GamesActionAssassin’s CreedHow Assassin’s Creed Shadows is using changing seasons and dynamic weather to be the series' “most advanced” game yetWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
GamesActionAssassin’s CreedHow Assassin’s Creed Shadows is using changing seasons and dynamic weather to be the series' “most advanced” game yetWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
(Image credit: Ubisoft)
Assassin’s Creed Shadowsis about to take us to Feudal Japan to explore the intertwining story ofshinobi assassin Naoe, and samurai Yasuke. For one of the most anticipated settings in the series,UbisoftQuebec is using new-gen tech to bring us into what art director Thierry Dansereau calls the “most advanced visual Assassin’s Creed game to date”. As Dansereau goes on to outline in a tech demo at Gamescom, the Anvil engine, which has been used to develop every AC entry, has been pushed further to support and introduce innovations, such as the new weather system, changing seasons, enhanced lighting and shadows, and “dynamic wind and spray” - which can show up to 10,000 particles on screen that move with the wind flow.
Everything is intended to come together to transport us into what will hopefully be a living and breathing environment. Not only is it intended to look visually impressive, but Dansereau says the open-world setting is also designed to be more interactive and responsive to you, with footage showing Naoe slicing through bamboo, while Yasuke tears his way through paper screen doors.
Weather and seasons
(Image credit: Ubisoft)
The world of Assassin’s Creed Shadows’is equivalentto that ofAssassin’s Creed Originsin “terms of play size”, with Dansereau adding that the team reworked the setting to a “much more realistic scale ratio compared to the previous titles” to reflect the mountains within the landscape of Japan that they wanted to capture. During the tech demo, I get to see some of the ways the team is trying to make its world feel more alive and immersive, with picturesque environments that move with the wind, and reflect light in realistic ways. As one of the most long awaited settings in the series, it’s clear from speaking with Dansereau that the team felt pressure to bring something new and go beyond what has been done before.
Gamescom 2024(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)For more of our previews and exclusive interviews, visit ourGamescom 2024coverage hub.
Gamescom 2024
(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)For more of our previews and exclusive interviews, visit ourGamescom 2024coverage hub.
(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)
For more of our previews and exclusive interviews, visit ourGamescom 2024coverage hub.
“This time around was difficult, because we knew it was a highly anticipated setting, and we knew that the expectations were very high,” Dansereau says, “and so we pushed ourselves, [and said] ‘okay, let’s do something very ambitious’. So we needed that very strong support from the Anvil team, because they’re working end to end with us making sure that we have the support we need.”
“The seasons offer the ability to go and see the same location in a different season, but also a different weather state, so from a player point of view, it’s a different visual experience and also [a different] gameplay experience,” Dansereau says. “This, for us, was something great to achieve in a new-gen game. This is part of what’s new for AC that we wanted to do. Of course, it was challenging because we had to rethink the way we were producing assets and how we rig them to the wind tech that was built, [which] is completely new.”
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In motion
(Image credit: Ubisoft)
As Dansereau says during the demo presentation, “the world is in constant motion”, and the wind tech is a big part of that. I watch as the wind causes rainfall to bounce off of the rooftop of a temple in a certain direction, or richequot off of Naoe’s armor as she runs through a storm. I can also see how it interacts with the landscape, picking up leaves or causing snowflakes to swirl off the ground.
“It [the wind tech] really follows the world in the environment,” Dansereau says. “We are constantly reviewing the game, and at some point we were in a field and just looking at the particles, how they were carried over with the wind. They were swirling around, and we just stopped and looked at the game. And we said, ‘wow, this is real’. This is what the system is giving us.”
While it certainly looks impressive, I’m more interested in experiencing how all of these systems will impact the way we play. As an example, Dansereau explains that the weather and seasons can affect how NPCs behave. So, if you were to knock an icicle from a rooftop during winter, that will naturally draw attention, while weather states like fog or the day and night cycles will affect your visibility. Guards can even fall asleep during warm weather, and if it’s colder or raining, they might seek shelter and change position. Ultimately the hope is that the various systems introduced will offer more variety and make it so that each player will have a different experience.
Everything shown certainly looked like it’s capturing the “photorealism” the team is striving for, not just in terms of how picturesque it appears, but how it moves, and how light reacts in different ways to make it appear more realistic. How it will actually change how I approach every mission remains to be seen, but from slicing through bamboo, to snuffing out lights, and using the weather for added cover, all of the new systems promise to offer up some new ingredients I’m looking forward to playing around with as Naoe and Yasuke.
See what else is in store in the stealthy series with our roundup of all of theupcoming Assassin’s Creed gameson the way.
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PRODUCTSAssassin’s Creed ShadowsGamescom 2024
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I’ve seen enough: Assassin’s Creed Shadows will beat Black Flag as my favorite AC game as Ubisoft says it lets you “Naruto run” as the “fastest Assassin” it’s ever made
Ubisoft had to “retool” the mobile game lore for Assassin’s Creed Shadows, with a brand new modern narrative that “will develop over time”
Ubisoft had to “retool” the mobile game lore for Assassin’s Creed Shadows, with a brand new modern narrative that “will develop over time”
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