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[mdkirby]

They can try to fix it, but I expect it will now have been permanently tainted in the eyes of a fairly sizable percent of its target audience. My guess is it’ll do better than outlaws, but not substantially. 1.5 mil ish in its first month. Numbers some studios would be thrilled with, but numbers Ubisoft will view as catastrophic.

What’s crazy is that they’ve managed to fudge this as badly as they have, it should have been an easy guaranteed hit, and licence to print money, as a Japan set assassins creed game is something people have been crying out for, for over a decade. But they somehow shat the bed (maybe I’ll be proven wrong a year from now).

 

[EDMIX]

That's games journalism for you. Tom should stick with PS leaks only.

Well...when you read what is being stated, it doesn't sound like he is saying Valhalla released AT LAUNCH on Steam, he is merely pointing out it launched on Steam, as in it released on Steam

isn’t matching Valhalla in pre-order numbers (which launched on Steam and past-generation consoles)

He may also be referring to like the launch window as the Steam version of this game comes out 1 month after release...

So I'd say, maybe this is splitting hairs lol

 

[kruis]

They can try to fix it, but I expect it will now have been permanently tainted in the eyes of a fairly sizable percent of its target audience. My guess is it’ll do better than outlaws, but not substantially. 1.5 mil ish in its first month. Numbers some studios would be thrilled with, but numbers Ubisoft will view as catastrophic.

What’s crazy is that they’ve managed to fudge this as badly as they have, it should have been an easy guaranteed hit, and licence to print money, as a Japan set assassins creed game is something people have been crying out for, for over a decade. But they somehow shat the bed (maybe I’ll be proven wrong a year from now).

My guess is that Ubisoft intends to launch AC:S close to the launch date of the Switch 2. AC:Valhalla sold exceptionally well because it was released three days after the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X launched. Tons of new PS5/Xbox owners bought AC:V because it was one of the few "next gen" titles available for their system.

Ubisoft was lucky that there weren't that many official PS5 games available when the PS5 was launched. I think the situation will be dramatically different for the Switch 2.

 

[digoutyoursoul]

At its core it’s just the same fucking game in a different setting , copy and paste gaming .

 

[StereoVsn]

Sounds like it needs a longer delay to fix everything if they really want to fix it

Yep, and they really should rethink whole February release in any case.

The issue is of course that C)Game has negative publicity
B)Ubisoft has negative publicity
C)Ghost 2 is coming from Sony next year

And 3.5 months is really not a lot especially when doing big changes and need to get though QA. Because last thing they want to do is have the game run like shit on release and get panned by reviewers and on Steam.

 

[EDMIX]

My guess is that Ubisoft intends to launch AC:S close to the launch date of the Switch 2. AC:Valhalla sold exceptionally well because it was released three days after the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X launched. Tons of new PS5/Xbox owners bought AC:V because it was one of the few "next gen" titles available for their system.

Ubisoft was lucky that there weren't that many official PS5 games available when the PS5 was launched. I think the situation will be dramatically different for the Switch 2.

Could be.

There was a rumor about Switch 2 releasing next year, so if its a spring release, for all we know that is the version they want to make sure is running fine or something.

 

[March Climber]

There's a difference between those sagas and Assassins Creed.

For example, RE4 depicts Spain as a place full of deranged cultists that the Anglo-Saxon savior kills merrily. The currency is wrong and the Spaniards have Mexican accents. It's hilariously bad. Nobody cared because Resident Evil is what it is, it doesn't have any pretense of accuracy.

However, an Assassin's Creed game with the same mistakes would be destroyed.

Even in your rebuttal you avoided talking about Resident Evil 5

 

[mdkirby]

My guess is that Ubisoft intends to launch AC:S close to the launch date of the Switch 2. AC:Valhalla sold exceptionally well because it was released three days after the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X launched. Tons of new PS5/Xbox owners bought AC:V because it was one of the few "next gen" titles available for their system.

Ubisoft was lucky that there weren't that many official PS5 games available when the PS5 was launched. I think the situation will be dramatically different for the Switch 2.

Would be a smart move to be fair

 

[Nydius]

I applaud them for realizing the game needed a lot of help but pushing it into 2025 is probably no better than releasing it as a bug filled, culturally offensive mess in 2024.

If they keep it in February, they’re going up against Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, Avowed, Like a Dragon Pirate Yakuza, Monster Hunter Wilds and Civilization 7 all in the same month. If you only had $70 or $140 to spend, would you look at this list and decide to spend it on AC Shadows?

If they move it beyond February they will constantly be in the shadow of Ghost of Yotei. Not to mention whatever other high profile games come out later in the year (Fable, Death Stranding 2, Doom, etc).

I don’t see a very rosy future for Shadows no matter what they do.

 

[Raven117]

I don’t know man….. I’m not sure this will be enough.

I can’t believe they did such a poor job with this. The one thing fans have asked for since the beginning…. And they eff it up.

 

[Topher]

Yep, and they really should rethink whole February release in any case.

The issue is of course that C)Game has negative publicity
B)Ubisoft has negative publicity
C)Ghost 2 is coming from Sony next year

And 3.5 months is really not a lot especially when doing big changes and need to get though QA. Because last thing they want to do is have the game run like shit on release and get panned by reviewers and on Steam.

Not a lot of time at all. Just sad to me that a game company can't do things the right way due to constant fear of a bunch of stockholders, most of which don't give a shit about games. That's what seems to be driving their decisions right now, imo.

 

[Saber]

I never expected Yasuke to be removed, dunno where that came from.

What I was expecting(kinda right) is the disgusting spit on the japanese culture while throwing the "it's fantasy" defense card.Theres probably worse things in there than what we saw, they probably were way over their asses with this game.
Looks like the famous "west faking outrage" was big fat lie and they were scared of being crucified by the japanese during TGS.

 

[Fake]

So they are removing and editing things about Yasuke... I wonder what in fuck they have been doing creating his storyline.

More funny yet is wasn't the whining from west right wing folks? Was told from Ubisoft himself. Maybe japanese guys are tired of this western mentality of calling everyone that disagree with you a bigot, racist, sexist, mysoginist...

You just need to dig even more deep to find out the mess Ubisoft as a company become.

 

[ShadowkillXNA]

But first, let me address some of the wild rumors about Yasuke—he’s not going to be removed.

Then I still won't be buying.

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

Even in your rebuttal you avoided talking about Resident Evil 5

I didn't avoid it, I'm so fed up with the example of RE5, which is a nothing burger compared to the mess of RE4, which the non-racist woke media always forget. The hypocrisy is through the roof.

To me, neither of them are worth mentioning, because Resident Evil is set in a fictional world.

 

[Kotaro]

BUT had the preorder number was great, none of the bugs and controversies mattered to Ubisoft, they would release the game anyway. They are known to release games in buggy mess condition in the past

THE MAIN REASON it's delayed is because the preorder number is horrible, and this is their number one IP

 

[Radical_3d]

As an expert on Japanese culture they need to understand that honour and shame are huge parts of it. It's not like America where you can become successful by an asshole. If you screw someone over in Japan you bring shame to yourself and the only way to get rid of that shame is with reptenance.

 

[StereoVsn]

Not a lot of time at all. Just sad to me that a game company can't do things the right way due to constant fear of a bunch of stockholders, most of which don't give a shit about games. That's what seems to be driving their decisions right now, imo.

But it’s not even just shareholders. Shareholders didn’t demand a black samurai in AC Japan. And further it was done in a manner designed to offend people who actually like AC games and Japanese public.

That’s all on Ubisoft management. Couple that with terrible production output (AAAA Skull, Avatar, Outlaws) and badly accepted titles lately so you get the push to get AC game out ASAP to fix the stock which fell 85% due to sheer ineptitude and hubris.

Edit: And what’s annoying is that they could have easily had Yosuke in a much better manner as MC if they just didn’t do a terrible job about it.

Between really bad looking trailers seemingly designed to slam Japanese culture/history, iffy hip hop tracks (despite having a lot of potential choices for hip hop and martial arts as it’s been done quite well before) and other shit around it that tanked the reception.

And then of course being arrogant AF and calling people racists and incels or whatever because folks criticized them.

 

[Kotaro]

Didn't this dude also say the pre-order was very strong a few months ago?!? (probably to hype the game up). So now we know, all these 'insider-leaks' is nothing but a controlled communication by Ubisoft.

had the pre-order was great none of the controversies or bugs matter to Ubisoft

What a lying sack of shit!

Rumor - Sales-Age - Tom Henderson: Assassin's Creed Shadows Pre Orders are very strong

Assassin's Creed Shadows pre-orders are looking very strong. I don't have the exact numbers yet, but no one in the know is disappointed with them.

www.neogaf.com

 

[amscanner]

 

[demigod]

Well...when you read what is being stated, it doesn't sound like he is saying Valhalla released AT LAUNCH on Steam, he is merely pointing out it launched on Steam, as in it released on Steam



He may also be referring to like the launch window as the Steam version of this game comes out 1 month after release...

So I'd say, maybe this is splitting hairs lol

Yes he is, he's talking about PRE-ORDERS.

 

[Ceadeus]

I applaud them for realizing the game needed a lot of help but pushing it into 2025 is probably no better than releasing it as a bug filled, culturally offensive mess in 2024.

If they keep it in February, they’re going up against Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, Avowed, Like a Dragon Pirate Yakuza, Monster Hunter Wilds and Civilization 7 all in the same month. If you only had $70 or $140 to spend, would you look at this list and decide to spend it on AC Shadows?

If they move it beyond February they will constantly be in the shadow of Ghost of Yotei. Not to mention whatever other high profile games come out later in the year (Fable, Death Stranding 2, Doom, etc).

I don’t see a very rosy future for Shadows no matter what they do.

In the long run by having sales over and over. The usual Ubisoft. In April the game will be 40% off

 

[EDMIX]

the numbers are solid and are likely to rise further given its Steam release announcement.

BUT had the preorder number was great

Didn't this dude also say the pre-order was very strong a few months ago

Tom confirms the numbers are solid, so doesn't seem like the main reason, keep in mind he confirmed this prior as well. His current comment doesn't really change much, I think you merely are stuck in this either or mindset.

Strong, solid, can all be the case and merely not as strong as Valhalla, but thats like saying the new Ghost has strong, solid preorder numbers, but not as solid as The Last Us 2 which broke records for the company, that doesn't mean the numbers are "horrible" as you seem to reach for this fucking shit like.....a lot.


Its like zero nuance or in between exist with you, its either "woke" or "anti woke" or RECORD BREAKING or "HORRBLE" or some fucking shit lol

Its like commonsense has completely left the equation in favor wild hot takes.

 

[Fess]

Their best shot was releasing before Yotei did to get the impatient crowd who want a taste of that kind of game even if it's similar or inferior (Saints Row built nearly it's entire success on this idea, but with GTA), but now with this delay they've fucked that massively.

Yotei seems to have it’s own share of battles to fight and going in after AC means they absolutely needs to nail the open world climbing which was a sore point in Tsushima.

 

[S0ULZB0URNE]

My guess is that Ubisoft intends to launch AC:S close to the launch date of the Switch 2. AC:Valhalla sold exceptionally well because it was released three days after the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X launched. Tons of new PS5/Xbox owners bought AC:V because it was one of the few "next gen" titles available for their system.

Ubisoft was lucky that there weren't that many official PS5 games available when the PS5 was launched. I think the situation will be dramatically different for the Switch 2.

I'm not understanding the Switch and Switch 2 connection?

 

[ZehDon]

Curious to read that they're changing parts of the story to address how Yasuke is represented. I'd love to be a fly on the wall on those internal discussions.

Hopefully the end result is a better overall game that people can enjoy.

 

[Ridicululzz]

Can't believe people actually thought they'd remove Yasuke.

 

[Bashtee]

Fundamentally, though, these are issues that should have been caught internally before the game’s reveal, especially given Ubisoft’s strict asset-approval process.

If this is similar to the process I'm familiar with, there is a track record of who approved which artworks...

Depending on how many artworks were approved without being checked properly, heads need to roll. The damage is massive, and the non-existing quality is painfully obvious.

 

[EDMIX]

Yotei seems to have it’s own share of battles to fight and going in after AC means they absolutely needs to nail the open world climbing which was a sore point in Tsushima.

errr...maybe.

I'm fine with how it works now and I don't know if it matching AC would matter as much as people think. Ghost moved 13 million with it being lessor in that area, just horrid stealth, no travel outside of just horse ie no boats, no clan type system, like you can't order a bunch of Samurai to do stuff like in those other AC titles etc

Yet Ghost still did fine.

I think there is room for both. I'm not saying they shouldn't focus on it, cause I think they should, merely I don't think it will be something that hurts them if they don't.

I also agree that they have their own battles to fight as that game might have a uphill battle like Shadows seeing some of the hate its getting right now too.

Either way, I'm happy I'm just buying both and I'm fine if they are different from each other. ( i would love that seasonal system in Ghost though lol)

Ridicululzz lolz, people think the wildest shit regarding this culture war thing, some literally thought Hogwarts would just stop existing and not release based on petitions, but shit same clowns thought Far Cry 5 would just change everything or not release based on petitions.

Same clowns, different circus lol

Like back down in reality, that shit is not going to change and those of us with some damn sense already knew that lol

 

[thismeinteil]

"Ubisoft’s strict asset-approval process" my ass ...


I'll tell you the real reason for the delay. They know they've shit the bed, so they're going to release it during Black History Month, push Yasuke harder than ever, and hope black gamers pull them out of this mess. All I got to say is

 

[DaciaJC]

As for how these issues fell through the cracks, I’m told that historical experts were brought onto the project much later than usual for a project of this magnitude

Shadows is the first time ever feudal Japan will be depicted in Assassin's Creed, and also the first time ever in the series where they decided to make an historical figure the protagonist of the game ... yet they didn't feel a need to bring in historical experts until late into development.

Brilliant plan, Ubisoft.

 

[Astray]

Yotei seems to have it’s own share of battles to fight and going in after AC means they absolutely needs to nail the open world climbing which was a sore point in Tsushima.

Why would it have its own battles? Grifters are gonna grift no matter what Sucker Punch does.

 

[captainnapalm]

Shadows is the first time ever feudal Japan will be depicted in Assassin's Creed, and also the first time ever in the series where they decided to make an historical figure the protagonist of the game ... yet they didn't feel a need to bring in historical experts until late into development.

Brilliant plan, Ubisoft.

I think that's a lie. They didn't bring on late experts - they brought on shitty experts. When they revealed their main historian in one of their videos I remember it emerged that the women's main thesis or something was on man-man love in Feudal Japan or something. So it's another DEI failure on Ubisoft's part.

There was a post on here that detailed her. Something tells me the Ezio games weren't using historians like this:

If you check out her credentials, you wonder (or perhaps not) why Ubisoft chose her since she's primarily interested in topics like ...

• Tales of Idolized Boys: Male-Male Love in Medieval Japanese Buddhist Narratives
• The New Lady-in-Waiting Is a Chigo: Sexual Fluidity and Dual Transvestism in a Medieval Acolyte Tale
• Non-Binary Genders in the Genji, the New Chamberlain, and Beyond
• Overcoming Yoshitsune’s Shortcoming of Shortness: National Identity, Masculinities, and Corporeality in the Cultural History of Japan
• The Queer Love Triangle of Lord Kiso, Imai Kaneira, and Lady Tomoe
• How to Queer Acolyte Tales
• Chigo no sōshi: A Homoerotic Handscroll of Five Buddhist Acolytes from 14th-Century Japan
• Benevolent Infidelity and Subversion of Sexual Roles in a Love Triangle
• Idolized Boys on Stage: Warawa-mai as a Power-Generating Machinery in Medieval Elite Society
• Foster Brothers with Benefits: Subversions of Sexual Roles in a Lord-Vassal Dyad
• Chigo no sōshi: Erotic Images and Stories of Five Capricious Adolescent Boys
• From the Ugly Shorty to Pretty Young Thing and Precocious Boy Fighter: Fragmentary Images of Minamoto no Yoshitsune.
• Overcoming Lookism: The Cross-dressing of the Heroine in The Tale of the New Chamberlain

And then there's this photo of her:

How difficult could it have been to find a bonafide Japanese born professor in Japanese history without all of the political/gender baggage?

 

[Cyberpunkd]

I think that's a lie. They didn't bring on late experts - they brought on shitty experts. When they revealed their main historian in one of their videos I remember it emerged that the women's main thesis or something was on man-man love in Feudal Japan or something. So it's another DEI failure on Ubisoft's part.

There was a post on here that detailed her. Something tells me the Ezio games weren't using historians like this:

If you check out her credentials, you wonder (or perhaps not) why Ubisoft chose her since she's primarily interested in topics like ...

• Tales of Idolized Boys: Male-Male Love in Medieval Japanese Buddhist Narratives
• The New Lady-in-Waiting Is a Chigo: Sexual Fluidity and Dual Transvestism in a Medieval Acolyte Tale
• Non-Binary Genders in the Genji, the New Chamberlain, and Beyond
• Overcoming Yoshitsune’s Shortcoming of Shortness: National Identity, Masculinities, and Corporeality in the Cultural History of Japan
• The Queer Love Triangle of Lord Kiso, Imai Kaneira, and Lady Tomoe
• How to Queer Acolyte Tales
• Chigo no sōshi: A Homoerotic Handscroll of Five Buddhist Acolytes from 14th-Century Japan
• Benevolent Infidelity and Subversion of Sexual Roles in a Love Triangle
• Idolized Boys on Stage: Warawa-mai as a Power-Generating Machinery in Medieval Elite Society
• Foster Brothers with Benefits: Subversions of Sexual Roles in a Lord-Vassal Dyad
• Chigo no sōshi: Erotic Images and Stories of Five Capricious Adolescent Boys
• From the Ugly Shorty to Pretty Young Thing and Precocious Boy Fighter: Fragmentary Images of Minamoto no Yoshitsune.
• Overcoming Lookism: The Cross-dressing of the Heroine in The Tale of the New Chamberlain

How difficult could it have been to find a bonafide Japanese born professor in Japanese history without all of the political/gender baggage?

There is a lot to unpack here but I agree with what you said:

1. They didn't bring experts late, they just brought expert that doesn't have a very good knowledge of Japanese history, hence shit with Kanji and damaged Tori gate. That links to number 2...

2. I think Ubisoft failed to see how the Japanese AC will be perceived - this is THE AC people have been asking from the start, the one you were supposed to absolutely ace, we are talking 90+ AC. We know how highly the Japanese culture is regarded in Japan and internationally, it seems it didn't register with anyone at Ubisoft the importance of getting this right. Egypt - lol, nobody cares, Cleopatra was black ; England / Vikings - whatever ; Bagdad - oh, it's the place that has terrorists now ; Japan...

"Historical fiction" is an intellectually lazy excuse, kinda saying "too much trouble, too expensive, we will make shit up".

 

[FunkMiller]

.

Yotei seems to have it’s own share of battles to fight and going in after AC means they absolutely needs to nail the open world climbing which was a sore point in Tsushima.

Yotei is still going to sell a bucketload, because Tsushima was excellent, and Sucker Punch have earned some trust from the audience. It's a very small, extremely dumb minority who won't engage with it just because it has a female protagonist.

AC will bomb like the fucking bitch it is because Ubisoft have zero trust from the audience, thanks to years of putting out rancid slop. Add the grotesque amounts of anti-Japanese racism going on, because they're a bunch of ideologically captured fuckheads, and you have a glorious recipe for the company's much deserved downfall.

 

[captainnapalm]

There is a lot to unpack here but I agree with what you said:

1. They didn't bring experts late, they just brought expert that doesn't have a very good knowledge of Japanese history, hence shit with Kanji and damaged Tori gate. That links to number 2...

2. I think Ubisoft failed to see how the Japanese AC will be perceived - this is THE AC people have been asking from the start, the one you were supposed to absolutely ace, we are talking 90+ AC. We know how highly the Japanese culture is regarded in Japan and internationally, it seems it didn't register with anyone at Ubisoft the importance of getting this right. Egypt - lol, nobody cares, Cleopatra was black ; England / Vikings - whatever ; Bagdad - oh, it's the place that has terrorists now ; Japan...

"Historical fiction" is an intellectually lazy excuse, kinda saying "too much trouble, too expensive, we will make shit up".

Yes, not having the main male and female protag both be Japanese was a big mistake.

 

[MMaRsu]

Damn, they're removing the hip hop music.

Lets hope so. Fucking bullshit

 

[MMaRsu]

Curious to read that they're changing parts of the story to address how Yasuke is represented.

How would they do that in three months?

 

[MetalFreak]

"I’m told that historical experts were brought onto the project"

 

[RCX]

"The game is currently not at the stage it needs to be for release"

But until the preview cycle started falling apart they were still planning to release it anyway. They 100% intended to charge full price for bug ridden beta.
Try to remember that the next time you consider buying anything from these assholes.

 

[ZehDon]

How would they do that in three months?

You'll have to ask them?

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Yotei seems to have it’s own share of battles to fight and going in after AC means they absolutely needs to nail the open world climbing which was a sore point in Tsushima.

Um, what was wrong with the open world climbing in Tsushima?

 

[FewRope]

Hip hop fighting music for a black samurai 500 years ago. lol.

I'm no historian, but tip for all the white, french, christian folks at UBI Quebec: Just because there's a black guy doesn't mean you have to bundle in rap music.

That was legit crazy, I cannot believe someone thought that was a good move

 

[Braag]

Actually Valhalla came to Steam over a year after its release. Them putting Shadows in steam, especially so close to Kingdom Come 2, wont make much of a difference.

 

[FewRope]

Honestly I don't mind the idea of hip hop music with samurai, as it's been a fun mix in the past:



It's just that Ubisoft had no sense of good hip hop music to use, so they went with the generic 'safe hip-hop' you'd hear in countless bad trailers that sounds like royalty free junk. It doesn't take that much effort for a AAA company to go and search for better hip hop producers. Here are three recent examples of better music than what was shown in that latest AC Shadows gameplay video:

Samurai Champloo was so peak and the music helped the fluid movement of the combat style of both protagonists, the problem isnt with hip hop, the problem is giving the only black dude in the entire country the hip hop theme, it was fucking crazy in the reveal and Yasuke plays like a bull, it was so stereotypical that became unironically the most overtly racist shit I have ever watch in a videogame

 

[StueyDuck]

Imagine being on the c-suite and looking at the Financials, seeing all the fails from the experts and then looking at how much you have spent on expert consulting fees .

As we all know these slacktavists are grifters so I can imagine they don't come cheap.

Surely ubi can take whichever consulting firm to court for potential damages if it's true that they just provided a bunch of made up nonsense knowingly, which can be proven factually incorrect or culturally offensive. I mean that's their job, to get the historical accuracies correct.

It'll never happen but I'd love to see the grifters get their come uppance.

 

[GymWolf]

Bets are open, are they gonna left intact the dubstep music when you murder japanese mofos?

 

[MMaRsu]

Actually Valhalla came to Steam over a year after its release. Them putting Shadows in steam, especially so close to Kingdom Come 2, wont make much of a difference.

Putting a game on a service a year later or day and date makes a lot of difference.

Kingdom Come 2 is an entirely different crowd.

 

[FewRope]

Bets are open, are they gonna left intact the dubstep music when you murder japanese mofos?

I hope they dont remove it just for the memes

 

[MMaRsu]

Honestly I don't mind the idea of hip hop music with samurai, as it's been a fun mix in the past:



It's just that Ubisoft had no sense of good hip hop music to use, so they went with the generic 'safe hip-hop' you'd hear in countless bad trailers that sounds like royalty free junk. It doesn't take that much effort for a AAA company to go and search for better hip hop producers. Here are three recent examples of better music than what was shown in that latest AC Shadows gameplay video:

It seems fine to me when it's not specifically a african man who gets the hiphop music.

In that case it seemed racist as fuck to me.

Oh he's black? Throw some hiphop music in there, the kids will love it!