Support NeoGAF

[F0rneus]

Will we get to pick or will it be like syndicate, and we have to use both? If we can pick, yes problem solved. If it's more like syndicate I'm out, as I hated the thug story missions.

I can't answer that lol.

To explain the situation, I am no leaker at all but...my best friend ever (who cut everyone out of his life in the past few months after his marriage to a Morrocan architect) is a college professor in programming. And a lot of his students end up at Ubisoft in Montreal or Quebec City, so I knew about Odyssey (my dream AC game was a female lead AC in Ancient Greece and boom!), I knew about Ragnarok (which became Valhalla), and I know about Red.

So...although he's a cunt (and an abuser at that, as I learned from his ex)...I will protect what he told me.

 

[Doom85]

Even in Japanese games and anime, there aren't a ton of asian protagonists even though it can work well, something like samurai champloo was amazing.

Okay, Japanese games is a maybe, but anime? In what reality does the vast majority of anime not feature a Japanese lead?

Let’s see from this current season alone:

Bleach - Japanese lead
Jujutsu Kaiser - Japanese lead
Bungo Stray Dogs - Japanese lead
Mushoku Tensei - Japanese lead
Eminence in Shadow - Japanese lead
My Happy Marriage - Japanese lead
Zom 100 - Japanese lead
Horimiya - Japanese lead
Undead Girl Murder Farce - Japanese lead
Sugar Apple Fairy Tale - white lead
Dark Gathering - Japanese lead
Helck- race/ethnicity unspecified
The Girl I Like Forgot Her Glasses - Japanese lead
Reign of the Seven Spellblades - white lead, though the main girl is Japanese
Reborn as a Vending Machine - Japanese lead

There’s more titles, I just went with the first 15 I remembered were airing. So that’s 12 Japanese leads, two white leads (but one with a co-lead being Japanese), and one ambiguous one. Yeeeaaaah. Even if one would claim maybe older anime featured less Japanese leads, I’d say the majority were still Japanese.

 

[Zane Zaminski]

- Oh my god, Assassin's Creed in Japan. Finally I can be a Japanese ninja or samurai.

Ubisoft: here's the only black samurai we can find specially just for you.

 

[Edgelord79]

If you are a pseudo intellectual and historical accuracy offends thee, then please fuck off. It’s a game, not a text book. Don the inevitable assassins hood that will be in the game and you can use your imagination. You are in the distinct minority of those with fucks given.

If the character being black offends thee for no reason other that they are black, please fuck off.

This is the most trivial shit ever. Most likely you will get to put a mask on, wear a hood, paint your face and murder tons of shit. The colour of the protagonists skin is irrelevant in a historical fantasy.

 

[8BiTw0LF]

$20 skin incoming

 

[NoobSmog]

Okay, Japanese games is a maybe, but anime? In what reality does the vast majority of anime not feature a Japanese lead?

Let’s see from this current season alone:

Bleach - Japanese lead
Jujutsu Kaiser - Japanese lead
Bungo Stray Dogs - Japanese lead
Mushoku Tensei - Japanese lead
Eminence in Shadow - Japanese lead
My Happy Marriage - Japanese lead
Zom 100 - Japanese lead
Horimiya - Japanese lead
Undead Girl Murder Farce - Japanese lead
Sugar Apple Fairy Tale - white lead
Dark Gathering - Japanese lead
Helck- race/ethnicity unspecified
The Girl I Like Forgot Her Glasses - Japanese lead
Reign of the Seven Spellblades - white lead, though the main girl is Japanese
Reborn as a Vending Machine - Japanese lead

There’s more titles, I just went with the first 15 I remembered were airing. So that’s 12 Japanese leads, two white leads (but one with a co-lead being Japanese), and one ambiguous one. Yeeeaaaah. Even if one would claim maybe older anime featured less Japanese leads, I’d say the majority were still Japanese.

Japanese lead by name sure, but definitely not by looks which is what I'm talking about. Not that it really matters that much, because obviously anime feels very japanese because it's about the creative directors behind something that really matter, not the characters that they put in it. Resident evil has mostly white people as cast, but it's still a japanese ass video game.

 

[Horatius]

even without heading into the waters of culture wars discourse, this is still objectively funny

dude would be the worst assassin ever, he'd get one kill and any witnesses would be like yeah uh it was the one african dude we know

 

[jshaver488]

Wow, did you guys know that Blackrock owns just over 5% of Ubisoft? Blackrock has interesting corporate initiatives for companies they are invested in

 

[violence]

Given that they were 1-upped and cannot top ghost of Tsushima. The only thing that can do is try to be different.

 

[Red5]

even without heading into the waters of culture wars discourse, this is still objectively funny

dude would be the worst assassin ever, he'd get one kill and any witnesses would be like yeah uh it was the one african dude we know

The theory is it's going to be similar to Syndicate with two protagonists, one female Shinobi assassin as seen in the first leaks, and Yasuke as a Samurai/Tank type.

 

[mckmas8808]

Looks like it's another take on Yasuke the african samurai, hopefully no weirdo bullshit

This might be one of the coolest protagonists of all time. Just going by that pic alone!

 

[Germuso]

A generic black man, give me an asían.

 

[Tams]

This was an incredibly obvious choice, they just googled "most famous non-Japanese samurai that isn't white" and picked the first hit.

He was also a dedicated retainer of Nobunaga so I can't wait for them to totally rewrite everything and be like "but he actually hated him and was secretly a good guy."

Not that Nobunaga was necessarily a bad guy I guess, he just usually isn't depicted very positively.

Well, the story of Nobunaga is pretty much:

Beat up, kill, kill, betray, kill, kill, kill, betray, kill, kill, kill, be betrayed.

 

[Tams]

If that's the official (leaked) image, then my only concerns are:

• How would they justify such an person being an assassin?
• Why is he wearing very 'African' looking attire?

Yasuke went as far as to take a Japanese name and receive a residence and sword (highly symbolic). Though let's be honest, he was ultimately a curio (to put it nicely) of Nobunaga, if a well respected one.

 

[GetInTheRobot]

Oh cool more reasons to piss off some players, I personally couldn’t careless but every interaction in that story will be about him being black so I will gradually turn off the story in my mind

The concept of race didn't really exist in the same way it does now in that era...I doubt it'll be much of a role in the story other than maybe people pointing out he looks different than most of the world which is true. But I doubt the story dives deeply into racial prejudice because that concept didn't really exist. If anything it would be class prejudice.

 

[GetInTheRobot]

I would call excluding asian male protagonists for a black one in a game set in feudal Japan left-wing identity politics, yes.

Asians are for some reason left out of most left wing calls for minority representation in media.

I think in large part it's because asian have a massive video game market of their own so they don't really of a shortage of representation in this industry. I do hope Africa in general can grow it's own video game industry because some of the stories there are superb. A video game based on west african folk lore, or battles set in ancient africa asa moor...theres so much untapped potential, but the industry sadly isn't there yet.

 

[L*][*N*K]

The concept of race didn't really exist in the same way it does now in that era...I doubt it'll be much of a role in the story other than maybe people pointing out he looks different than most of the world which is true. But I doubt the story dives deeply into racial prejudice because that concept didn't really exist. If anything it would be class prejudice.

And yeah that is the direction Ubisoft will go with, in 2023.

 

[Masterofchapter]

The concept of race didn't really exist in the same way it does now in that era...I doubt it'll be much of a role in the story other than maybe people pointing out he looks different than most of the world which is true. But I doubt the story dives deeply into racial prejudice because that concept didn't really exist. If anything it would be class prejudice.

Asians has massive representation in games unlike Africans and ac red will have female asian characters and African character both asian and African representation. If anything this take is unique, games need more African representation, movies need more asian representation

 

[Aces High]

Wow, did you guys know that Blackrock owns just over 5% of Ubisoft? Blackrock has interesting corporate initiatives for companies they are invested in

Of course they are invested in a multitude of companys. They're an investment company after all. They buy these shares investments for their customers. How else would they be able to offer ETFs?

When you take a bread and butter ETF like any MSCI world, the investment company that gives out this ETF (like BlackRock) has to buy shares of every company that is used within this ETF to replicate the market.

Some of you guys...

 

[Zok310]

- Oh my god, Assassin's Creed in Japan. Finally I can be a Japanese ninja or samurai.

Ubisoft: here's the only black samurai we can find specially just for you.

You know what, it gives them some breathing room from GOT. Otherwise it would literally be the same game imo.

 

[Kamina]

I wonder if they will make it so immersive that the Japanese people in the game will refer to you as Koku-jin.

 

[EverydayBeast]

Doesn’t make a difference who the main character in an assassins creed game is you could have anyone play the main character and I wouldn’t have known.

 

[Arachnid]

He looks BADASS. I'm down.

 

[TagZ]

Sorry if it's already been said, I don't understand though, with Assassin in the title wouldn't this be based on Shinobi/Ninja? The real clans that existed Iga and Koga. If they use Yasuke doesn't that clash with the whole Assassin part because he was a Samurai and apparently most samurai were not fans of shinobi, like they had no honor something.

 

[Topher]

Sorry if it's already been said, I don't understand though, with Assassin in the title wouldn't this be based on Shinobi/Ninja? The real clans that existed Iga and Koga. If they use Yasuke doesn't that clash with the whole Assassin part because he was a Samurai and apparently most samurai were not fans of shinobi, like they had no honor something.

The last two "Assassin's" games didn't have protagonists who were assassins so this isn't new. And the rumor is that there will be a female Japanese ninja character as well.

 

[TagZ]

The last two "Assassin's" games didn't have protagonists who were assassins so this isn't new. And the rumor is that there will be a female Japanese ninja character as well.

I get that but it's a bit different when one is "historically" opposed to the other. Maybe this rumor of a "Kunoichi" female ninja will do the Shinobi part / stealth parts of the game.

 

[Topher]

I get that but it's a bit different when one is "historically" opposed to the other. Maybe this rumor of a "Kunoichi" female ninja will do the Shinobi part / stealth parts of the game.

Not so certain how opposed Samurai were to stealth really. That has been a point of debate in this thread. Ghost of Tsushima explored that dynamic quite a bit as well. But yeah, could be there are distinct roles for both characters. We really don't know enough at this point.

 

[Shubh_C63]

Now watch Ubi butcher the character script completely, just like every Ubi game.

Story coherency in Ubi games is an afterthought.

 

[GetInTheRobot]

Asians has massive representation in games unlike Africans and ac red will have female asian characters and African character both asian anal African representation. If anything this take is unique, games need more African representation, movies need more asian representation

I agree, different representation in different mediums.

 

[WorldHero]

Looking forward to this

 

[tecmo9000]

Just lock this thread.

 

[Puskas]

History and differentiation aside, people have been persistently bitching and moaning about an AssCreed game taking place i fedual Japan and the idea of one might (as Yasuke still not being officially confirmed) end playing as a black samurai...well, you just have to recognize the fact that this would be absolutely fucking hilarious.

 

[Tams]

Just lock this thread.

Why?

There's actually some honest, knowledgeable, informed discussion going on in here.

 

[DeafTourette]

History and differentiation aside, people have been persistently bitching and moaning about an AssCreed game taking place i fedual Japan and the idea of one might (as Yasuke still not being officially confirmed) end playing as a black samurai...well, you just have to recognize the fact that this would be absolutely fucking hilarious.

I'm floored by the animosity some have of Yasuke being the main character.

I liked up Yasuke and came across this thread. I've never played an AC game (apart from a demo at E3) so this might be my first one

 

[BadBurger]

I'm not one to typically care about DEI or whatever, but I find it distasteful and even disrespectful for Ubisoft to finally center a game in the far east and yet focus on a foreigner as one of their protags. They always focused on protags that were very much borne of their historical locales in one way or another, so this just seems shitty. Especially given how few AAA western games even bother to include Asian characters in the first place unless they're like a computer hacker or femme fatale or whatever other lazy stereotypes they traffic in.

My two cents anyways. I probably wasn't going to buy the game anyways given how little I cared for the previous one, but I def won't be buying now.

Edit: yea AC4 featured a British person in the Caribbean, but it was a story about pirates in that area at the time. Hence, a dude from Europe was obvious. This is different. Straight replacing the locals for what?

 

[Hudo]

I bet you that this decision was made not because Ubisoft has a genuine interest in Yasuke but because it's their way of trying to differentiate / minimize comparisons to Ghost of Tsushima, which frankly, has beaten Ubisoft at their own game. Ghost of Tsushima is a better Ubisoft-style game than all the AC games since Revelations.

 

[MMaRsu]

I have to assume you are joking because there have been SO MANY games where can play as an Asian warrior in recent years. Did you miss all of Ghost of Tsushima somehow for example? The countless Japanese JRPGs? For Honor has an entire faction of Japanese warriors.


And even if you want to dismiss games like that it doesn't change the fact that the idea of a non-traditionally Asian samurai is neither new nor historically/culturally inaccurate let alone fucking "woke".

For honor isnt an assassins creed game, nor are any of your other examples.

 

[Toots]

I can't answer that lol.

To explain the situation, I am no leaker at all but...my best friend ever (who cut everyone out of his life in the past few months after his marriage to a Morrocan architect) is a college professor in programming. And a lot of his students end up at Ubisoft in Montreal or Quebec City, so I knew about Odyssey (my dream AC game was a female lead AC in Ancient Greece and boom!), I knew about Ragnarok (which became Valhalla), and I know about Red.

So...although he's a cunt (and an abuser at that, as I learned from his ex)...I will protect what he told me.

I don't think your best friend ever cut you out of his life because of his wife.
There's nothing worst than someone telling you that he knows something for internet brownie points :/

 

[M0G]

I did not know about this guy, but now that I do I can see this was won't have had any competition when they were choosing a character for the game. At least it actually happened and after the historical bullshit of Valhalla it's almost refreshing. If they keep the reaching to a minimum and try not to inflate every historical ambiguity it could be quite enjoyable. If there gameplay goes back to the RPG creeds though, this will be fucking horrible. +1 to Ghost of Tshushima has the crown.

 

[ahtlas7]

I don’t want to play as a black dude nor white dude. I’d prefer to play as a period accurate Japanese Samurai dude or chick with compelling story and gameplay.

 

[DeafTourette]

I don’t want to play as a black dude nor white dude. I’d prefer to play as a period accurate Japanese Samurai dude or chick with compelling story and gameplay.

It has at least some basis in history. Yasuke was an actual African samurai.

 

[Gaiff]

I don’t want to play as a black dude nor white dude. I’d prefer to play as a period accurate Japanese Samurai dude or chick with compelling story and gameplay.

And why should anyone care what you want?

 

[Nobody_Important]

For honor isnt an assassins creed game, nor are any of your other examples.

Astute observation.


Gold star.

 

[Represent.]

Day 1 for me.

Hopefully it looks next gen

 

[ZoukGalaxy]

What a weird combo if true, would have preferred BY FAR an AC set in deep Sub-Saharan/West/East Africa instead of this aberration.

 

[touchfuzzy]

Wasn't there just an art-leak a few weeks ago showing a female Japanese samurai assassin as the character?

 

[ahtlas7]

And why should anyone care what you want?

I care. Are you the gate keeper of opinion?

 

[Gaiff]

What a weird combo if true, would have preferred BY FAR an AC set in deep Sub-Saharan/West/East Africa instead of this aberration.

One set in the Mali Empire during the times of Mansa Musa could have been dope.

 

[Tams]

One set in the Mali Empire during the times of Mansa Musa could have been dope.

Spoiler: The ending

He sails off into the sunset never to be seen again and his empire crumbles soon afterwards.

 

[YOU PC BRO?!]

Considering this is a period game set in historic Japan. Have to say, if I was Japanese, I would consider the main character choice to be disrespectful… an insult to my culture and heritage. What are they thinking with this?