Mothergamer Plays Assassin's Creed Shadows

 I was so excited for Assassin's Creed Shadows when I saw it would be set in feudal Japan and not only that, but that we would get to play as an actual historical figure in parts of the game, Yasuke an African samurai who served Oda Nobunaga. Yasuke wouldn't be alone because we also get to play as a young shinobi woman, Naoe. I was ready to dive into the game and begin my adventure. Once again, the accessibility settings for the game are great. I was able to tweak the size of the subtitles, adjust the difficulty to my liking, as well as getting the controls how I wanted them. 

The story introduces us at first to Yasuke known as Diogo here traveling with Jesuit priests who are meeting with Nobunaga to request safe passage through Japan. He agrees, but only if they allow Diogo to be in his service. They reluctantly agree and Diogo trains as a samurai for Nobunaga and is now known as Yasuke. It does a great job of setting up the scenario and themes for the game. Shortly after, we meet Naoe, a smart and talented young shinobi in her village of Iga. This introduces us to the tutorial on the mechanics of the gameplay and of course the usual favorites like leap of faith are still there. I instantly liked both Yasuke and Naoe. Both voice actors did a wonderful job with them. Naoe is sharp and quick with her wit while Yasuke is more than just a big man, he has a thoughtful demeanor that stands out and is a good foil to Naoe's sometimes brash impatience of the young.

Naoe the young shinobi. 

One fun thing that I got for having preordered the game was a fun cosmetic that gave a cool Sekiryu dragon armor for the horse and weapons and armor for Naoe. I was able to use the dragon armor on Yasuke's horse as well and it was fun pretending the horses were very cool dragons. 

The Sekiryu armor in action. 

The nods to previous Assassin's Creed are spread throughout the game which I appreciated, but I also enjoyed that Shadows explored its own story with the usual Templar versus Assassins thread woven in. I love that the game lets you take your time with the main story and allows you to explore everywhere. For me, that's always been one of the joys of the Assassin's Creed games; being able to mosey along discovering fast travel view points and getting to take in the gorgeous scenery from atop a mountain or at the top of a castle. 

The main story missions and side quests are spread out on a huge objective board allowing you to find the clues for each one in the various areas. I also love that the game allows you to switch between Naoe and Yasuke for the story missions and side quests. Both Naoe and Yasuke are quite skilled and depending on which skills you want or need for a mission, it's very easy to switch between the two. You can also switch when fast traveling. There are of course some story missions that are specifically just for them and these are very well done flowing organically through the story. I loved Naoe's stealth and agility, but I also had a blast busting through doors like they were paper and bouncing baddies around with Yasuke. The combat for both is a lot of fun and I liked seeing what both of them were capable of. 

Yasuke shows off his samurai skills. 

Of course it wouldn't be Assassin's Creed without allies and some of the side quests give you a myriad of characters who meet Naoe and Yasuke on their journey and join their cause. This means you have a base hideout that you can expand and build provided you get enough resources. Raiding various castles and bandit hideouts helps with this because Naoe and Yasuke can tag the items to be smuggled out of their by their scouts. When the seasons change in the game, it resets so you can raid those places again. Another cool thing is you can summon certain allies in a fight to help you out. My personal favorite was summoning a badass monk Yaya who had no qualms about busting the heads of the baddies she helps you fight. 

There is also romance and romantic dalliances in Shadows. I was pleased to see there are two Queer romance options for Naoe and Yasuke. I did that for both of them and the romances are thoughtful, sweet, and quite lovely. The writing for all the characters and allies is very well done. I was invested every step of the way for not just the main story, but the side stories as well as Naoe and Yasuke's personal story quests. 

Assassin's Creed Shadows also understood the assignment about letting everyone pet and hug dogs and cats in the game. Every single dog and cat I came across I absolutely hugged and cuddled them and they were all incredibly cute. It seems like such a small thing, but it brought me so joy stopping to cuddle a cute dog or play with adorable kittens. 

Cuddling a cute, good dog. 

The only thing I wasn't really a fan of is the knowledge point system. The game doesn't do a very good job of explaining it at first or that a lot of Naoe and Yasuke's skills are locked behind this system. You need a certain number of knowledge points to unlock those skills. Some are unlocked automatically after certain story chapters are done, but the rest you get from doing exercises in various map locations that give you knowledge points. For example, Naoe has to do a meditation known as kuji-kiri following the button prompts and when successful gets a knowledge point. For Yasuke, it's doing exercises like the kata with various weapons or being able to shoot targets with his arrows while moving on horseback. I understand what they were trying to do here and why, but frankly knowledge points are not fun and often feel like a tedious chore to get in order to unlock new skill trees and gain mastery of those skills. I was relieved when I had mastered all the skill trees because it meant I didn't have to do it anymore.

I had an amazing time with Shadows. The story itself is well done and there are a lot of interesting side quest threads that do tie in with the main story beautifully. I really love Naoe and Yasuke's blossoming friendship not just with each other, but with their companions and the many people they help throughout the story. I took my time with all of it and ended up putting about seventy five hours into the game. The story reveals blew me away and by the time I got to the end of their journey I was sad to say goodbye, but I was impressed with how well they tied everything together giving a truly satisfying ending. I'm looking forward to the DLC we have coming in September because Naoe and Yasuke are both characters I came to like a great deal and I can't wait to adventure with them again.

Naoe enjoying the cherry blossoms. 

*Assassin's Creed Shadows is available to play on the following platforms: Playstation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows (Steam)

*Join our community on Twitch where we play games and discuss mental health: https://www.twitch.tv/mothergamer