Summary
- Assassin’s Creed has always played fast and loose with historical accuracy, and that continues with Shadows.
- Ubisoft has come up with its own origin and story for Yasuke, including revealing how he got his name.
- Historians don’t actually know how Yasuke came to be called that, or what his name was before meeting Oda Nobunaga.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows creates its own origin story for Yasuke, including explaining how he got his name and what he was originally called when he arrived in Japan.
One of the things that makes Yasuke such an interesting historical figure and the perfect protagonist for an Assassin’s Creed game is how much of his origin is unknown. Historians have made some sense of it over the years, but there’s simply not all that much confirmed about Yasuke’s time in Japan or even what he was called before Oda Nobunaga gave him his name.
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With how loosely Assassin’s Creed tends to play with history, that makes Yasuke’s inclusion in the game quite an interesting one, and frees up some space to put a unique spin on the character. That’s made clear from the opening moments of the game, which introduce Yasuke with a completely different name.
Ubisoft Came Up With Its Own Story For How Yasuke Got His Name
When you first start playing Shadows, you’ll kick things off by controlling Yasuke as he comes to Japan with Alessandro Valignano. Only, he’s not actually called Yasuke yet and is referred to as Diogo by the Portuguese Jesuits. Yasuke’s actual name isn’t known in real-world history, so this is a unique twist from Ubisoft.
You might think that Oda Nobunaga would simply come up with the name Yasuke, but there’s actually a bit more to it than that. During a flashback mission where Yasuke is training with a legendary swordsman, he is approached by a young boy who tells him about his grandfather, a warrior called Yasuke who was “brave” and “kind”.
The young boy talks about how much he misses his grandfather and how much he helped everyone around him, which clearly makes a mark on Yasuke, as he announces that will be his name shortly after defeating a rival school and earning Oda Nobunaga’s respect. From that point on, Yasuke is the samurai’s name, and he’s only ever called Diogo by some horrible people from his past.
This unique origin story is interesting since records don’t really reveal how Yasuke got his name beyond suggesting it was given to him by Oda Nobunaga. While that is technically true in Shadows since Nobunaga appoints Yasuke as his samurai shortly after this scene, it’s a unique twist for Yasuke to have really chosen his own name and have been influenced by the stories of a brave and kind man.
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