Assassin’s Creed Shadows Dev Put Significant Effort Into Creating a Respectful Representation, but Was Never Meant to Be a Factual Representation of History

Ubisoft has put significant effort into ensuring Assassin’s Creed Shadows is an immersive and respectful representation of Feudal Japan, but the game was never meant to be a factual representation of history or historical characters.

Earlier today, Ubisoft shared a new message on X/Twitter addressed to the Japanese community, which doesn’t seem to be taking some of the developer’s decisions too well, going over some of the controversies surrounding the next entry in the series set in Feudal Japan. As mentioned above, Ubisoft said that the entirety of the series isn’t meant to be a factual representation of history, but it is aimed at sparking curiosity and encouraging players to learn more about the historical settings the developers are inspired by. As such, Assassin’s Creed Shadows is designed, first and foremost, to be an entertaining game that tells a compelling fiction set in Feudal Japan.

Despite their sustained efforts, Ubisoft recognizes that some of the Assassin’s Creed Shadows marketing caused concerns within the Japanese community, and for that, they apologize. At the same time, the development team reminded fans how the series has always taken creative license and incorporated fantasy elements to craft engaging experiences. It was the same in the new entry in the series with Yasuke, who’s represented as a samurai despite this status being a matter of debate and discussion. This is woven into the narrative and with the other lead character, Naoe, to provide players with different gameplay styles.

Assassin’s Creed Shadows launches on November 15th for PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S.