It's been a long time coming, but Assassin's Creed Shadows will finally launch in March 2025 we got to play it, and it's shaping up to be the best entry in yearsTech17:00, 23 Jan 2025Assassin's Creed Shadows is shaping up excellentlyThere are few series in gaming with the sheer volume of entries that Assassin's Creed has massed over the years. From the original stealthier entries, to smaller, side-scrollers and mammoth RPGs, the series has gone to Ancient Egypt, Renaissance Italy, the Viking invasion of England and plenty more, and everyone has their own favourite time period, mission, or protagonist.Still, I'm not sure there's ever been as much riding on an entry in the series, which turns 18 years old this year. With regular delays, a wave of 'controversy' over its inclusion of a black man in Japan, and the ongoing rumblings over the sale of Ubisoft, there has never been a more important Assassin's Creed game than Shadows. Thankfully, after playing a few hours, it just might become my favourite entry since 2017's Origins.Even Yasuke can struggle against powerful opponentsAt a recent preview event at Ubisoft's offices, I was able to play a chunk of the game's prologue, before being let loose in one open world region to complete quests and activities. I'll avoid spoilers here, but I think it's important to state explicitly that the character of Yasuke, who has drawn so much criticism from some corners of the internet for being a black man in Feudal Japan, is a "fish out of water" who's reasons for being in the area are explained within the first five minutes.With that out of the way, Shadows is a gorgeous video game. Assassin's Creed Valhalla was a launch title for the current generation of consoles and looked great, while Mirage was certainly prettier but narrower in scope, but Shadows feels like a mix of the two in that it is almost impossibly detailed in places but doesn't sacrifice scale to achieve this.Assassin's Creed Shadows opens in explosive fashionYasuke's armour is packed with detail, from worn sections to fabric, while Naoe's hair flows realistically as she slinks through the darkness. In the earliest section of the game, players get to step into the shoes of both, kicking off what feels like an epic tale of revenge, albeit with political ramifications.The prologue certainly isn't a cheerful one, and it's much less playful than Mirage or Assassin's Creed 2's earliest moments with Ezio, but it lays out how each of our protagonists plays. I was a little worried things would be too dour, but in the later section of the game there's a little more levity here's hoping that continues throughout.Naoe is focused on getting in and getting out unseenYasuke is a physical fighter, capable of handily wielding two-handed weapons, but it's his movement that's more fun to experiment with. He's a little less sure in his parkour, often looking just as liable to teeter and fall as he is to make the next leap, and standing on a rope suspended between two rooftops (a common feature in just about every Assassin's Creed game so far) will see the rope snap and our hero plummet.Still, he's able to break down locked doors by charging, and doing so makes him feel incredibly powerful because it's tied to his sprint so doesn't take up an ability slot.On the other hand, Naoe is a shinobi, and she's just as fun to control for very different reasons. In the prologue, she has to sneak into an encampment and retrieve an item, but it's left up to the player how they choose to engage.Assassin's Creed Shadows can play like a classic, stealth-focused AC title if you preferI slipped through by sticking to the rooftops and picking guards off with throwing knives, while using her grappling hook to escape trouble. It's not quite as fast as I'd hoped, but I'd imagine that's to do with realism, and it's a nice way to give the parkour a rest for some higher vantage points.Sticking with the series' trademark movement, however, I think this might be the closest Ubisoft will ever get to perfecting it. It's fun to use, and just feels ever so slightly more refined than earlier titles. There's still an element of "no, don't go there, go the other way!" particularly in chase scenes, but they are fewer and further between.Yasuke lacks the agility to climb to certain points in the map, and will often suggest Naoe be a better choice. Switching between them isn't as instant as something like Marvel's Spider-Man 2 (at least not on the PC build we played), but it's still very quick. Some missions will let you choose which character to use, but you can also switch freely between them in my experience, meaning if the brute force approach isn't working, you can switch to stealth or vice versa.Players can switch at any point, or at the start of a missionThe sanding down of those edges, paired with the option to play as either of the protagonists at any point in time, makes Assassin's Creed Shadows feel like the dream game for anyone with even a passing interest in the franchise. Prefer sneaking into heavily-guarded fortresses? Try Naoe, and sneak in. Looking for bombastic combat? Yasuke's your best bet.While some missions take place in the open world, others feel more akin to set-pieces, and they're fantastic. Leading an assault on what is essentially a fortress as either of the two characters in a race to save a comrade felt great, and offered plenty of opportunity to experiment with both Yasuke and Naoe.This story mission was particularly memorable, but I'll leave this spoiler-freeWhat struck me at multiple times in my demo session was just how tricky Shadows can be. Blocking and parrying windows are relatively small, and while Yasuke can take a hit or two and keep swinging, Naoe is much less able to withstand.Combat, perhaps more than any other entry, has a focus on disengaging when things don't go your way, or pivoting to another solution. One mission ended in an ambush, and while I attempted to stand my ground, I ended up having to sprint clear.Skirmishes reward quick target prioritisation, like spotting the ranged enemy before they shoot and taking them down. It's a far cry from the series' first entries and their 'instant counter kills', and it's all the better for it.There's even a whole base-building system I haven't seen yetWhile I did find both Yasuke and Naoe getting bloodied and bruised, I do wonder how the gear system (returning from Valhalla, Odyssey, and Origins) will help factor into the game's challenge. I got through Origins with a pretty slick poison-focused build that carried me for much of the way, and I'm curious to see if those same possibilities will exist in Shadows.Speaking of the more RPG side of things, there are choices to be made but Shadows still occasionally drops the notion that those choices matter. One mission needed me to sneak into a home to speak to a civilian, but I used Yasuke to slay the guards instead. While the contact initially screamed, I was instantly able to trigger the dialogue and have a normal conversation with them, despite standing atop a small mountain of enemies. Sure, it's hardly a major plot point, but it's still lagging behind the kind of conversation-altering systems that The Witcher 3 had in 2015.I should note that as part of the preview, we didn't see any 'modern day' content focusing on the more contemporary side of the battle between the Templars and the Assassin's, but I did get to see the 'Animus Hub' which will seemingly be a launcher of sorts for Assassin's Creed. It'll let players jump across the timeline and helps put each entry in order, but I'd need to see how it looks when it launches to say whether it's worthwhile.Small nitpicks aside, I loved my time with Assassin's Creed Shadows and still felt as though I barely scratched the surface. Despite having the run of an entire region, opening the map showed me it was actually a very small section of the map.With so much more to see, including gear options and even a base-building system, I'm not sure I've ever been this excited for an Assassin's Creed title since Origins shook up the series in 2017.Article continues belowPreviewed on PC. Preview access provided by the publisher.RECOMMENDED