Assassin's Creed Shadows Trailer Reveals Two Protagonists, A Samurai And A Shinobi

Assassin's Creed Shadows, the next game in Ubisoft's long-running action-adventure series, is scheduled to launch November 15, just a little over a year after Assassin's Creed Mirage. And as confirmed by the new cinematic reveal trailer, you can play Shadows three days earlier if you're paying $18 a month for Ubisoft Plus' Premium Plan. Shadows will feature a larger map akin to Assassin's Creed Origins, and incorporate an ally system similar to Assassin's Creed III.

Shadows will feature two playable protagonists: Yasuke and Naoe. Whether you'll be able to quickly switch between the two within the same mission or only between big story beats (like Assassin's Creed Syndicate, the best Assassin's Creed game) remains to be seen. The two have different gameplay styles. As a samurai, Yasuke is a fighter who excels out in the open, while Naoe, as a shinobi, is armed with the franchise's signature hidden blade and is better at sneaking and stabbing.

Initially codenamed Project Red, Shadows was already confirmed to take place in feudal Japan, but the cinematic trailer narrows the window even further with Naoe's talks of "unification" pointing toward the end of the Sengoku period and Yasuke's inclusion--a samurai who operated during the tail end of the Sengoku period--further pointing to that time period.

In an interview with IGN, Ubisoft Quebec mentioned that Shadows will incorporate an ally-recruitment system that's reminiscent of how Connor could meet people and build a thriving homestead in Assassin's Creed III. "Naoe and Yasuke, they do have allies in the world and they do help people and sometimes they can help them find what they're looking for and everything is centralized around them building a hideout where their friends and allies can help them--[this] is an integral part of the exploration loop," creative director Jonathan Dumont said. "You can call on those allies once in a while."

Gallery

"They are your eyes and ears on the field so if you use them properly, they will help you to find what you're looking for or what you missed," game director Charles Benoit added.

In that same interview, Dumont compared the size of Shadows to that of Origins, putting it on the larger side when it comes to the franchise but not coming anywhere close to the scale of the massive open worlds seen in Assassin's Creed Odyssey and Valhalla.

Assassin's Creed Shadows preorders are live and the game is scheduled to launch for Xbox Series X|S, PS5, PC, Mac, and Amazon Luna.