Some of the developers who worked on (and are still working on) Assassin’s Creed Shadows hopped into a Reddit AMA to answer fan questions about Ubisoft’s latest entry in its stabby historical fiction franchise. Not all of the questions and answers were revealing, but buried in the AMA were some interesting pieces of information about the lore of Assassin’s Creed, upcoming games in the series, more updates coming for Shadows, and a confirmation on some features that won’t be added in future updates.
Here are 10(ish) things we learned about Assassin’s Creed Shadows from the August 12 AMA on the Assassin’s Creed subreddit.
The war between Assassins and Templars will continue
When a fan asked if players can expect more content about the franchise’s classic conflict between Assassins and Templars, AC Shadows level design director Luc had this to say:
“The Assassins vs. Templars conflict has always been a core pillar of Assassin’s Creed. With Shadows, we wanted to properly set our protagonist in the setting before expanding on the Assassins vs. Templars. Now that it’s done on the main game, we scratched the surface with the Critical Role story drop, and you can expect more deep dive in this conflict in the near future.”
Why Ubisoft Didn’t Include The Modern-Day Storyline
Another user asked where Basim was and if his modern-day storyline, which began in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, will ever return or if Ubisoft had moved on. Once again, Luc replied to this question and explained why it was missing and teased more to come in the future:
“We have complex new characters that were introduced in Shadows that we didn’t feel there would have been enough spotlight for Basim as well. With AC Shadows we are putting in place the first stone of new means to deliver the Modern Day story line with the Animus HUB. That is not the end of it, and we are listening to your feedback. While Modern Day is not the main focus of the story we tell with Shadows, it remains important for our community, so you can expect it to be expanded at some point, in some fashion…”
The Team Isn’t Retconning Assassin’s Creed Lore
A seeming expert in Assassin’s Creed lore asked a bunch of long questions about the franchise’s universe and how they were worried that parts of it from older games, such as Isu artifacts, were being ignored or even retconned completely. Again, Luc swooped in to provide an extended answer you can read here, but this bit is his confirmation that the team isn’t erasing AC lore; they just aren’t always including it in games unless it makes sense.
“The AC lore is very complex and keeps expanding as we are creating new games. We are not retconning what we have done in the past, but we do not necessarily mention everything in every game if it doesn’t directly support the narrative we are building. In our timeline Japan wasn’t unified yet, and not mentioning Shao Jun and her apprentice doesn’t mean that they couldn’t have co-existed.
“Similar to this, the fact that there is no Isu artifact in the main game of Shadows doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist in the world of Shadows; it just wasn’t a story device that we needed for the story we wanted to tell.”
More Story Updates Will Be Added To Assassin’s Creed Shadows
One last answer about Assassin’s Creed Shadows and its narrative. This time, someone asked about whether any new story updates or additional expansions will be forthcoming. Simon, associate game director on Shadows, replied:
“We are hard at work [on] more free story drops that will come in the future – nothing we can announce yet though! We’ll let you sink your teeth into the Claws of Awaji [expansion] first, and you tell us if you want more!”
Making Yasuke Or Naoe Your In-Game Companion
One really interesting question that resulted in an equally interesting response was about Ubisoft adding a feature to Shadows that would let players call the other main character as a companion. AC Shadows live producer André said that the feature would be “cool” but admitted that its unlikely to happen because it would involve a lot of work.
“That would be a cool feature for sure!! We would love to do this also but at the moment it is not in development but I can tell you we have discussed about this internally but a lot of technicalities as to be overcome so we can’t deliver such a feature.”
“For example, the quality of our main character is so high we would need to spawn them in a much lower quality to not explode the memory. Another element would be to develop an AI for them that is fitting with our balancing. No technical problems can’t be overcome, but it would require a lot of effort. More than we are willing to spend on this feature without compromising every other features our players are waiting for. In short, it is not planned at the moment. If it changes, we will let you know.”
Changing Seasons From Shadows Will Likely Show Up In Future AC Games
One of the coolest parts of Assassin’s Creed Shadows is how, over time, the seasons change across the map. This affects not only the look of the world, but also how you explore it. For example, it can make rivers freeze up and offer new paths to the player. It’s a nifty feature, and when asked if it will be included in future AC games, André implied that the tech will be shared with other Ubisoft teams and that he wouldn’t be surprised to see seasons in a future installment.
“I’m super happy to see you enjoyed that improvement in our world-building. We can’t promise anything for the future Assassin’s Creed, but what I can tell you is that our development team is sharing the tech and knowledge for future installments, so they can decide if they want to integrate the dynamic seasons. Developing those seasons required a lot of effort to put together, so every game will need decide if it’s important enough to invest all the time needed to deliver it compared to other features. I can tell you that internally everyone finds it amazing, also, so I would not be surprised to see it again in the future!”
Social Stealth Could Return In The Franchise
Speaking of features that could return, someone asked why social stealth was missing from Shadows after playing such a big role in 2023’s Assassin’s Creed Mirage. And Ubisoft confirmed that hiding in crowds and on benches is still a part of the series.
“For Shadows, our stealth team chose to put 100% of their energy on the moment-to-moment tactical shinobi experience, which left no space for Social Stealth… That does not mean that Social Stealth is gone from the Assassin’s Creed franchise, though!”
Mirage’s Parkour Helped Improve Naoe’s Moves In Shadows
When a player asked if Mirage had an impact on Shadows, specifically the game’s parkour, André admitted that due to how buildings are built in Japan and the team’s desire to keep the action grounded, they rebuilt parkour and didn’t reuse Mirage star Basim’s move set. That said, the parkour in Mirage did affect the post-launch updates that improved and expanded Naoe’s move set. Here’s part of André’s answer:
“The Mirage team’s dedication to parkour is what inspired us to do more post-launch parkour updates, and we use a lot of their work as stepping stones for Naoe’s improvements in post-launch and to involve some experts from the community in those discussions.”
No Discovery mode coming
Some bad news: There won’t be a non-combat-focused educational mode added to Shadows as we have seen in past games like Valhalla and Origins. With André delivering the disappointing news bluntly: “But to get to the core of your question, we do not currently have a ‘Japan Discovery Tour’ like we had for ‘Viking Age’ in the works.”
Also, No New Hair Options Are Being Added In Any Updates
And some more bad news: Ubisoft doesn’t plan on adding new hair customization options for either of the main characters in Shadows. Here’s André’s transparent answer to someone asking about more hair choices:
“We will not add more different type of hair for our character because, to be blunt, it is extremely costly. The complexity is to have the physic works appropriately in all scenarios we have.”
