Pure marketing strategy,ubisoft are at the bottom of the abyss,by doing this ubi thinks improve their image,and in any case they have nothing to lose the game has been continually smashed for months by everybody,they have absolutely nothing left to lose
@@JcJcvd the internet can be a loud place, but the loudest are often the most irrelevant. The second all of these positive hands on reviews dropped, those loud people got shut up
@xzxasxadxas I think there should have been environmental changes within shadows to have a better balance between historical accuracy and the gameplay/parkour. It's only a matter of opinion on whether you think the actual mechanics in the game have to suffer because of its authenticity to the landscapes and architecture of the time period. I really feel like Ubisoft missed such a clear shot of what was needed in terms of improvements to the games going forward. I mean parkour, in my opinion, is what attributed to the unique experience of Assassin's Creed, and that satisfaction is ever fleeting from what we're being shown
@@iBitePpl5you put my exact thoughts and then some into words. As I was watching the video I was also thinking about the historical accuracy that this game uses to design its cities. Although, I’m pretty sure most fans would be okay with like 75%-85% historically accurate cities that are made for the parkour mechanics.
@xzxasxadxas not really, even with large buildings, it sucks. its a downgrade compared to mirage's parkour patch. ropotopolous and leo k both mentioned it.
Shadows with this demo, to me, feels in the same 'return to form' boat as mirage. Improvements to what was downgraded from a good template, adding features that other stealth games had a decade in advance or what was already in previous entries, and even then suffering from accommodating design choices made post odyssey.
It is confusing that (AAA) stealth has seen so little innovation over the past few years. I can't name a single unique mechanic in this game that I haven't seen before that really adds to the experience.
The only things that kept me interested in Shadows was the "improved parkour and stealth" they were marketing. But damn, parkour is worse than Mirage? Stealth is no better either? You had one freakin job, Ubisoft. Goddayun.
The only way they could've done it for me was to revert to and improve upon the Unity style of the games imo. I have not cared for this style since it started in Origins
agreed, that is a pretty good forest. Not only the density, but also color. It feels like recently game devs forgot that colors can be bright. Everything needs to be dark and greedy and some times I feel sensory deprevation while playing games.
I wonder what it would be if they didn't decide to rip off the Witcher back then. Maybe they would've focused more on stealth and come up with really cool mechanics by now
@DdHenley307 yeah, the new games really are a poor's man Witcher. Tbh, its quite sad, I know the devs at ubi are capable of cool stuff, the last prince of Persia proved that.
Crazy for me to think its almost been ten years since I played a "new" assassins creed. Had to stop after Origins and have only played the older ones since,didnt realize it had been so long
@@leopard_52 the thing is this would never kill them. They are too big and have too many IPs. What you're essentially wishing is for them to get acquired (by Tencent...) and turn into even bigger dogshit for a prolonged period where they will throw even more dogshit monetization systems into their games. Best scenario imo? AC:Shadow barely works enough to stave off the capitalist sharks, but is still a big let down financially in the franchise which would still hopefully be a cold enough shower for them to wake the fuck up
@@TheWaross I honestly think the first step to making AC great again is to take a hiatus. Like at least 5-8 years. Let other franchises breathe or better yet start a new one with a modest budget.
Thanks for your honest review. The setting is something i hoped for since Black Flag so i am still hopeful at least the story and setting will be great. All the marketing talk about new stealth sounded very nice. I am sad to here it really seems to be. I think i will wait with my buy decision until there are full game reviews. I hope there will also be one on your channel.
I wish games had an option to stop slow motion finishers and counters. Its stopped being epic years ago. A really fast and graphic kill would be so much more fun
I think Parkour has a lot to do with the setting and the city in question, like you mentioned. Even things like side ejects make more sense in Baghdad than in a town in rural Japan.
My god I am so glad to see that Ubisoft has given you access to the demo!! I am very happy for you, congratulations!! They did not give me access, probably I should have asked 😂 I do not follow any other youtuber of AC, so I have only seen what you showed us in this video, and with those 20 minutes the only thing I can say is that I am astonished with how much the movement of this game is a copy of Valhalla. I was not expecting that, nor do I understand why is the same after five years of waiting. It feels a waste of time. I think it's a mistake. I was hoping for something different. As you say, we will see. Honestly I think I would not pay for this at release - if they do not send me a code, I will wait until you have done the video with your thoughts. I trust you, because I often think the same as you do of past games.
Im hopeful, not optimistic but hopeful. I liked origins and i enjoyed odyssey and I had some fun with moments of valhalla so im hopeful ill enjoy this.
Im somewhat optimistic. Im in the group that liked origins & odyssey but valhalla less. Will as always not judge it until I have tried it myself. The forest did actually look like an actual forest
No one I'd rather hear the thoughts about the game then you! It seems like another "wait for a sale" type of Ubisoft game, maybe more on the 7-7,5/10 scale of things, which is refreshing after they've put out nothing but 6/10's at best for years. My PC wouldn't be able to handle it anyway, so if by the time I build a new one (hopefully this year), it comes out and is loved, I'd be happy to try it. Can't wait for your full review!
Damn I can’t lie man. I was leaning towards buying on release date. But what you said about parkour reaaaalllllllly is making me change my mind lol. I want this game to be good.
From what we can atleast see in the video I am surprised with how parkour was described, playing through Mirage now and not liking it that much but Shadows does look more engaging, honestly just holding out hope thats its just an upward trajectory from the previous titles
I was lost when a character that’s in an ac game have limit parkour my excitement went from 100 to 0 quickly but as a ac fan ima still play it would of enjoy it if the the character that I was most excited for can’t climb the builds I want him to climb but in my 24 years of living I learnt u don’t always get what u want
I don't want to be a pessimist, but all these mini additions are reminding me of the revelations. Lots of new tools and features that feel like standalone additions added to the RPG trilogy gameplay style, rather than an expansion.
Honestly, a stealth worse than Mirage doesn't mean bad in my eyes. I had a lot of fun with Origins and Odissey Stealth and if it's anything like that I'm fine. Valhalla was good when it worked, but I felt like a bull walking in a glass room. Any wrong move and the whole system went to hell.
I never saw anything in the marketing to suggest it wouldn't have the same open world RPG concept as Origins-Valhalla. I know it's the first AC built specifically for current gen, but it was always going to be a mistake to expect something completely transformative.
It was always going to be the same concept - what I think people weren’t necessarily expecting was the extent to which almost every core animation is the same. As I mentioned at the start, the first iteration of AC lasted 5 years, the second lasted 2 years, and the two games in the third were a single year apart. It has now been 8 years since Origins, and we have never had an engine upgrade without an overhaul of the base assets. Again, I don’t see it as an inherently bad thing. But even then, from what I saw, this game actually carries more animations over from Valhalla than any of the three other RPG games carried over from one another. Odyssey changed the basic walking and running animations and Valhalla changed a ton of the animations outside of the basic vertical traversal and the jump. As far as I could see (which was again limited here) core movement and climbing are all identical to Valhalla. On top of that you have plenty of extra animations so it has its own feel, but to me, Shadows felt more like Valhalla than Valhalla felt like Odyssey and Odyssey felt like Origins, in my opinion.
Well the fact it's lifting so much from Valhalla is interesting. I agreed with your video on that game where you said it didn't know what it wanted to be, and I thought Shadows might veer closer to Odyssey, given it's the same studio. And then Hexe would be where they shake things up. Anyway, like you said, not inherently a bad thing. I like the newer games, but mainly for the exploration and story. Personally, I always wished they just kept what worked with Unity and Syndicate's gameplay and refined the rest. And you're right. That toggle sprint button is diabolical 😂
@ I was also surprised to see it didn't feel much like Odyssey. I suppose it is the exploration and progression that will really showcase what direction the game leans in, so I will be waiting to see what it ends up looking like
I really enjoyed origins, alot. Odyssey and Valhalla just were very boring to me. I could see reused assets in both, both had cookie cutter missions, and really loved Micro transactions, reused hairstyles and skins, and so much more. Buying these games really made me feel cheated, and because I felt so cheated, I never bought Mirage. Shadows seems unique. I can say that watching ur video it has given me new investment in the release.
Modern Ac has always had the issue of allowing players to pick their own dialogue instead of making the character be a character, this is compounded further by their lack of want to make a soul female protagonist (Evie was meant to be for syndicate, kissandra in odyssey and evior is canonically female in valhalla i assume naoe is meant to be the mc if it werent for corporate meddling). It makes the stories feel weaker and your ties to the characters less real as the character is slightly built in your image and not the intended way the devs wanted the character to be perceived. Additionally the 100 hour campaign of valhalla was a massive kick in the balls to the entire player base especially since the story was just drawn out instead of being deservedly 100 hours. if the lord of the rings can fit into 3 books or 3 movies, you can make a game fit into less than 50 hours. From what i have seen across a few content creators with early access, there's some good and some bad with this game already, which doesnt fill me with hope since normally when you make a demo build you make it really good to sell the game. I hope some of the things can be addressed, but when youre building off of the ac odyssey engine with that games god awful mechanics i suppose there is not much the dev team can do. IMO this game REEKS of a 60% off sale purchase, rather than a full price on launch purchase. While its setting is genuinely one of the most interesting points in history for me, the gameplay itself looks average at best and the story is still obviously unknown. Though it does make me happy that we are finally going back to assassins and templars, With the Portuguese involvement and you have a really good narrative introduction to how the templars are spreading in Japan and their beliefs across the nation, I still am somewhat concerned by the fantasy like combat of yasuke, which is deeply reminicent of valhalla. Where as Naoe, who is from what ive seen terrible in combat situations by comparison, looks like she uses genuine techniques in her fighting style, for yasuke it looks like a "hurr durr i swing harder" moment. One thing is for sure though, at least we have finally moved away from the god/demigod plot lines and we might move back towards the normal plotlines of ac.
The only thing that could've made me bought this was that it was better than Ghost of Tsushima, but aadly that doesnt seem to be the case, aside from the flips. That, as well as the guaranteed microtransactions just makes me hold off and wait for the next Ghost game thats releasing. I'm hoping the IP gets aquired by some other, better company so that the quality of the games hopefully get much better. The past few AC games have been okay, but they're not the GOTY material they used to be with the Ezio trilogy. Each passing game just feels like wasted potential to me, potential that games like Ghost of Tsushima have better materialized.
How do you mean? Jumping and vertical climbing are the same as they were before. The additions are the hook, which is somewhat contextual, and the flips, which had pretty limited utility. Without those functions there isn’t much here that wasn’t lifted from the last couple games
@ I hope so! Sadly they haven’t made that clear at all lol. Thank you for covering the content, I hope this ends up being an actual Assassins Creed game.
Holy wow u got to play it too thats awesome. My thought of the 4 major people I was looking foward to was it suceeded my personal expectations tbh. That being Mortismal Gaminh, The hidden One, The Spainiard, and MasterAssassin. I will say tho it seems like truly the area of the map in which they had u guys in the preview play didnt seem to do it justice in terms of more Naoe gameplay side of things like stealth and parkour. Could be pure ignorance and copium but it seems like there was more city like structure where the architecture was made with parkour in mind than some of the smaller regions or countryside-esque farther regions compared to main inland center regions. Will say seeing 2 stealth ac centric channels do what they was able to do with the stealth is kinda cool and shows that it can possibly be great especially for a playstyle of ghosting. Finally nice to see the smoke bombs finally act like a screen again so u can be on the outside of it and still walk past a location u smoked without being detected. Also you can switch the assassinate button to triangle/y which The Spaniard said helped out a lot with the accidental attacks. Also even tho it fully isnt like brotherhood having a spy be able to take out/assassinate (needs to be a specific one since certain spys have exact roles from the looks of it) is something i enjoy seeing back within the series. I was expecting a Valhalla situation but seems like it has much more quality and thought put into it. Makes no sense expecting OG style since we knew since announcement when it is codename red it was rpg style, and with that mindset is why my expectations are succeeded. Seems like a ima get it under ubi+ and see how i enjoy it by the end of that month. Not going into it with the expectation of a masterclass 9/10 or even 8/10 game. Just looking at it more on a enjoyable play it after a work week or work day without feeling the need to commit to it with it being the only game i play like almost all of the other sp games my backlog has is what im looking for and this game seems like it.
AC Origins honestly ruined AC. Syndicate didn't sell less cause of yearly releases, it sold less cause Unity was a disaster at launch. Which is so frustrating cause they could have simply delayed Unity and just released Rogue, and even port it to the ps4/xbone gen. There was no reason for it to stay last gen only. AC was better when it had yearly releases.
Every time I look at AC and see the Origins DNA, all I can think about is "what could have been". Origins had so many systems that would have been perfect to expand on into a deeper stealth system, better gearing, more interesting skill trees, and the beginning of an amazing combat system. And then every one of the next games took those systems in the wrong direction, smoothing them out, adding the more of the level gating and superpowers of RPGs instead of the interesting buildcraft (which Ghost of Tsushima did incredibly btw), reducing combat to even more of a button mash, making stealth near nonexistent, and adding animation to parkour, but none of the actual interesting gameplay systems people liked about the old gameplay. I was so hopeful after Origins, and then I got so Jaded. And every release since Valhalla keeps promising to do better, and then does the same thing with different animations. At least it seems like combat is getting better.
That's basically the entire story of this franchise. Introduce a new mechanic/characters/setting/etc., then *maybe* improve on it in the sequel, and then just flush it all down the toilet and do it all over again.
Hearing that the game engine feels similar to the last few games, for me personally, is not a good thing. I’m just not a fan of this version of the game engine at all, and Ubisoft’s seeming refusal to overhaul it like they used to is as confusing as it is annoying. It simply just isn’t that fun to play in for me, so the thought of having to do it again isn’t exactly an inspiring one. ‘Movement feels like Valhalla’ is a damning enough statement in its own right. Yet another reason I was hoping the game would feel as fresh as Ubisoft have been claiming it would, but I can’t say I’m surprised that was a lie. Great video though, nice and in depth and just honest about everything. Sadly for me though it’s made up my mind that this one is better to skip, I can’t waste more time and money on another Odyssey/Valhalla copy and paste
No way, an assassins creed GAME from the assassins creed FRANCHISE that is still using most of the same mechanics and some animations from its previous games? Why are you so surprised lol, that's how it goes in most franchises. You literally complain about a hotkey that you can remap? Wtf is this review. Feels like a kid that started playing assassins creed games yesterday.
Assassination button and attack button should always be same because it adds a type risk of failure feel to it. You just have to time it right. Time it wrong, it all goes downhill. It should be always be like this. And some of the things you mentioned, is perhaps because of the demo build by the looks of it. I have seen somewhere else that this build doesn't let you go outside of the demo playable area. So, you can always hope the full build is gonna be different. And, if you are gonna compare shadows to ghost then you have to compare everything not just combat. Because apart from combat, even mirage had better movement/parkour than ghost and I don't like mirage.
I disagree with that, personally. I don’t think it adds anything that pressing assassinate too early can cause your character to stand up and punch a wall - especially since it’s not exactly a skill check, it’s just an annoyance. It would be one thing if it were just a range thing, but get your camera stuck on something, have the enemy glitch out, be in a weird part of the environment, anything that causes the game to not register that you are trying to assassinate takes away your ability to try, and that sucks. I’ve never played a game where it felt like a test of skill - just an attempt to pack all the inputs onto a controller. I almost never agree with having one button do more than one input - it tends to exclusively remove player agency.
@@sosaysjay that's a matter of opinion. But as a fan since the first game, this has been a necessary norm and I would not prefer otherwise. It would just be an annoying thing on keyboard as I am a pc player, too many buttons to press for the button that you have to press constantly. I really hate the input mapping of rdr2.
The environments look insane. This is probably the best looking foresty area in any video game ever and it reminds me a lot of far cry 4. Such a shame that everything else looks genuinely awful. Combat as always, is terrible, it plays terrible and it looks jank. Not only is parkouring/ climbing the regressed dumbed down version of it from the new AC instalments but only one of your 2 characters can properly engage in it. And the one that can engage in it decides to do them dumbest looking immersion breaking front flips for no reason in basic jumps. If you like parkour in AC games don’t buy this game. The environments simply aren’t built for meaningful parkour even if it had a better system. The story is god awful, we’re so far away from complaining about the story not being assassins centric anymore. No, now a days we’re just begging for it to be good. It’s not. Characters are always written terribly now. And on top of that, we can’t even enjoy the shit story cos an awful pander centric character in yasuke is forced into this game where he doesn’t belong. It really is over.
Yo it's awesome that ubisoft allowed you to be part of the people who got a hands on demo.
Imagine criticizing every Ubisoft game ever but with such good quality they give you a new game to criticize before anyone else
Pure marketing strategy,ubisoft are at the bottom of the abyss,by doing this ubi thinks improve their image,and in any case they have nothing to lose the game has been continually smashed for months by everybody,they have absolutely nothing left to lose
@@JcJcvd the internet can be a loud place, but the loudest are often the most irrelevant. The second all of these positive hands on reviews dropped, those loud people got shut up
11:59 "Parkour seems like an afterthought & a step down even from Mirage" damn...
it makes sense, doesn't it? Going from a bustling urban city to a feudal country?
@xzxasxadxas I think there should have been environmental changes within shadows to have a better balance between historical accuracy and the gameplay/parkour. It's only a matter of opinion on whether you think the actual mechanics in the game have to suffer because of its authenticity to the landscapes and architecture of the time period. I really feel like Ubisoft missed such a clear shot of what was needed in terms of improvements to the games going forward. I mean parkour, in my opinion, is what attributed to the unique experience of Assassin's Creed, and that satisfaction is ever fleeting from what we're being shown
@@iBitePpl5you put my exact thoughts and then some into words. As I was watching the video I was also thinking about the historical accuracy that this game uses to design its cities. Although, I’m pretty sure most fans would be okay with like 75%-85% historically accurate cities that are made for the parkour mechanics.
@xzxasxadxas not really, even with large buildings, it sucks. its a downgrade compared to mirage's parkour patch.
ropotopolous and leo k both mentioned it.
Looks fine the me I can’t wait 😅
Shadows with this demo, to me, feels in the same 'return to form' boat as mirage.
Improvements to what was downgraded from a good template, adding features that other stealth games had a decade in advance or what was already in previous entries, and even then suffering from accommodating design choices made post odyssey.
It is confusing that (AAA) stealth has seen so little innovation over the past few years. I can't name a single unique mechanic in this game that I haven't seen before that really adds to the experience.
The only things that kept me interested in Shadows was the "improved parkour and stealth" they were marketing.
But damn, parkour is worse than Mirage? Stealth is no better either? You had one freakin job, Ubisoft. Goddayun.
The only way they could've done it for me was to revert to and improve upon the Unity style of the games imo. I have not cared for this style since it started in Origins
FOR REAL
the stealth IS better
but mainly at the higher difficulties
leo k mentioned it being similar to splinter cell/thief dialed down
agreed, that is a pretty good forest. Not only the density, but also color. It feels like recently game devs forgot that colors can be bright. Everything needs to be dark and greedy and some times I feel sensory deprevation while playing games.
This is so much more in depth than previews from other youtubers, thank you so much for your detailed analysis! I enjoy every video you put out.
100%, I've also watched SkillUps video but it's nothing compared to this.
That forest is insane!! We've come a long way from the Frontier in AC III
I’m glad you got to play the demo. This Chanel easily makes some of the best assassins creed videos
Yours was the first vid that popped up and I'm glad it did.
thank you for your work, and your honesty
I hate to be that guy but a Ubisoft game being same is the expected since 2015
I wonder what it would be if they didn't decide to rip off the Witcher back then. Maybe they would've focused more on stealth and come up with really cool mechanics by now
@DdHenley307 yeah, the new games really are a poor's man Witcher. Tbh, its quite sad, I know the devs at ubi are capable of cool stuff, the last prince of Persia proved that.
@@DdHenley307 I wonder what could've been if they decided to go with shinobi before quirk chungus British twins.
More of the same? My Ubisoft boycott continues... I appreciate the directness of your impressions.
Crazy for me to think its almost been ten years since I played a "new" assassins creed. Had to stop after Origins and have only played the older ones since,didnt realize it had been so long
You haven't missed much, honestly.
It needs to be more than this if Ubisoft are to survive. Smoking that Yves Guillemot pack fr fr.
Sincerely hope they don't survive because they need a reality check.
@@leopard_52 the thing is this would never kill them. They are too big and have too many IPs. What you're essentially wishing is for them to get acquired (by Tencent...) and turn into even bigger dogshit for a prolonged period where they will throw even more dogshit monetization systems into their games.
Best scenario imo? AC:Shadow barely works enough to stave off the capitalist sharks, but is still a big let down financially in the franchise which would still hopefully be a cold enough shower for them to wake the fuck up
@@TheWaross I honestly think the first step to making AC great again is to take a hiatus. Like at least 5-8 years. Let other franchises breathe or better yet start a new one with a modest budget.
Thanks for your honest review.
The setting is something i hoped for since Black Flag so i am still hopeful at least the story and setting will be great.
All the marketing talk about new stealth sounded very nice. I am sad to here it really seems to be.
I think i will wait with my buy decision until there are full game reviews. I hope there will also be one on your channel.
Best ac RUclipsr we need more retrospectives
I wish games had an option to stop slow motion finishers and counters. Its stopped being epic years ago. A really fast and graphic kill would be so much more fun
Like how the first gameplay trailer for Ghost of Tsushima showed Jin killing an enemy in a standoff super fast. I wish that stayed in.
they weren't joking about how fast she was
Thank you for your honesty
I think Parkour has a lot to do with the setting and the city in question, like you mentioned. Even things like side ejects make more sense in Baghdad than in a town in rural Japan.
Well every ubisoft game feels somewhat familiar since theyre mostly just reskins of others
No opinion
My god I am so glad to see that Ubisoft has given you access to the demo!! I am very happy for you, congratulations!! They did not give me access, probably I should have asked 😂 I do not follow any other youtuber of AC, so I have only seen what you showed us in this video, and with those 20 minutes the only thing I can say is that I am astonished with how much the movement of this game is a copy of Valhalla. I was not expecting that, nor do I understand why is the same after five years of waiting. It feels a waste of time. I think it's a mistake. I was hoping for something different. As you say, we will see. Honestly I think I would not pay for this at release - if they do not send me a code, I will wait until you have done the video with your thoughts. I trust you, because I often think the same as you do of past games.
Overall it sounds like it's a bit worse than I'd hoped, but better than I'd feared.
Dam. I really hope Ubisoft watches this video and the videos of others who got to play the game early and make some changes before release.
Thanks for being honest about the game being similar to the last few. I'm one of those people that was hoping for a total revamp.
Wow already? Wild
Im hopeful, not optimistic but hopeful.
I liked origins and i enjoyed odyssey and I had some fun with moments of valhalla so im hopeful ill enjoy this.
Im somewhat optimistic. Im in the group that liked origins & odyssey but valhalla less. Will as always not judge it until I have tried it myself.
The forest did actually look like an actual forest
Thanks for this early look!
I now know this game isn't for me, and I will not have to bother buying it.
Ubisoft has also recognized you as a good ac youtuber. Congrats
"Feel Familiar", sounds like A Big Thumbs Down, know what I mean?
Ubisoft quebec really does hate parkour huh ...
16:25 i mean they need you to be Yasuke somehow
They gotta get the players to play their shoe horned in DEI phony character somehow.
@@leopard_52 Comment written by someone with undiagnosed autism.
So glad ubiosoft found my fav pure creator.
How much can they improve by March?
No one I'd rather hear the thoughts about the game then you! It seems like another "wait for a sale" type of Ubisoft game, maybe more on the 7-7,5/10 scale of things, which is refreshing after they've put out nothing but 6/10's at best for years. My PC wouldn't be able to handle it anyway, so if by the time I build a new one (hopefully this year), it comes out and is loved, I'd be happy to try it. Can't wait for your full review!
Damn I can’t lie man. I was leaning towards buying on release date. But what you said about parkour reaaaalllllllly is making me change my mind lol. I want this game to be good.
Wow someone who got early access and is actually criticizing the game, great job.
This confirms to me that this will be worse than Vahalla or just about the same. I really enjoyed Odyssey and Origins.
Same...
with Ubisoft it is never a quark with the demo, what you played is the game they are releasing
From what we can atleast see in the video I am surprised with how parkour was described, playing through Mirage now and not liking it that much but Shadows does look more engaging, honestly just holding out hope thats its just an upward trajectory from the previous titles
I was lost when a character that’s in an ac game have limit parkour my excitement went from 100 to 0 quickly but as a ac fan ima still play it would of enjoy it if the the character that I was most excited for can’t climb the builds I want him to climb but in my 24 years of living I learnt u don’t always get what u want
I just want the narrative and characters to be as good in ots writing as the TV show Shogun was, wnen it aired last year.
I can’t wait 😅
I don't want to be a pessimist, but all these mini additions are reminding me of the revelations. Lots of new tools and features that feel like standalone additions added to the RPG trilogy gameplay style, rather than an expansion.
5:13 wow, just wow. if i can prone and hunt in this forest
im sold
i literraly feel fresh air and grass
any word on the modern story? I imagine it's still a complete afterthought that they expect no one to care about...
Honestly, a stealth worse than Mirage doesn't mean bad in my eyes. I had a lot of fun with Origins and Odissey Stealth and if it's anything like that I'm fine.
Valhalla was good when it worked, but I felt like a bull walking in a glass room. Any wrong move and the whole system went to hell.
I never saw anything in the marketing to suggest it wouldn't have the same open world RPG concept as Origins-Valhalla. I know it's the first AC built specifically for current gen, but it was always going to be a mistake to expect something completely transformative.
It was always going to be the same concept - what I think people weren’t necessarily expecting was the extent to which almost every core animation is the same. As I mentioned at the start, the first iteration of AC lasted 5 years, the second lasted 2 years, and the two games in the third were a single year apart. It has now been 8 years since Origins, and we have never had an engine upgrade without an overhaul of the base assets.
Again, I don’t see it as an inherently bad thing. But even then, from what I saw, this game actually carries more animations over from Valhalla than any of the three other RPG games carried over from one another. Odyssey changed the basic walking and running animations and Valhalla changed a ton of the animations outside of the basic vertical traversal and the jump. As far as I could see (which was again limited here) core movement and climbing are all identical to Valhalla. On top of that you have plenty of extra animations so it has its own feel, but to me, Shadows felt more like Valhalla than Valhalla felt like Odyssey and Odyssey felt like Origins, in my opinion.
Well the fact it's lifting so much from Valhalla is interesting. I agreed with your video on that game where you said it didn't know what it wanted to be, and I thought Shadows might veer closer to Odyssey, given it's the same studio. And then Hexe would be where they shake things up.
Anyway, like you said, not inherently a bad thing. I like the newer games, but mainly for the exploration and story. Personally, I always wished they just kept what worked with Unity and Syndicate's gameplay and refined the rest.
And you're right. That toggle sprint button is diabolical 😂
@ I was also surprised to see it didn't feel much like Odyssey. I suppose it is the exploration and progression that will really showcase what direction the game leans in, so I will be waiting to see what it ends up looking like
Man, this game looks beautiful. I just wish the gameplay wasn't so meh
So this is what Jay says, hm.
I really enjoyed origins, alot. Odyssey and Valhalla just were very boring to me. I could see reused assets in both, both had cookie cutter missions, and really loved Micro transactions, reused hairstyles and skins, and so much more. Buying these games really made me feel cheated, and because I felt so cheated, I never bought Mirage. Shadows seems unique. I can say that watching ur video it has given me new investment in the release.
Is it just me or do the models seem...just a little too small?
hey do you know if we can play the game with japanese VA?
I believe I saw that there was a mode where all characters speak in their native language, i.e. Japanese, Portuguese
@sosaysjay ok this might get me to buy it on release, thank you for the response
Modern Ac has always had the issue of allowing players to pick their own dialogue instead of making the character be a character, this is compounded further by their lack of want to make a soul female protagonist (Evie was meant to be for syndicate, kissandra in odyssey and evior is canonically female in valhalla i assume naoe is meant to be the mc if it werent for corporate meddling). It makes the stories feel weaker and your ties to the characters less real as the character is slightly built in your image and not the intended way the devs wanted the character to be perceived.
Additionally the 100 hour campaign of valhalla was a massive kick in the balls to the entire player base especially since the story was just drawn out instead of being deservedly 100 hours.
if the lord of the rings can fit into 3 books or 3 movies, you can make a game fit into less than 50 hours.
From what i have seen across a few content creators with early access, there's some good and some bad with this game already, which doesnt fill me with hope since normally when you make a demo build you make it really good to sell the game.
I hope some of the things can be addressed, but when youre building off of the ac odyssey engine with that games god awful mechanics i suppose there is not much the dev team can do.
IMO this game REEKS of a 60% off sale purchase, rather than a full price on launch purchase. While its setting is genuinely one of the most interesting points in history for me, the gameplay itself looks average at best and the story is still obviously unknown.
Though it does make me happy that we are finally going back to assassins and templars, With the Portuguese involvement and you have a really good narrative introduction to how the templars are spreading in Japan and their beliefs across the nation, I still am somewhat concerned by the fantasy like combat of yasuke, which is deeply reminicent of valhalla. Where as Naoe, who is from what ive seen terrible in combat situations by comparison, looks like she uses genuine techniques in her fighting style, for yasuke it looks like a "hurr durr i swing harder" moment.
One thing is for sure though, at least we have finally moved away from the god/demigod plot lines and we might move back towards the normal plotlines of ac.
Disappointing, oh well. Here's hoping the IP goes to a different studio in 10 years and we get a good game at last.
Parkour looks like it has no momentum buildup whatsoever. :/
Stealth looks as binary as ever as well...disappointing...
Was there any interesting music during your playthrough?
It didn’t stand out to me in the section I played but I don’t have a great audio setup.
In all the newer games I’ve hated how floaty & lazy the parkour and fighting has been. I want that unity weighted feel to attacks and parkour.
Sounds like I'll be waiting on a sale for this.
I really don't care, give me good stealth and good combat from this god foresaken studio, and it will be sufficient
The only thing that could've made me bought this was that it was better than Ghost of Tsushima, but aadly that doesnt seem to be the case, aside from the flips. That, as well as the guaranteed microtransactions just makes me hold off and wait for the next Ghost game thats releasing.
I'm hoping the IP gets aquired by some other, better company so that the quality of the games hopefully get much better. The past few AC games have been okay, but they're not the GOTY material they used to be with the Ezio trilogy. Each passing game just feels like wasted potential to me, potential that games like Ghost of Tsushima have better materialized.
Let's hope this comment boots you in the algorithm. Good video!
I tend to share similar opinions to you on AC, I can safety avoid this one.
I don't rly undedrstand what you trying to say about parkour rly... it's totally different tho.
How do you mean? Jumping and vertical climbing are the same as they were before. The additions are the hook, which is somewhat contextual, and the flips, which had pretty limited utility. Without those functions there isn’t much here that wasn’t lifted from the last couple games
If it’s bad (and it seems like it uh… certainly won’t be GOOD) I’m not gonna look forward to The Discourse on why.
Nor will I
It’s so over.
There was no need for a samurai in a shinobi game
Anything related to the creed in this game? Or is this another game without Assassins…
As far as I know both main characters are part of the assassin brotherhood, with Naoe being part of it via her lineage
@ I hope so! Sadly they haven’t made that clear at all lol. Thank you for covering the content, I hope this ends up being an actual Assassins Creed game.
this game looks awful gameplay wise and even the graphics look dated at this point.
F this game and f Ubisoft
Holy wow u got to play it too thats awesome. My thought of the 4 major people I was looking foward to was it suceeded my personal expectations tbh. That being Mortismal Gaminh, The hidden One, The Spainiard, and MasterAssassin. I will say tho it seems like truly the area of the map in which they had u guys in the preview play didnt seem to do it justice in terms of more Naoe gameplay side of things like stealth and parkour. Could be pure ignorance and copium but it seems like there was more city like structure where the architecture was made with parkour in mind than some of the smaller regions or countryside-esque farther regions compared to main inland center regions. Will say seeing 2 stealth ac centric channels do what they was able to do with the stealth is kinda cool and shows that it can possibly be great especially for a playstyle of ghosting. Finally nice to see the smoke bombs finally act like a screen again so u can be on the outside of it and still walk past a location u smoked without being detected. Also you can switch the assassinate button to triangle/y which The Spaniard said helped out a lot with the accidental attacks. Also even tho it fully isnt like brotherhood having a spy be able to take out/assassinate (needs to be a specific one since certain spys have exact roles from the looks of it) is something i enjoy seeing back within the series. I was expecting a Valhalla situation but seems like it has much more quality and thought put into it. Makes no sense expecting OG style since we knew since announcement when it is codename red it was rpg style, and with that mindset is why my expectations are succeeded. Seems like a ima get it under ubi+ and see how i enjoy it by the end of that month. Not going into it with the expectation of a masterclass 9/10 or even 8/10 game. Just looking at it more on a enjoyable play it after a work week or work day without feeling the need to commit to it with it being the only game i play like almost all of the other sp games my backlog has is what im looking for and this game seems like it.
AC Origins honestly ruined AC. Syndicate didn't sell less cause of yearly releases, it sold less cause Unity was a disaster at launch. Which is so frustrating cause they could have simply delayed Unity and just released Rogue, and even port it to the ps4/xbone gen. There was no reason for it to stay last gen only. AC was better when it had yearly releases.
Ninja girl looks pretty hot thank god
Nice review but I think I'll pass.
Every time I look at AC and see the Origins DNA, all I can think about is "what could have been". Origins had so many systems that would have been perfect to expand on into a deeper stealth system, better gearing, more interesting skill trees, and the beginning of an amazing combat system.
And then every one of the next games took those systems in the wrong direction, smoothing them out, adding the more of the level gating and superpowers of RPGs instead of the interesting buildcraft (which Ghost of Tsushima did incredibly btw), reducing combat to even more of a button mash, making stealth near nonexistent, and adding animation to parkour, but none of the actual interesting gameplay systems people liked about the old gameplay.
I was so hopeful after Origins, and then I got so Jaded. And every release since Valhalla keeps promising to do better, and then does the same thing with different animations. At least it seems like combat is getting better.
That's basically the entire story of this franchise. Introduce a new mechanic/characters/setting/etc., then *maybe* improve on it in the sequel, and then just flush it all down the toilet and do it all over again.
HITMAN is a better AC game nowadays anyways
Hearing that the game engine feels similar to the last few games, for me personally, is not a good thing. I’m just not a fan of this version of the game engine at all, and Ubisoft’s seeming refusal to overhaul it like they used to is as confusing as it is annoying. It simply just isn’t that fun to play in for me, so the thought of having to do it again isn’t exactly an inspiring one.
‘Movement feels like Valhalla’ is a damning enough statement in its own right. Yet another reason I was hoping the game would feel as fresh as Ubisoft have been claiming it would, but I can’t say I’m surprised that was a lie.
Great video though, nice and in depth and just honest about everything. Sadly for me though it’s made up my mind that this one is better to skip, I can’t waste more time and money on another Odyssey/Valhalla copy and paste
Looks like a ps4 game
@7:06 a Far Cry from the likes of MGS5 AI
Seems it will be mid... what a... wait no definitely not a surprise forget it
no buy for me
More Valhalla? No thanks
🫡✊🏿
Just downhill since ac unity🤦🏾♂️
No way, an assassins creed GAME from the assassins creed FRANCHISE that is still using most of the same mechanics and some animations from its previous games? Why are you so surprised lol, that's how it goes in most franchises. You literally complain about a hotkey that you can remap? Wtf is this review. Feels like a kid that started playing assassins creed games yesterday.
Im playing mirage which has the absolute WORST parkour im not seeing how this is worst than that
Assassination button and attack button should always be same because it adds a type risk of failure feel to it. You just have to time it right. Time it wrong, it all goes downhill. It should be always be like this. And some of the things you mentioned, is perhaps because of the demo build by the looks of it. I have seen somewhere else that this build doesn't let you go outside of the demo playable area. So, you can always hope the full build is gonna be different. And, if you are gonna compare shadows to ghost then you have to compare everything not just combat. Because apart from combat, even mirage had better movement/parkour than ghost and I don't like mirage.
I disagree with that, personally. I don’t think it adds anything that pressing assassinate too early can cause your character to stand up and punch a wall - especially since it’s not exactly a skill check, it’s just an annoyance.
It would be one thing if it were just a range thing, but get your camera stuck on something, have the enemy glitch out, be in a weird part of the environment, anything that causes the game to not register that you are trying to assassinate takes away your ability to try, and that sucks. I’ve never played a game where it felt like a test of skill - just an attempt to pack all the inputs onto a controller. I almost never agree with having one button do more than one input - it tends to exclusively remove player agency.
@@sosaysjay that's a matter of opinion. But as a fan since the first game, this has been a necessary norm and I would not prefer otherwise. It would just be an annoying thing on keyboard as I am a pc player, too many buttons to press for the button that you have to press constantly. I really hate the input mapping of rdr2.
As a Black and African American, I find this game incredibly offensive.
I wish shame and misfortune upon Ubisoft.
Delete this cringe.
@@blackpaisley5156 shill says what?
Seems like another typical copy paste mediocre game from ubi. I'll stick to tsushima for this particular setting and gameplay.
Was hoping that you'd have some integrity and boycott Shadows. Guess I'll have to boycott you.
As is your right. But if you do not mind my asking, why would you see it as a lack of integrity to play this video game?
The environments look insane. This is probably the best looking foresty area in any video game ever and it reminds me a lot of far cry 4.
Such a shame that everything else looks genuinely awful. Combat as always, is terrible, it plays terrible and it looks jank.
Not only is parkouring/ climbing the regressed dumbed down version of it from the new AC instalments but only one of your 2 characters can properly engage in it. And the one that can engage in it decides to do them dumbest looking immersion breaking front flips for no reason in basic jumps.
If you like parkour in AC games don’t buy this game. The environments simply aren’t built for meaningful parkour even if it had a better system.
The story is god awful, we’re so far away from complaining about the story not being assassins centric anymore. No, now a days we’re just begging for it to be good. It’s not. Characters are always written terribly now.
And on top of that, we can’t even enjoy the shit story cos an awful pander centric character in yasuke is forced into this game where he doesn’t belong. It really is over.
yeah bcs they let u play it for free lol