Not long ago, the release of Assassin’s Creed Shadows was moved to February 2025. And while this event might have come as a surprise to the public, the developers themselves breathed a sigh of relief. As insider Tom Henderson reports, Ubisoft Quebec, responsible for the game, has long been asking for more time.
According to the insider, this is quite a complicated issue, as it mixes together a strict development timeline, polishing, and the struggle for historical and cultural accuracy due to the concerns of Japanese fans. Here are the main points:
Contrary to rumors, the samurai Yasuke is not going to be cut from the game. However, the developers will slightly change how he is depicted in Shadows, as well as make edits to his storyline so as not to distort history. The team will also clean up the architecture and make sure that the setting is historically sound, but also fits into the Assassin’s Creed universe.
- Ubisoft usually strictly monitors the correctness of assets, but in the case of Shadows, experts in the field of history were brought in relatively late. In addition, there was a misunderstanding between departments, and during the process of approving assets, the developers had to cut corners in order to deliver everything on time.
- Currently, Shadows is far from the technical state it should be in at release. Some gameplay mechanics and other components of the game have been changed - they also require time to debug.
Recall that in the official announcement of the postponement, Ubisoft said that more time was needed to polish and improve the experience of the game. Separately, the company said that the decision was also influenced by the unsuccessful launch of Star Wars Outlaws. According to the media, the action movie about Kay Vess and Nix was bought only 1 million times, which disappointed the studio.
A little later, Henderson listed a few more busy details about Assassin's Creed:
- Developers believe Ubisoft has given them an adequate amount of time to finalize.
- The postponement of Shadows will affect the release dates of other installments in the series, but it's unclear how much.
- Invictus multiplayer, Hexe, and a Black Flag remake are still in development. Ubisoft is optimistic about them.
- Everyone inside the studio is happy that the games will be released on Steam again.
Now Assassin’s Creed Shadows will be released only on February 14 on PC (Epic Games Store, Steam, Ubisoft Connect), PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series. As Henderson said, the number of pre-orders for Shadows lags behind those of Valhalla, but their number is still quite significant. It is possible that with the appearance of the game page on Steam, there will be even more pre-orders.
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