168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Assassin's Creed Shadows is just over the horizon, and it feels like a game that has swelled in importance since it was announced. The 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:face of a culture war that has since 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:rapidly expanded to⛄ include everꦰy video game, but one where losses are disregarded and victories are massively exaggerated. But also the face of Ubisoft, a company that 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:once defined open world gameplay, now so🅷rely in need of a win, and relying onꦑ a twice-delayed game to get it.

Here's the real kicker - underneath it all, Assassin's Creed Shadows will be an 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Assassin's Creed game. It may be a good, bad, or middling version of that, but that is what it will be. I don't just mean in the obvious sense that it will bear the series name, but that it will also havꦡe the hallmarks. It will be fun in places, janky in others. Some quests will be cool, many will drag. You'll reach an inexplicable spike in the story where you're asked to complete Assassin's Creed-related tasks when you'd rather just be playing Assassin's Creed.𒁃 Underneath it all, Assassin's Creed Shadows will be an Assassin's Creed game.

Assassin's Creed Shadows Cannot Be More Of The Same

Can this possibly be enough? The first thing to point out is that we don't know the financial state of Ubisoft exactly, nor do we know what Shadows' overall budget was and how much it needs to make to turn everything around. But from the 168澳洲幸运5♔开奖网:repeated failures of its live-service endeavours, plus 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Star Wars Outlaws and 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Assassin's Creed Mirage fallingbelow expec🉐tations, we can assume that state is 'bad' and the amount of money Shadows needs to make is 'a lot'.

Assassin's Creed is one of the best known video game series in the world, and is certainly capable of making 'a lot'. As of September 2022, the last time we got an update, the series overall had sold 200 million copies. Valhalla, the last mainline full-sized game (with Mirage more of a double-A interpretation), is responsible for 20 million of those alone, and brought in $1 billion from sales and microtransactions. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Shadows could follow in its footsteps.

But also, many would say Valhalla is just 'good enough'. Enjoyable, with some cool moments, but never inspiring 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the love we see forꦡ Ezio's three game ꧑run, or the 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:pirate adventures of Black Flag. Five years later, can Shadows be just good enough and succeed? Despite 168澳洲幸运5开﷽奖🧔网:live-service mechanics becoming more commonplace, single-player💙 games tend to get more backlash for including them - though Valhalla admittedly got some at the time - and Assassin's Creed and Ubisoft have lost some cultural cache since 2020.

While Valhalla was simply The Next Assassin's Creed and thus fans accepted it doing a lot of the same stuff as the games that came before, there is a fear that Shadows could be The Last Assassin's Creed, and that brings a different sort of pressure. These fears may be exaggerated - we know that 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:work is continuing on Assassin's Cree🧔d Hexe - but nevertheless they ex🐭ist and will c🐓hange the tone of discussion around the game, and that could also hurt sales.

Is Assassin's Creed Ready For The Culture War?

Yasuke in Assassin's Creed Shadows.

Another obvious factor that will alter the tone around the game is the ongoing culture war surrounding it. This stems from the fact 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Yasuke (a real historical figure) is the star of the game. More accurately, it stems from the fact Yasuke is a Black man. These complaints range from arguments that playing as a non-Japanese person in a Japa🅘nese setting is disrespectful (something many, many games have done previously), to simple anger at being forced to play as a Black person at all. Ubisoft h𓆏as stopꦿped short of calling this criticism "racist", though it has deওfended the game's decision to centre on Y൩asuke.

When critics of the game are or to (and Naoe with 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Stellar Blade's Eve, a futuristic Korean android), it does not seem as though h💧istorical accuracy or cultural respect is the 💦main motivation.

How biased or legitimate this criticism of the game may be is largely moot, however. The fact is it exists, and has dominated the conversation around the game for a year. The old adage that the proof is in the pudding is correct - though few games have been targeted like Shadows, other games like 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Space Marine 2, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Monster Hunter Wilds, and 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Baldur's Gate 3 that were had this label when 𒉰the gam♍es launched to rapturous success.

Assassin's Creed Shadows is in too deep for that sort of 180, and so has the job of proving doubters wrong. These doubters may not be acting in good faith, but they are acting loudly nonetheless. If Shadows is 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:just another Assassin's Creed, good enough at g🐭oing through the motions but not particularly inspiring, it will 💝likely be dragged down at every turn by people willing the game to fail.

It leaves Shadows with a lot to do. It's not fair, but it is accurate. Everyt💙hing I've seen of Shadows makes it look like just another Assassin's Creed game, and if it were any other Assassin's Creed game, that would be enough. For Shadows, it might not be. We'll just have to wait and see.

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Your Rating

Assassin's Creed Shadows
Action
Stealth
RPG
Systems
13
8.5/10
Top Critic Avg: 81/100 Critics Rec: 81%
Released
March 20, 2025
ESRB
Matur෴eඣ 17+ // Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Language
Developer(s)
🌸 Ubisoft Quebec
Publisher(s)
Ubisoft
Engine
AnvilNext

WHERE TO PLAY

DIGITAL
PHYSICAL