Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Shadows is the latest controversial battleground. This time, people online are now arguing that the studio has disrespected Japanese culture by allowing players to destroy a shrine in the game. This is part of a criticism of the game’s alleged historical inaccuracies. But since when has Assassin’s Creed been about accuracy?
Have people forgotten the past games of the franchise? Remember when the final fight of Assassin’s Creed 2 was a literal fistfight with Pope Alexander VI? This selective outrage is annoying to see and appears to be entangled with deeper issues, including racism and the ongoing culture war surrounding diversity in gaming.
The recent controversy has started from a viral clip showing Yasuke seemingly destroying a shrine in Assassin’s Creed Shadows. A lot of people are already calling this an act of cultural disrespect, accusing Ubisoft of exploiting Japanese history while failing to honor its significance. But like this user on X commented, “You literally control the buttons you press.”
You literally control the buttons you press. If you decided to do that, that speaks more about you than the actual game.
— Mgs2master2 (@mgs2master2) January 31, 2025
Assassin’s Creed has always been about our choices as the player, and blaming Ubisoft for what a player chooses to do in-game is disingenuous. The complaints about historical inaccuracy for Shadows have been loud but they aren’t new to the franchise. Assassin’s Creed 2 famously depicted a battle between protagonist Ezio Auditore and Pope Alexander VI, complete with a fistfight inside the Vatican.
Other games of the franchise have even included mythological elements, from fighting the Minotaur in Odyssey to visiting Atlantis. Ubisoft has always brought together history and fiction for narrative and gameplay purposes. So why is AC Shadows getting so much more hate? It feels like the criticism isn’t really about historical accuracy at all.
There seems to be a selective concern for historical accuracy when it comes to AC Shadows. For instance, Ghost of Tsushima featured katanas despite them not being invented until after its setting, yet the game received widespread praise. Similarly, Like A Dragon: Ishin took liberties with real historical figures without any backlash.
LMAO
Rewriting history? It takes a few seconds to boot up any Assassin’s Creed game for it to tell you it’s a work of fiction that’s INSPIRED by history.
Not once do the games say “Oh hey this is 100% how it happened. Deal with it”
You think they rewrote history giving Jack…
— The Hidden One (@TheHiddenOneAC) January 27, 2025
The Ubisoft franchise itself has changed history since the start. So why is it that historical accuracy has become a big point of debate? It first started when Ubisoft that the protagonist of AC Shadows would be Yasuke, a real historical figure who served under Oda Nobunaga. People argued that his portrayal as a samurai is inaccurate. But that has since been disproved.
Every Assassin’s Creed game has the same disclaimer when you play it that says “Inspired by historical events and characters, this work of fiction was designed, developed, and produced by a multicultural team of various beliefs, sexual orientations, and gender identities.” But then there’s the fact that the devs also advertised “historical fidelity” in an interview for AC Shadows.
This whole hubbub feels like it’s not about history but about perpetuating culture war debates. We saw similar situations when Stellar Blade and other titles featuring diverse characters came out. So it’s really just a wildfire of random opinions right now.
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