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[Laptop1991]

The bolded is the one thing that makes me nervous about the game. I love hip-hop (it's my favorite genre of music), but why was it only playing during Yasuke's fights?

I know right lol, like a comment i saw on YT said he is African, not African American ha ha

 

[Kurotri]

While we are on topic of music, they released 4 tracks from the OST:


I can't even bring myself to like the music from this game. The soundtrack was always a huge part of AC but this time even this area is lacking. The main theme is boring as hell.

 

[GymWolf]

All these controversies about this game is making me extremely interested in how it’s gonna do sales wise.

Valhalla was terrible and had the worse representation of vikings in all form of media and it was still the most successful ac game ever.

Shadows is gonna do fine.

 

[Lokaum D+]

While we are on topic of music, they released 4 tracks from the OST:


I can't even bring myself to like the music from this game. The soundtrack was always a huge part of AC but this time even this area is lacking. The main theme is boring as hell.

the only AC Japan we need had already been released, GoT theme is fire

 

[Terenty]

Lol these people are walking caricatures, opened an app to calm down, wtf?

 

[simpatico]

I have a mindfulness app on my phone.

They put this guy in charge of a $400,000,000 project?

 

[GymWolf]

I mean, it is a way some people self-regulate. It isn't destructive and can only take a few minutes. I don't see the issue. I'm bad at it but more power to people who take action to deal with their emotions instead of letting it fester and explode.

You think an app can deal with something complicated like strong emotions?

All these people are gonna eventually explode even harder than normal people if this is their way to deal with problems.

 

[Majormaxxx]

They put this guy in charge of a $400,000,000 project?

Ommmmmmm

 

[PaddyOCanager]

A mindfulness app?

 

[jason10mm]

Find me one line in a history book that suggests there wasn't hip-hop in feudal Japan.

I'll wait.

The japanese can DEFINITELY carry a beat...

 

[RoboFu]

You do have two characters to choose from, one male and one female. This time they just made two differents gameplays tied to these two characters. I don't think it's an issue at all ?

Isn't that my point? The game and the guy being black is not the reason people are mad.. keep up.

 

[Oddvintagechap]

the fact remains that 99.9999999999999999999999999% of samurai were Japanese men

and so? you know what’s more interesting? than 99.9999999999999999999999999%? 0.0000000000000000000000001%. Go play the 85% of samurai games with exclusively Japanese people. Let the adults make and play the rest.

 

[diffusionx]

and so? you know what’s more interesting? than 99.9999999999999999999999999%? 0.0000000000000000000000001%. Go play the 85% of samurai games with exclusively Japanese people. Let the adults make and play the rest.

I didn't realize children made those games, an incredible achievement really.

 

[sendit]

Mindfulness app, wild….society is fucked.

 

[Fbh]

Yea, lots of modern game (specially western ones) do feel like they are made by people who have a mindfulness App on their phone.... that they need to use after reading tweets lol

 

[DenchDeckard]

I meditate. I use mindfulness, its great but never once in my life have I read something on the Internet or have anyone say anything in real life that's made me go....

I need to fire up this mindfulness app right now!

 

[Sephimoth]

While we are on topic of music, they released 4 tracks from the OST:


I can't even bring myself to like the music from this game. The soundtrack was always a huge part of AC but this time even this area is lacking. The main theme is boring as hell.

Shite.

Brotherhood was my fav

 

[jason10mm]

Valhalla was terrible and had the worse representation of vikings in all form of media and it was still the most successful ac game ever.

Shadows is gonna do fine.

Maybe. But in my mind Valhalla being a slog and overstuffed was not due to the "vikingness" of it IMHO, just the extended drawn out nature of the game play.

A better comparison to this Yasuke thing would be if the main character in Valhalla was Ahmad ibn Fadlan, an arabic visitor whose writing about the vikings (or Rus) are THE BASIS for a bunch of what we "know" about them. Certainly a more credible and understandable "Diversity character" to use. Yasuke could have been a character IN Shadows, but as a main playable one, poor choice IMHO.

 

[BennyBlanco]

They are free to make whatever game they want, but the consumers are also free to voice their opinion on what they’re making. I will not be buying this junk.

 

[killatopak]

I enjoy Ubisoft games as crazy as that sounds but this one seems just a bit over the edge for me. When the people your game is portraying is already hating on you already, I'm not sure if I need to embroil myself in that. It's a stark difference in how GoT was received with Japanese game developers even went in to join the praise.

I don't see any of that excitement here. It's just not the vibe I want especially when I have fun discussing games I play.

 

[GymWolf]

Maybe. But in my mind Valhalla being a slog and overstuffed was not due to the "vikingness" of it IMHO, just the extended drawn out nature of the game play.

A better comparison to this Yasuke thing would be if the main character in Valhalla was Ahmad ibn Fadlan, an arabic visitor whose writing about the vikings (or Rus) are THE BASIS for a bunch of what we "know" about them. Certainly a more credible and understandable "Diversity character" to use. Yasuke could have been a character IN Shadows, but as a main playable one, poor choice IMHO.

Valhalla was bad at everything except graphic tbh.

 

[LordBlodgett]

It is absolutely wild to me that they decided to make their protagonist in ancient feudal Japan a black man, especially since you are supposed to be an "assassin" living in the shadows. Just absolutely nonsensical. Odyssey and Origins were both good, and you played as a Greek protagonist in Greece, and an Egyptian in Egypt, as you would expect. Obviously these are stories and so they are made up worlds, but one thing I always loved about the games is they sort of at least tried to stay true to the place they were depicting and the people in those places. They sort of started going off the rails with Valhalla where you play as a viking in England, basically just making shit completely up (Pillaging and raping? The vikings settled here, and they were the good guys, trust us!). No one cared about that one though because it's just one group of white people being misrepresented at the expense of another group of white people, and really now, who gives a shit about white people

I will probably still play this because I enjoy the game play loop of AC, but I think it absolutely deserves all the shit it's getting, and I ain't gonna buy it for anything more than 80% off asking price with all of its DLC. Probably gonna be a while......

 

[ManaByte]

“I have the mindfulness app on my phone”

 

[Sushi_Combo]

Just finished the Ezio trilogy last week. Loved this soundtrack in AC2 so much. Especially the first minute.

 

[Kikorin]

I can't care less about AC, but I watched the extended gameplay released by Ubisoft and I can't believe how much out of place this huge black guy is in this setting lol

Also is fun to see ancient Japanese people have no reaction to him, when you can see videos of black influencers in places like China today, where kids and people are surprised to see a black guy.

 

[jason10mm]

Valhalla was bad at everything except graphic tbh.

Ahhh, I liked a lot of stuff in it, there was just SO MUCH. If england had 3 fewer regions and maybe half as many dots on the map with an accelerated story (that DID NOT include getting hit on by rando viking men, WTF?) I think it would have been a much better experience. Building out that town is always fun, though it wasn't as cool as the villa in AC2 or modding your ship in BF.

It's the modern interlude stuff I dislike about recent AC games, even the forced templar/assassin shit. Or hitting the fourth wall "in game" with the digital stuff.

 

[whyman]

Sometimes I wonder how poorly managed game companies must be, given their huge budgets, yet failing to produce half decent games. I'm glad this person could explain why that is the case.

 

[NickFire]

Valhalla was terrible and had the worse representation of vikings in all form of media and it was still the most successful ac game ever.

Shadows is gonna do fine.

How would you rate Valhalla if the possible purchaser wanted nothing to do with stealth and just wanted to run amok as a Viking? Asking because the complete edition is on sale and has been tempting me.

 

[Last Hearth]

In my mind this is a like The Last Samurai (Tom Cruise) movie, which was also criticised, but it seems like there's more criticism over this. The difference in reaction could be because times have changed, or for other reasons...

Historical accuracy is also irrelevant in this situation because Ubi have a track record of being loose (taking creative liberties) with historical figures in their AC titles.

The difference is that the assassins creed franchise has never had the player play as a historical character. They’ve always made the historical characters NPCs and had the player character be a fictional character.

They changed their rules because they obviously had a desired outcome, and then wanted to use historicity as a shield, and everyone sees through it.

 

[Rambone]

I opened up my mindfulness app and it said I would have fun playing as a black man in feudal japan. I hope there is some good rap'n'jap fusion music, I feel so cultural now.

 

[March Climber]

While we are on topic of music, they released 4 tracks from the OST:


I can't even bring myself to like the music from this game. The soundtrack was always a huge part of AC but this time even this area is lacking. The main theme is boring as hell.

If they're going to mix the stylings of modern hip-hop beats with a japanese influence behind it, there are much better ways to do this. Here is an example:



This was the official music for the character Overhaul in the MHA anime. Much more energy behind it than what Ubisoft has shown so far, which feels more like they asked a composer who wasn't familiar with hip-hop to work with hip-hop.

 

[Kurotri]

If they're going to mix the stylings of modern hip-hop beats with a japanese influence behind it, there are much better ways to do this. Here is an example:



This was the official music for the character Overhaul in the MHA anime. Much more energy behind it than what Ubisoft has shown so far, which feels more like they asked a composer who wasn't familiar with hip-hop to work with hip-hop.

I think The Flight do good stuff, I liked their work on AC Odyssey and both Horizon games. So it's either as you said that they don't gel well with hip-hop-esque stuff, or the band that they were tasked to work with, Teke Teke, just suck. I think it's the latter.

 

[Dr. Claus]

It is absolutely wild to me that they decided to make their protagonist in ancient feudal Japan a black man, especially since you are supposed to be an "assassin" living in the shadows. Just absolutely nonsensical. Odyssey and Origins were both good, and you played as a Greek protagonist in Greece, and an Egyptian in Egypt, as you would expect. Obviously these are stories and so they are made up worlds, but one thing I always loved about the games is they sort of at least tried to stay true to the place they were depicting and the people in those places. They sort of started going off the rails with Valhalla where you play as a viking in England, basically just making shit completely up (Pillaging and raping? The vikings settled here, and they were the good guys, trust us!). No one cared about that one though because it's just one group of white people being misrepresented at the expense of another group of white people, and really now, who gives a shit about white people

I will probably still play this because I enjoy the game play loop of AC, but I think it absolutely deserves all the shit it's getting, and I ain't gonna buy it for anything more than 80% off asking price with all of its DLC. Probably gonna be a while......

Nah, Odyssey was horrid. From an old post of mine:

Go read actual Greek philosophers and Greek historians. That is by no means a fact. Women did not have free reign and they were treated *very* differently in Sparta vs Athens.

• The Aspasia was known as a "hataera", an ancient Greek courtesan or concubine, especially one of a special class of cultivated female companions. They were also a metic, a foreign resident of Athens, one who did not have citizen rights in their Greek city-state of residence.
  • Being what she was, she was free of the legal constraints that normally bound women to their homes in Ancient Athens. Therefore she was able to interact in social gatherings that were normally forbidden for most Athenian women.
• The vast majority of women were not frontline fighters, rarely would there ever be a women in a skirmish situation. Their roles were to raise children and tend to the household.
• The Greek World was not as "diverse" as is portrayed in the game. Indo-europeans brought in the language. The Greek people were and still are a mix of those indo-european migrations and older indigenous groups (that were still fair of skin). The Pelasgians were most likely the original indigenous group in the area. They didn't have darker skin tone like Dravidian people found in the southern and eastern ends of Africa.
  • Due to climatological sciences, we know that since the end of the ice age the Mediterraneans did not have high UV levels that would introduce evolutionary pressure to increase melanin levels within the Pelasgians. (A Eruopean Population in Minoan Bronze Age Crete, look it up via Scholar.Google).
• Spartans were ancient Eugensists who killed any who they thought were "weak". They made clear demarcations between themselves and the other greeks. They did not give them citizenship or equal rights.
• Ancient Greece had clear issues with race.
  • Xenophanes - "Our gods have flat noses and black skins, say the ethiopians. The Thracians say our gods have red hair and hazel eyes."
  • Aethiopia literally means "The Land of Burnt Faces"
  • Greece once had a huge Empire and ruled over multiple other groups. This lead to those groups speaking Greek - however that does not mean that they were anymore ethnically greek just as Japanese who speak English are British.
  • Hippocrates himself had believed that climate, geography, and location lead to the physical and mental characteristics of people:
    • "Concerning the listlessness and the cowardice of peoples, the seasons are especially the cause why asians are less martial than the europeans and more tame in their character, for making no dramatic shift either to the hot nor to the cold, their seasons are temperate." | "For there are no mental disturbances nor strong change of the body, from which it is more likely that the passion is roused and indulges the senseless and high-spirited rather than when it is in a steady state." | "For it is change of everything which wakes the disposition of men and does not allow it to rest." | " For these aforesaid reasons it seems to me that the asian race is weak and yet further so because of their customs. For much of asia is ruled by a king." | "And where men do not rule themselves nor are autonomous but are ruled by a despot, there is no reason for them to concern themselves over this. So when they do not practice the military disciplines, but they work to seem pacifistic."
  • Sparta had the Xenelasia - expelling foreigners who were deemed injurious to the city-state.
• Homosexuality and Pederasty *DID* exist, but it is greatly debated by the extent of which it occured.
  • Pederasty was the relationship between an Erastes (Adult Male) and an Eromenos (Younger Male), usually in their teens. However, this was believed to be more of a Mentor/Mentee relationship, not one that was inherently sexual. It also was only allowed for Citizens as any non-citizens could not engage in pederastic relationships. All surviving artwork involving pederasty does not show any sexual relationships between the Erastes and Eromenos.
  • Aristophanes wrote the famous Greek play: Lysistrata. This involves a ploy by Athenian women to stop having sex with their men so they would stop waging war with Sparta. If most greek men could gain sexual release through other means, this ploy would not have worked, but it did.
  • Greek Homosexuality by K.J. Dover explains better than I can in his book. He notes that there are 600 "homosexual" relations depicted out of nearly 80,000 known Greek vases. That is not great evidence to show a prevalent homosexual nature within Greek culture.
  • Xenophon: "Lycurgus adopted a system opposed to all of these alike. Given that someone, himself being all that a man ought to be, should in admiration off a boy's soul endeavor to discover in him a true friend without reproach, and to consort with him - this was a relationship which Lycurgus commended, and indeed regarded as the noblest type of bringing up." | "But if, as was evident, it was not an attachment to the soul, but a yearning merely towards the body, he stamped this thing as foul and horrible; And with this result, to the credit of Lycurgus be it said, that in lacedaemon the relationship of lover and beloved is like that of parent and child or brother and brother where carnal appetite is in abeyance."
  • Sparta also had very different words for Erastes and Eromenos.
    • Eispnelas, meaning inspirer.
    • Aites, meaning listener.
  • Grown men would not have had engaged in open homosexual relationships. One character: Alkibiades is shown as an unrelenting figure in the game's homosexual relationships. While history does show he was an active bisexual, it is suggested that he suffers from psychopathy. He was a self-serving and treacherous individual.
• Greek Men and Women (Promiscuity) is not at all as it is portrayed in the game.
  • There were laws that prevented men from seducing noble women who were under the protection of a kyrios. However, men were able to sleep with slaves and prostitutes despite being married - but noble women were not one of those. If caught, they would be executed by the Kyrios without trial.
  • Women were able to have sex with specific men as designated by the Kyrios in order to produce a stronger offspring, however they were *not* allowed to sleep with whomever they wanted.

The Greek world was consumed by gender and race. This is shown through the various accounts of ancient Greeks and the physical history we have of that ancient civilization.

I could have wrote a book on everything wrong with Odyssey and Valhalla, if it weren't so lazy.

The sad thing is, they could have had a way to utilize Yasuke in a simple and convicing way that helps the plot of the overall franchise while keeping true to what he actually did and not what a bunch of mentally challenged ideologues are trying to rewrite history to claim what he did.

Have him be a Hidden One/Assassin who is looking to expand and learn about other places. He is in a unique position to allow him to be a novelty in Nobunaga's court, learn important information, and share said information with his contacts overseas. Allow him to work with the Shinobi and learn off each other, him teaching them things about the Hidden Blade and the Assassin's Code, while they teach him about the land, its people, and unique characteristics about the Shinobi and how they deal with assassination/espionage.

He could have played a role similar to Malik Al-Sayf in AC1 - running the Assassin's Bureau, but not engaging directly with assassination. Hell, even have him "pretend fight" on the behest of Nobunaga for a mission or two - but he should never have been a main character.

 

[TheInfamousKira]

Just waiting at this point for the First Civilization to be retconned into straight up Africans and Adam and Eve were the black man's hubris for creating the soulless white homonculous race that ended up overturning the very fabric of space time. Also expecting Desmond to be reincarnated with the Shroud of Turin and immediately be 40% more Middle Eastern because of posthumous mana injections done by Abstergo or some shit.

 

[makaveli60]

So basically, he has no real arguments, just that it hurt his feelings?

 

[semiconscious]

“That tweet generated emotions, that…the first thing I wanted to do was go back on X—that I had deleted—and just tweet back,” he told Game File. “And I just took a step back. I have a mindfulness app on my phone. And I did a bit of mindfulness to try to explore the emotions that this tweet created. For me, Elon, it’s sad, he’s just feeding hatred. I had a lot of three-word replies that came to mind.”

every time i try to tell myself 'things can only get just so bad, right?', i'll turn around & see something like this, & realize, nope: they can actually get much worse...

 

[mckmas8808]

every time i try to tell myself 'things can only get just so bad, right?', i'll turn around & see something like this, & realize, nope: they can actually get much worse...

Is the Mindfulness app the new boogeyman or something? Did I miss an email?

 

[Shits_McGiggles]

fuck Ubisoft.

 

[Shits_McGiggles]

Valhalla was terrible and had the worse representation of vikings in all form of media and it was still the most successful ac game ever.

Shadows is gonna do fine.

Valhalla releasing on next gen consoles *might* have given it a sales boost, but you have a point either way.
It was an awful depiction of vikings (I think they included black vikings too) and was boring to boot, but people love their derivative slop I guess.

 

[Rocco Schiavone]

 

[GymWolf]

How would you rate Valhalla if the possible purchaser wanted nothing to do with stealth and just wanted to run amok as a Viking? Asking because the complete edition is on sale and has been tempting me.

I would not spend more than 10-15 dollars on it tbh.

Game is way too long and combat and story\charas are nowhere near as good to sustain such a long game (i'm not inherently against long games if at least one of the 2 is good)
Even the loot sucks compared to odissey\origin.

 

[cinnamonandgravy]

I love hip-hop (it's my favorite genre of music), but why was it only playing during Yasuke's fights?

it should never stop playing.
talking to NPC? hip hop.
main menu? hip hop.
PC install window? hip hop.

layer in a single japanese flute or something too.

 

[DeVeAn]

Imagine he was white instead lol. People would LOSE it. Personally, don't mind what ethic background a main character is. Does seem to be there for the sake of checking a box though.

 

[RavageX]

Personally, if I were him I would have just simply said, "IDGAF, this is something I wanted to create and a character I wanted to use. Make your own damn games if you don't like it."

 

[MacReady13]

Valhalla was terrible and had the worse representation of vikings in all form of media and it was still the most successful ac game ever.

Shadows is gonna do fine.

Sadly, you are right. I think just buy cause it's Assassins Creed.

And a mindfulness app? Fucking pussy. Didn't even answer the question as to why a black man plays the main character in a game set in feudal Japan!

 

[Doczu]

I dream of a forum where people are just excited about games more than pursuing an agenda.

Oh you are on one. Or at least you would be once companies stopped pursuing an agenda.

The purple dildo place will melt once this shit stop being injected

 

[jason10mm]

How would you rate Valhalla if the possible purchaser wanted nothing to do with stealth and just wanted to run amok as a Viking? Asking because the complete edition is on sale and has been tempting me.

There are some "forced" stealth parts but you can do a looooooot of viking raiding if you want. It's just a looooong ass game with, for me, overly repetitive combat loops and too many little things to chase to get "Stuff" to build "stuff". The story is a little basic but the norse stuff I thought was fun and well done.

 

[Madserb2023]

The issue is that not that the character is black but rather the reason he is. They did it because it is of the time, let's just say. If by being creative, they mean doing what everyone else is doing then I guess it is.

 

[winjer]

 

[fart town usa]

I mean the guy actually existed and is pretty well documented, chances of him actually being a samurai is 0% but its a dumb fucking series about made up assassins vs templars with aliens thrown into it, musk just comes accross as a cringe fucking retard like he always does

Dude helped create space rockets that reenter the earth's atmosphere and can land themselves and be reused.

Electric cars. Starlink which is giving Internet access to the most remote places on the planet.

Rather than emulate a retard era stance, maybe appreciate that you're lucky enough to live in a time period where we have an entrepreneur who is actually doing amazing things.