The recent trend in the Assassin’s Creed series of featuring dual heroes is sometimes “divisive,” said the deputy game director of this year’s Assassin’s Creed Shadows, admitting that the choice between the agile shinobi Naoe and the mighty samurai Yasuke was a particularly notable example of this.
Shadows is being developed by Ubisoft Quebec, the studio behind the Victoria, London-based Assassin’s Creed Syndicate games and the archaic Greece role-playing game Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. Both also featured dual heroes, although in different ways.
“The differences between Evie and Jacob were mostly cosmetic,” said deputy game director Simon Lemay-Comtois GamesRadar+. “They play very, very similar, except for very few select skills.” In comparison, Shadows was specifically designed as an “exercise in contrast” – something that “may divide our fan base a little bit.”
Of course, these aren’t the only Assassin’s Creed games to feature multiple heroes. In Origins, set in archaic Egypt, you can play as both husband and wife, Bayek, and Aya, even if the latter only gets a fraction of the screen time. Meanwhile, Viking-era Valhalla also offered male and female versions of the hero Eivor for complicated plot reasons (but also so that Ubisoft could have a male character on the game box).
However, more than any other Assassin’s Creed game before it, the two protagonists of Shadows are built as completely different people. Their abilities are different, their combat systems are different and they are treated as two different but equal characters that can be used to perform the main task in the game.
“Dual heroes can be divisive in very strange ways, right?” – said Lemay-Comtois. “It’s not just saying, ‘Well, I prefer war, that’s why I prefer Yasuke.’ Some people just don’t like one character over the other and don’t like spending time with one. That’s true for Evie and Jacob, but for Naoe and Yasuke, the divide is greater,” he continued. “We knew that. We knew how to commit to it, but I think it might also divide our fan base a little bit.”
Will Ubisoft continue to offer dual heroes in the future – for example in the upcoming Assassin’s Creed Hexe? “I think the lesson for us was that yes, we could do more games with dual protagonists in the future – if we have a good reason to do it narratively and for the setting,” Lemay-Comtois concluded.
Ubisoft’s next Assassin’s Creed project to be released will be the still-unannounced Black Flag remake, which is reportedly scheduled for release in spring 2026. The main role is played by the pirate Edward Kenway, who has no second partner during the game’s main campaign.
As for Assassin’s Creed Shadows, little is known about Ubisoft’s plans to support the game throughout next year. The company initially expected to release a second major expansion following the launch of Claws of Awaji this fall, but Ubisoft has stated that plans have changed due to the delay of Shadows – and next year’s expansion content will now be of a smaller nature.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s news editor. You can contact Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
