AC Shadows is Taking One Successful Page Out of AC Unity’s Book

Posted by By our-little-miss-is-home January 11, 2025 8 Views 6 Min Read
AC Shadows is Taking One Successful Page Out of AC Unity's Book



The upcoming Assassin’s Creed Shadows is drawing closer to release, even with the game being plagued by several delays that have now seen its release date be pushed to March 20. Many fans are interested to see how Ubisoft will apply the modern RPG framework of the franchise to the long-anticipated setting of Feudal Japan, with every narrative and gameplay-related detail being squeezed out of each glimpse of in-game footage that has been shown.

The decision for Assassin’s Creed Shadows to feature two simultaneous protagonists is itself quite uncommon, being quite reminiscent of 2015’s AC Syndicate, and it already seems clear that this is having a large impact on gameplay. It always seemed obvious that the larger frame of Yasuke would lead to more brutal and powerful combat mechanics, and fans now have a good idea about how Naoe’s Shinobi background will impact the important parkour mechanics of AC Shadows. Recently released gameplay footage shows a focus on seamless transitions and smooth animations for AC Shadow‘s parkour, with the game seemingly taking great inspiration from one of the best aspects of 2014’s Assassin’s Creed Unity.

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Assassin’s Creed Shadows’ Parkour is Leaning Into the Strengths of the Franchise’s Past

The upcoming Assassin’s Creed Shadows is choosing to continue the franchise’s recent trend of massively expansive mainline releases that adopt RPG mechanics, being a far cry away from the more compact and intimate scale of the IP’s earliest releases. This will hopefully allow Shadows to portray a wide range of Japanese settlements and landscapes, having a much greater impact on the game’s parkour possibilities rather than its combat mechanics.

Freerunning and parkour have always been at the heart of the Assassin’s Creed franchise, being the secret weapon of the Assassin Brotherhood to rapidly traverse crowded urban spaces to eliminate targets and communicate with each other, yet the series has failed to really land on a consistent level of positive reception for the parkour mechanics of its many titles. A clear effort has been placed into AC Shadows to evolve the parkour mechanics that were seen in recent open-world games like Valhalla, with modern mainline franchise entries having focused largely on combat to the detriment of parkour.

Ubisoft recently teased some more gameplay footage of Assassin’s Creed Shadows, largely showcasing Naoe’s parkour abilities, and fans were quick to point out how this seems like a return to form for this aspect of the franchise. The studio has stated how a massive focus has been placed on increasing the density of “parkour highways” in AC Shadows, with a new dive button also being used to seamlessly and stylishly dismount from ledges and leap over obstacles to transition between different traversal options.

A Smooth Parkour System Like Unity’s Could Provide a Huge Boost to Assassin’s Creed Shadows

This care being placed on parkour transitions and pathways seems very reminiscent of 2014’s Assassin’s Creed Unity, which itself has one of the most polished and satisfying parkour systems of any AC entry in the opinion of many fans. Despite the infamously problematic and glitch-filled launch state of AC Unity, the parkour mechanics of the game were eventually refined to be an undeniable strong point for the franchise, and Shadows is seemingly leaning into this past success in what could be a very beneficial way.

While the delays that AC Shadows has experienced are undoubtedly disappointing, this hopefully allows Ubisoft to avoid the same buggy launch that Unity experienced in 2014. It does seem as if more attention needs to be paid to the parkour systems of modern mainline Assassin’s Creed titles, and a focus on recapturing the seamless magic of Unity‘s freerunning seems like the perfect way for Shadows to earn more favor with long-term fans of the Ubisoft franchise.

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