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Assassin's Creed Shadows fan theory might have pinpointed the open-world game's historical setting with a crucial event in Japanese history
Fans speculate that Assassin's Creed Shadows may conclude with the assassination of Oda Nobunaga, providing insight into the historical event and the relationship between protagonist Yasuke and Nobunaga.
Assassin's Creed Shadows fans think they've worked out where the upcoming game could potentially conclude.
Yesterday, Ubisoft finally pulled back the curtain on Assassin's Creed Shadows with its debut reveal trailer, showcasing dual protagonists Yasuke and Naoe, and a setting of 1579. The Reddit post below notes that this setting is intriguing, not least because it takes place three years before the assassination of Oda Nobunaga, Yasuke's lord, and a mighty figurehead of Japanese history.
This event is known as the 'Honnō-ji incident,' where Nobunaga was assassinated by his vassal Akechi Mitsuhide (if you've watched FX's Shogun, that's Mariko's father). The post posits that because we know so little about why Mitsuhide ultimately betrayed Nobunaga, Assassin's Creed Shadows could relatively easily dress it as the series' Assassins versus Templars battle.
With Yasuke one of Shadows' two protagonists, his relationship with Nobunaga could very well be central to the Ubisoft game's plot. It's not really a stretch to guess Shadows might feature the Honnō-ji incident in some capacity, but the Reddit user in particular is theorizing that Assassin's Creed Shadows could wrap up near the event, with Mitsuhide as the game's main antagonist.
We don't really know a lot of Yasuke, ultimately. History shows he arrived in Japan in 1579, quite possibly as a servant to the Jesuits, before somehow serving Oda Nobunaga as part of the daimyō's Kashindan, basically his standing army. If you were in a clan's Kashindan, you were effectively considered a Samurai - Yasuke didn't need to fit into the rigid caste system of a Samurai because it's mostly an invention of the Edo period.
Assassin's Creed Shadows launches later this year on November 15 for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. We already know that Shadows' open-world map is about the same as Assassin's Creed Origin's Egypt, if you're looking for a comparison point of how large the new game is. Thankfully, that's a hell of a lot smaller than the imposing map in Assassin's Creed Valhalla.