Assassin's Creed Shadows

Assassin's Creed Shadows review - Duel protagonists. Majestic in scope, impressive in detail, Assassin's Creed Shadows honours the beauty of feudal Japan, even if its strongest moments are saved for the personal stories of its two protagonists. Alongside its tea ceremonies, rangu poetry and Sumi-e ink drawing, Assassin's Creed Shadows makes several mentions of the Sakura festival, Japan's annual cherry blossom celebration. The brief appearance of falling petals each year, lasting just a week o...

Assassin's Creed Shadows messes with a good thing by including one too many playable protagonists, but Naoe is a valuable new addition to the legacy. It felt good to see Assassin's Creed Shadows protagonist Naoe's face nearly healed after the 50-hour journey through 16th-century Japan. The wound that had once marred her face was mostly gone, with only a thin, barely discernible scar left behind. Naoe's face slowly heals over the course of Shadows' story and the changing of the in-game seasons, ...

Assassin's Creed Shadows - The long-awaited Japan adventure sharpens and refines its edge without fully reforging it. By sharpening the edges of its existing systems, Assassin's Creed Shadows creates one of the best versions of the open-world style it's been honing for the last decade. It's wild that it took almost 20 years and dozens of games for the biggest stealth action series around to finally bend towards feudal Japan. Assassin's Creed Shadows makes the most of that theme, with a great p...

Come for the neck stabs and stay for the surprisingly great combat, Assassin's Creed Shadows is a stealth action buffet with a story to forget. Shadows is some of the most fun I've had with a stealth game in a decade, and impressively, it also has the best, stickiest combat this series has seen. When I'm Naoe, ghosting past samurai by rooftop or shadow, or I'm Yasuke, charging through a castle gate and nailing every perfect block against a warrior monk, Shadows is peak Assassin's Creed. But it...