DO NOT BUY Assassin's Creed Shadows - Very disappointing...

Hello and welcome back to a new video.

So, I've recently been playing the brand

new Assassin's Creed Shadows, and as an

avid fan of the Assassin's Creed franchise

and Japanese ninja games, samurai games in

general, I knew I just had to play this

game. Unfortunately, so far it's been a

bit bland, boring, uninspiring, and

lacking in a certain kind of lustre that I

didn't find lacking in other similar

games, such as Sekiro and Ghost of

Tsushima. So, this Assassin's Creed game

is slightly different to previous

installments of the Assassin's Creed

games, whereas instead of just playing as

a ninja, you also play as a warrior-style

So you got a black guy, he's like this

samurai guy, he's not really a stealth guy

or a ninja guy. And then you got the woman

who is the stealth woman. So it's kind of

like half the game is stealthy ninja,

typical assassin-style gameplay, which is

what we all love and know about the

Assassin's Creed games. And then the other

half of the game is kind of like samurai

slashing, got big armor. It's not really

about hiding, it's about brute strength.

And I don't know, it depends up to you if

you like that kind of game style, but most

people who play Assassin's Creed games are

probably in it because they want to be an

assassin, like a stealthy guy. So being

the samurai guy probably doesn't really

make you feel like an assassin, and you

might be disappointed if this is something

you don't really like because it's gonna

be what you have to do during half of the

game. It's kind of like in Metal Gear

Solid 2 when everyone thought you're gonna

be playing as Solid Snake, but then you

have to play half the game or more than

half the game as Raiden or Radion or

whatever his stupid name was, the guy with

the skinny bum and the big bum and the

tight clothing and the white hat. So I

found the combat in the game to be

extremely boring. So you basically spam

the left mouse button over and over again

for your light attack And then later

you'll get slightly different attacks

which are just basically different

variations of the same attack but just

holding down different buttons. So you've

got the heavy attacks where you can wind

it up, you've got stuff like parry,

counter, roll, dodge, and also

like a special move that builds up and

also like a, a stance-breaking,

guard-breaking kick thing. It's very

stereotypical, very bog-standard, but most

of the game in the combat you'll just be

spamming the left mouse button over and

over again and against trickier enemies

they're going to be blocking more, so

you're going to have to be a bit more

careful and try and counter their attacks

or try and get through their defenses.

But in the beginning of the game, it's

very boring. They're just like standing

around you waiting for you to attack, and

then you just spam the left mouse button.

I found the combat to be lacking in a

certain kind of appeal, and I found it

very dull. And it's not exactly an Elden

Ring or Dark Souls game where the feeling

of smashing the enemy with a melee weapon

is actually pretty satisfying. In this

game, everything's like automated. The

camera automatically attaches you to the

enemy. You don't really have to do much

dodging or rolling. There isn't really

much of a physics feeling to the engine,

the game engine, although it's a pretty

good game engine. There's not really a

feeling of physics or heavy gravity

towards your movement. It feels very

instantaneous. So as soon as you click the

button, it's going to happen. As soon as

you stop clicking it, it's going to stop.

You don't really have to worry about stuff

like physics or gravity or momentum in

this game, and everything's very snappy,

which I guess is okay if you want an

action game. But it just kind of makes it

feel very arcadey, very spammy, not very

logical where you have to use tactics and

strategy. It's more just, you know, look,

I'm a cool guy, I'm dressed up in samurai

gear, I've got a big sword, I'm gonna kill

stuff by spamming left mouse button over

and over again. So if you're into that,

then you might like the combat of this

game. If you're not into that, then you're

gonna be severely disappointed. I also

found it really frustrating how long it

takes until you can actually play the

game. There's so many cutscenes most of

them are not skippable. You can't skip the

beginning. I don't know, it's like 8 or 10

of these silly little clips in the

beginning of the game, like logos,

different branding signage. I don't want

to see that. You can't skip it. And then

in the beginning, it's like doing the

prologue of the story and you just can't

skip it. And then later on when it's just,

you know, in-game rendered cutscenes, you

can skip those. But for some reason, a lot

of them are not skippable and you're just

gonna have to sit there rolling your eyes

at the boring dialogue. The graphics are

okay, I guess. They don't really blow me

away. They look very bog standard, which I

guess is a good thing because I don't have

the most powerful laptop in the world,

and it was nice to be able to actually

play the game at a decent frame rate, and

the game still looks okay. So I give them

kudos for that, not requiring you to have

like a mega PC to be able to play this.

And yeah, I think they optimized graphics

for low-end machines pretty well. So yeah,

I give them points for that, but

unfortunately the gameplay Again, so look,

you basically got that super zoom-up dash

strike thing, which is just like overkill,

and it builds up over time, I guess, or

it's got cooldown. You use it now and

then, and the enemies just seem really

dumb. I mean, look at the AI, they're just

standing around getting slaughtered. And

sometimes the game just feels so easy. I

put the game onto maximum difficulty

level, and look, I'm just butchering these

villagers. The villagers just getting

slaughtered here. I don't even see what

the point is anymore. They're just like

standing there not doing anything is just

so stupid. As for the idea of a black guy

becoming a samurai, I don't have a problem

with it. I know a lot of people are

moaning about it and debating whether it's

historically accurate, and I don't really

think it matters too much if it's

historically accurate. If it's like a

fictitious twist on real events and they

wanted to chuck in a black guy, who cares

really? I mean, I guess there must have

been some black guys in Japan with all the

slave trading that went on during that

time period. There must have been at least

one black guy in Japan. There's a lot of

other like animes and TV shows where they

have black guys as samurais. I don't think

it's a big problem. But really, this game

story feels a bit like, like a budget

version of that Netflix series. What was

it called? Shogun. The Shogun. Shogun with

that white guy and that famous Japanese

actor. It feels like the game version of

that but not as well acted. The voice

acting not as good as the acting in

Shogun, and it just doesn't have memorable

characters like that show does. It's just

a bit disappointing overall. So for £60,

what do you get? You get an already

decent-looking game. Looks good enough, I

guess, but it's not mind-blowing. The

gameplay, very boring. You haven't seen

anything in this gameplay that you've

never seen that not before. It's just

exactly the same. I mean, they've pretty

much used the exact same game engine as

previous Assassin's Creed. It's all the

same. And then you got this woman riding

on a horse bit, so it's got kind of an

open world but not really. It gives you

the illusion of an open world, but it's

probably not gonna be open world like GTA

or Red Dead. So yeah, it's what you get

for £60. You get a pretty linear

action-based game with a story. I just

can't really guess what the story is gonna

be about. If I was gonna guess it's gonna

be about, I don't know, someone betrays

Lord Nobunaga and then you serve him and

then he betrays you and then you go on the

run, you become a fugitive. And then who

really cares about Japanese history?

Japanese history is so boring, it's all

the same. It's just like, oh, this, this

shogun hates this shogun and now they're

at wars and now the 2 different factions

are at war. Civil war in Japan again.

It's just, I don't know, for £60, I don't

feel like this game's worth it. This feels

like a £25 game. Doesn't really feel like

a 2025 game either, so I'm gonna have to

give it a 6.2 out of 10. Very boring,

bland, do not buy.

I killed the eagle!