of fans (I watch it every Christmas), it is just vague mythology from a far-off land.

It isn’t until much later – the reason this review is a day late after a week of playing sort of “later” – that you get pay-off to each of Yasuke and Naoe’s plots, but also some threads left hanging around. Assassin’s Creed Shadows feels like it is trying to do these more “mature” plots Sony and the likes have attempted in recent years. Of course, there are comparisons to be made with Ghost of Tsushima. However, I think as much as you could say Ghost of Tsushima is better for clanging katanas or Rise of the Ronin is for Ninja-based Monster Hunter, Shadows does enough to keep that uniquely Ubisoft feel about it.

Despite it’s want to be more mature and heavy, there is a significant portion of that second act that doesn’t exactly feel bloated but goes without major plot development. That’s not to say I found myself hating playing more of Shadows, but it did leave me saying to myself “What was that bit again?” or “Ok, this has been going on for how long?” It’s the typical narrative dissonance of an open world that’s massive and has lots of other tasks to do, people to save, and hideout homesteads to design.

Where Shadows peeks out from behind the crates, pallets of wood, a bush or pile of hay, and anything else that lets you obscure yourself are the systems highlighting both characters. From crawling prone in the long grass as Naoe or running as fast as Yasuke can into smaller foes, Assassin’s Creed Shadows doesn’t have the identity Black Flag or other games might have. However, it does something quite standalone, something that’s still enjoyable 50-60 hours in. Be it exploring for special gear, playing through a storyline, or even playing around and taking in the world via the photo mode, sometimes through the splatters of blood.

I almost don’t want to talk too much about the performance of Shadows for several reasons. Not because I had many significant issues but because of the number of hours played before the day-one patch. Not only the day-one patch but also Nvidia’s latest graphics drivers specifically for Shadows itself. I’d say I’ve only gotten in about 10-15 hours since both of those, and that in comparison to the tens before the patch and drivers makes it weighted too much in one direction to say either way. That said, I didn’t really see too many issues in-gameplay or while messing around to get a decent, consistent performance.

I was playing on an i-7, 32GB of RAM, and a 40 series RTX as I usually do, and the only problem I found was cutscenes. Running throughout Kyoto or Osaka I’d get 60 frames on the rather high to medium sort of settings, with ultra before patches and drivers having some limited issues. However, all cutscenes are force-limited to 30 frames per second. Of course, jumping in and out of cutscenes as you might expect in say a boss battle means there is a moment of lurching back down to console frame rates of a prior generation. “Well, it’s more cinematic,” I don’t care I’m playing a game.

Be it the detailing on Yasuke’s armor or the falling petals and fog of bamboo forests, Shadows looks and feels stunning. Aside from those times when you’re trying to Skyrim-Horse your way up a mountain to B-line while you ride a horse that is riding a bush, some moments make Shadows look stunning enough for you to stop. Either because you’ve run into a ronin that wants to kill you or a picturesque scene catches your eye.

Ultimately, Assassin’s Creed Shadows is stepping out from the shadow of stabbing stuff from on high, and to a degree, it begs the question of why it’s an Assassin’s Creed game in the first place. Despite that, I think Shadows places itself alongside (not below) Ghost of Tsushima as my go-to feudal Japan explore-a-thon. The obligatory Animus Hub and in-game store aren’t worth the breath, just money people being money people, but Shadows itself doesn’t feel as touched as PGA Tour 2K25. Shadows is genuinely a great action or stealth option, with a delightful world and a story that is maybe a touch long in the tooth.

A PC review copy of Assassin’s Creed Shadows was provided by Ubisoft for this review.

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Assassin's Creed Shadows

$69.99

8

Score

8.0/10

Pros

• Solid, Katana-based Ubisoft-ified combat.
• A stunning world to explore and navigate.
• The differences between Naoe and Yasuke.
• The new vague-direction quest marking.

Cons

• A second act that forgets to really show up too much.
• So many American accents in the English translation.