Released back in March, Assassin’s Creed Shadows is a capable, if a bit too safe, entry in its long-running series. While it introduces some interesting new features, like its dual protagonists and a fleshed-out base-building mode, it still has plenty of issues, including the removal of some key elements from earlier Assassin’s Creed games. In a recent Q&A session on Reddit, its developers have shared some of what’s ahead for Assassin’s Creed Shadows in future updates — and which great feature won’t be making a return.
Previous Assassin’s Creed games Valhalla, Odyssey, and Origins each featured their own version of Discovery Tour, a mode that let players explore their historical settings while interacting with characters and locations to learn more about them. Discovery Tours are available as separate downloads for any player and have also been used as educational tools in classrooms. But this time around, there’s no Discovery Tour in the works.
“On Shadows, we have decided to integrate the Historical Codex directly in the main game so it's available to everyone,” a Ubisoft developer said in response to a player question. “So compared to games like Odyssey or Valhalla, all players can access that historical information directly in the main game.But to get to the core of your question, we do not currently have a ‘Japan Discovery Tour’ like we had for ‘Viking Age’ in the works.”
Shadows does feature in-game information about the Sengoku period of Japan when it takes place, but it’s much more limited than the Discovery Tours. They’re essentially optional encyclopedia entries players can read while playing the game, as opposed to the interactive Discovery Tours, which are built specifically as educational experiences. These codex entries are certainly better than nothing, but they in no way make up for the loss of the Discovery Tour.
Another notable absence is going to be addressed in a future update, however. In Assassin’s Creed Shadows, the overarching series storyline following the battle between Assassins and Templars throughout history plays a much smaller role than it did in previous games, leaving some players disappointed. But Ubisoft says that storyline hasn’t been cut from Shadows entirely. According to the developer, it wanted to delay it until after the game had firmly established its protagonists, but that an update will bring it back “in the near future.” Assassin’s Creed Shadows has a DLC expansion, Claws of Awaji, slated for a September 16 release, which is where Ubisoft is most likely to continue the Assassins versus Templars story.
Also missing from Shadows is the concept of “social stealth.” A defining feature of early Assassin’s Creed games, and a major part of Assassin’s Creed Mirage, social stealth is a system where players can hide in plain sight by blending in with crowds as long as they don’t behave in ways that draw attention or mark them as assassins. Especially given how important it was in the previous game, its disappearance in Shadows was notable. And while it won’t be making its way back into the most recent game, Ubisoft says it could make a comeback in the future.
“For Shadows, our stealth team chose to put 100 percent of their energy on the moment-to-moment tactical shinobi experience, which left no space for Social Stealth,” Ubisoft says. “That does not mean that Social Stealth is gone from the Assassin's Creed franchise, though.”
For all the features it doesn’t carry over from previous Assassin’s Creed games, Shadows also introduces a few of its own. One of the most notable is that the world changes based on the passage of time, with the map progressing through seasons as the game goes on. While Ubisoft didn’t commit to anything, the developer says that a similar system is under consideration for future games, and the feature is one the Assassin’s Creed team is interested in working with again.
So much like Assassin’s Creed Shadows at launch, it seems the future of the game and the series is a mixed bag. While well received features like changing seasons and social stealth will make a comeback in the future, that does little to improve the experience for Shadows now. And the biggest reveal of the Q&A session is a letdown, in the confirmation that Discovery Tour won’t be coming back this time around. Shadows got a lot right, but what Ubisoft’s comments offer most is hope that the next game in the series will be a step up.
