Assassin's Creed Shadows Hands-On Preview: Heading In The Right Direction

The arrival of a new Assassin's Creed might be one of the most routinely expected events in the gaming sphere, but when it comes to Assassin's Creed Shadows, things feel a little different. Even when it was only known by the project title Codename Red, the announcement of anAssassin's Creed set in Japan fulfilled a request that's been around for as long as the series has. As the game has inched closer to release, however, it's come to bear a greater weight, with delays and changing launch plans highlighting how important it is for Ubisoft to land a hit.

Screen Rant had the opportunity to spend six hours playing a work-in-progress build of Assassin's Creed Shadows at the Ubisoft Québec office, and while that might be a drop in the bucket of the gigantic open-world adventure, it's plenty of time to learn a lot about the game. Like many long-time Assassin's Creed fans, I've been equally excited and nervous about the release, which could easily lean into either the best or worst tendencies of the series. Thankfully, six hours was enough to convince me that Assassin's Creed Shadows embraces a lot of the good and refreshingly little of the bad.

Two Protagonists That Stand Apart

A Proper Shared Narrative

The Assassin's Creed Shadows preview started with the game's prologue, a story-heavy part of the game that Ubisoft wants to keep unspoiled. After playing it, I get why. The prologue is burdened with all the necessary mechanical work, setting up the dual protagonists of Yasuke and Naoe while walking players through the motions of combat, but it also goes for a big emotional swing. While Assassin's Creed has often struggled with compelling narrative presentation in recent years, the cutscene that caps the opening of Naoe's story sticks the landing.

The prologue has heft, but the lion's share of the gameplay preview was spent a bit further along in the game, taking place two years after the introductory events. Centered around Himeji Castle, this portion of the game offers the usual Assassin's Creed mix of exploration, stealth, and combat. Naoe, a shinobi who moves gracefully and strikes silently, works better for exploration and stealth, while Yasuke is the easy pick for a brawl.

In my time spent with Shadows, I naturally gravitated toward Naoe, but I did spend a fair amount of time with Yasuke. While that was partly guided by the intention of understanding both characters, I did have a reason to opt for him at a few different times. When I picked up a Wanted status as Naoe, switching to Yasuke took off the heat, and a few key gameplay segments were fun to approach with his natural lack of subtlety.

Same Framework, New Mechanics

A More Dynamic World

I'm a stealth loyalist, though, and Shadows offers a lot more to talk about in that regard than Assassin's Creed has in a while. True to its name, Shadows makes use of lighting in stealth, cloaking Naoe and Yasuke when they stay away from illumination. It's not just a static element of level design, as tossing a shuriken at a light source can snuff it. Changes in weather can have similar effects, with fog providing more cover than a sunny day.

Taking some other tweaks into account, like the ability to go completely prone, Assassin's Creed Shadows certainly grants the player more control over stealth. It took me a while to get out of old habits and start applying the potential of these systems, but the changes feel natural, and they're integrated in a surprisingly seamless way compared to the lumbering weight of iteration in some of Assassin's Creed's weaker entries. While I didn't find the stealth scenarios presented in the preview quite as fascinating as Mirage's best challenges, Mirage runs circles around most of the series in that regard.

Once cover is blown, the scale definitely tips in Shadows' favor, with a significantly more fluid and satisfying approach to combat. Like Basim, Naoe is easily overwhelmed by enemy hordes, but getting the hang of her timing allows her to navigate multiple enemies without getting stuck between opponents. Yasuke has no trouble at all, but switching to his heavier weapons also requires some skill with timing, a dynamic that operates similarly to the approach in Origins, Odyssey, and Valhalla.

A couple of ranged weapons are also key to Yasuke's toolkit, with a heavy bow for stealth and a matchlock gun when it's time to blow cover.

Even if I can't see myself playing the majority of the game as Yasuke, his comparative clumsiness is actually one of the game's strong points. Assassin's Creed has always had some imperative to make every character graceful, but Shadows commits to the contrast, emphasizing Yasuke's weight as he smashes through doors and breaks ropes beneath him. Rather than running across the ridge of a roof, Yasuke teeters with hands outstretched. Making him sing as a stealth character is a real challenge, but while I haven't yet mastered it, an opportunity to watch game director Charles Benoit play proved that it's very possible.

I stuck to Naoe for the climactic fight in the preview, and her inherent grace translates just as well to a one-on-one clash of swords. For all that I love about classic Assassin's Creed games, it's hard to deny that her seamless backflip away from a strike is a significant evolution from anything Ezio ever did against a boss. Most strikingly, the minor succession of narrative choices before and after the battle once again showcased some emotional weight, and even if the overall story impact isn't game-changing, the bittersweet layers added to the villain's death might be one of the stronger arguments for the franchise's sometimes unconvincing RPG turn.

Assassin's Creed Shadows Embraces The Hideout

A Side Mode For Decorators

The last hour of hands-on gameplay was spent with the hideout, a side mode that builds on Odin's Camp from Valhalla. Shadows fleshes things out into a base-building experience, where various constructions can provide gameplay benefits or simply enhance the area's aesthetic appeal. Although progressing the hideout isn't mandatory, it operates in a back-and-forth with the main game, as decorations can be found and unlocked throughout the course of general gameplay.

The hideout isn't a particularly necessary addition to Shadows, but it makes sense as an evolution of past management elements in the franchise, and it's less wholly reliant on menus than, say, Brotherhood's system. As a largely separate system, it doesn't feel like a threat to the game's focus. Playing around with it for an hour straight probably isn't the best way to interact with its presence in Shadows, but I can see myself curating a nature reserve in smaller bursts, and talking to NPCs there is a charming offset to the thrust of the main story.

Final Impressions Of Assassin's Creed Shadows

Assassin's Creed Isn't Rolling Over

The traditional strengths of Assassin's Creed cropped up throughout the gameplay preview — thrilling landmarks, beautiful vistas, and a greatest hits approach to history that focuses on the big gestures while grounding them in fact. A few potential sticking points also hang around, like a mix of side activities that sometimes feels more like ways to fill out a map than bespoke additions. Within the bounds of the area surrounding Himeji Castle, I couldn't get a complete feel for how quests are structured across the map, a design prerogative that has seen some highs and lows in the series.

The traditional strengths of Assassin's Creed cropped up throughout the gameplay preview — thrilling landmarks, beautiful vistas, and a greatest hits approach to history.

More than anything, going hands-on with AC Shadows offered me a sense of renewed excitement for a game that hadn't yet enticed me in the way it would have a decade ago. I'm not sure if any modern Assassin's Creed is likely to represent a new franchise peak for me, but even in an imperfect preview build, this feels like a surprisingly assured evolution. Trailing after titles like Ghost of Tsushima and Rise of the Ronin, Assassin's Creed Shadows enters a more competitive world than games in its brotherhood have, but it's not willing to go down without a fight.

Source: Ubisoft/YouTube