Assassin's Creed: Shadows initially followed Ghost of Tsushima's path. However, Ubisoft felt that one character „it's not representing what the samurai and shinobi are”
Ubisoft considered introducing only one protagonist in Assassin's Creed: Shadows, who would combine the skills of a ninja and a samurai. The developers revealed why they ultimately settled on two characters - Naoe and Yasuke.
In the upcoming Assassin's Creed: Shadows, we can play as Naoe, who prefers stealth, and Yasuke, who focuses on a more direct approach. In an interview given to PC Gamer, creative director Jonathan Dumont and game director Charles Benoit revealed why Ubisoft ultimately decided on two playable characters. It turns out that in the early stages of production, the game had one protagonist, who, like Jin from Ghost of Tsushima, combined the profession of shinobi and samurai.
When you say 'Let's make an Assassin's Creed in Japan,' the first reflex is 'We need a ninja,' right? The shinobi is such a one-for-one with an assassin. In early prototyping, as we were looking at other archetypes, we felt like we wanted to do a samurai as well because it's very iconic - said Jonathan Dumont.
According to the devs, in the early design, our shinobi could have worn samurai armor to better cope in battles. However, as Charles Benoit underlined, the increased effectiveness of the character in combat due to this element seemed strange - "it's not representing what the samurai and shinobi are." Therefore, the decision was made to introduce a second protagonist, which allowed the developers to implement different skill groups, among other things.
The early games [from Assassin’s Creed series] were a bit more stealthy and parkour-ish, and people love that. And then from Origins on, people really like to fight. So trying to have those two things in the game for all the fans is the goal. That's why I refer to it [Assassin’s Creed: Shadows] as the ultimate Assassin's Creed game - boldly summarized Jonathan Dumont.
After several delays, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows is set to be released on March 20th this year on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series S/X.
