Ubisoft faces mounting pressure as the controversy surrounding Assassin’s Creed: Shadows intensifies. The backlash has forced both Ubisoft and PureArts to pull the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Shadows figurine from sale, labeling it “insensitive,” a move likely costing millions.
Previously, we discussed Ubisoft’s potential acquisition by Chinese conglomerate Tencent amid severe financial struggles. These issues were worsened by Ubisoft’s strong focus on DE&I initiatives, which have alienated the gaming community. Their missteps, including the racially insensitive portrayal in Assassin’s Creed: Shadows, have damaged their reputation beyond repair, leaving no room for correction or modification.
By now, you’re likely familiar with the situation. Ubisoft is just one of many game companies that have, in the eyes of critics, “sold out” to corporate interests like BlackRock, reshaping their policies to embrace and enforce a “woke” ideology centered on diversity and representation.
This focus permeates everything, from their hiring practices to the games they create. Assassin’s Creed: Shadows has become a particularly contentious title, drawing what might be the most intense backlash seen for any game, and it’s not without reason.
Fans of the Assassin’s Creed series have long been clamoring for a game set in Asia, especially Japan, given the cultural significance of shinobis and samurai and synergy they have with the franchise itself. It seemed like the perfect setting for the series, a surefire hit, even if not executed flawlessly.
With recent installments growing stale and development costs soaring while sales stagnated, Ubisoft was backed into a corner. They finally decided to deliver what fans had been asking for, hoping it would rejuvenate the franchise and boost profits. However, the results have been far from what was expected.
The issue, however, lies in Ubisoft’s alignment with the political ideologies heavily influenced by hedge fund investment firms that prioritize ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) scores.
This scoring system, driven by firms like BlackRock, aims to reshape companies by enforcing political correctness and inclusivity, often pushing for tokenized representation. Ubisoft, like many major gaming companies, has embraced these trends for years, seen in titles like Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, which included controversial elements such as homosexual relationships for Viking characters.
However, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows takes this further and has ignited even more backlash.
Unlike previous Assassin’s Creed games, which have always featured fictional protagonists set within somewhat historically grounded worlds, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows is set in early 1600s feudal Japan.
To align with DE&I and ESG-driven initiatives emphasizing racial inclusivity, Ubisoft made a controversial decision: they based their protagonist on Yasuke, a real but historically minor figure, a Black man who lived during that era.
Yasuke’s historical role is poorly documented and largely considered insignificant. While he served under Oda Nobunaga, records suggest that he was more likely a sword bearer or retainer rather than a full-fledged samurai warrior, as depicted in the game.
Ubisoft’s decision to fictionalize Yasuke’s background, portraying him as a skilled warrior, has drawn nothing but criticism, with many arguing that it distorts historical accuracy in favor of political messaging all while progressive journalists want Japanese history to be rewritten by mercilessly defending their antics while calling gamers racist.
Ubisoft openly stated their desire for a non-Japanese protagonist in Assassin’s Creed: Shadows, but instead of creating a new fictional character, they chose to base the lead on a real, albeit historically obscure figure: Yasuke, the so-called “world’s first Black samurai” is what they’re trying to sell you on.
While a fictional protagonist would likely still have faced heavy criticism, it would have aligned more with the franchise’s tradition of blending historical settings with fictional characters. Instead, Ubisoft’s approach has been seen as an act of historical revisionism, blurring the lines between fiction and reality, and forcing a modern narrative onto Japan’s cultural history.
As a result, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows has become the subject of ridicule within the gaming community, solidifying Ubisoft’s fall from grace. Coming on the heels of the disastrous Star Wars: Outlaws release, it’s clear that Ubisoft’s relevance is waning.
Once a dominant force in the industry, the company now faces widespread rejection from gamers, who are turning their backs on its ideologically driven titles, which are unappealing. Ubisoft’s gradual descent into obscurity seems inevitable as its attempts to fuse social messaging with gaming continue to alienate its audience.
Ubisoft recently made the sudden decision to cancel its presentation at this year’s Tokyo Game Show, where it had planned to showcase its upcoming Assassin’s Creed title, a game that may very well determine the company’s future amid its current financial struggles.
The cancellation, made just days before the event, was reportedly due to ongoing controversy surrounding Assassin’s Creed: Shadows. The game faced backlash, exacerbated by a figurine produced by PureArts that featured a desecration of a torii gate, one of Japan’s sacred cultural symbols.
Following this, Ubisoft announced a delay for Assassin’s Creed: Shadows, pushing the release to February 14, 2025. The delay has sparked speculation, with myself suggesting that Ubisoft is using the timing coinciding with Black History Month as a political shield for a game already under fire for its “Blackwashed” portrayal of history.
This delay has only heightened suspicions that Ubisoft is attempting to mitigate what many expect will be a major failure, as the game’s historical inaccuracies and cultural insensitivity have generated widespread controversy.
“We recently released an insensitive design,” PureArts acknowledged. “We appreciate and have learned from the concerns brought to our attention, and we apologize for the harm this caused. After carefully reviewing the feedback, we have immediately returned to the drawing board and are reworking the design of the Qlectors Assassin’s Creed: Shadows Yasuke and Naoe figures.”
The controversy surrounding the figure began trending prior to the game’s delay, adding to the mounting criticism of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows for its blatant cultural appropriation. The offending merchandise featured a highly disrespectful depiction of a torii gate, broken in half, representing a one-legged torii, a symbol many found offensive.
Despite the backlash, PureArts clarified that pre-orders for the figurine have not been canceled. Customers who already placed orders will receive further information via email. However, the controversy, which persisted for weeks, forced Ubisoft and PureArts to make a costly decision to redesign the figure just before its commercial release.
This last-minute revamp, likely already deep into production, could cost millions, with some unsellable stock likely to be written off entirely.
The original figurine for Assassin’s Creed: Shadows featured both protagonists, Yasuke and Naoe, standing beside a broken, one-legged torii gate. In Japanese culture, a torii gate is a sacred structure marking the entrance to a Shinto shrine, symbolizing the boundary between the everyday world and the sacred realm of the kami (gods or spirits in Shinto).
It is a deeply revered symbol of Japan, not to be desecrated or misrepresented.
The figurine sparked outrage among Japanese netizens and others worldwide because the only surviving instance of a “one-legged” torii gate is located at Sanno Shrine in Nagasaki, which was partially destroyed during the atomic bombing in August 1945.
For many, the use of this imagery in merchandise was seen as highly insensitive, especially considering the historical tragedy it represents. This controversy further fueled criticism of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows, a game intended to represent Japanese culture but perceived as distorting and appropriating its most sacred symbols.
The torii gate at Sanno Shrine in Nagasaki lost one of its pillars due to the atomic blast, yet it still stands today as a symbol of resilience, alongside some surviving trees in the city.
To see such a sacred and historically significant symbol commercialized in a figure for a video game allegedly set in feudal Japan is more than just “insensitive” it’s seen as downright discriminatory.
Many believe it shows a blatant disregard for Japanese culture, highlighting Ubisoft’s racial prejudice against Japan, as the company has previously faced accusations of disrespecting Japanese history, including plagiarizing Japanese historical material for concept art.
The game’s narrative was penned by Giles Armstrong, who has publicly stated that White people hold privilege in the gaming industry and criticized the prevalence of White protagonists in games. This asserts that Assassin’s Creed: Shadows reflects an intentional bias against Japan and an artificial importance on “marginalized” races.
This situation escalated further when The New York Times ran a supportive article on Assassin’s Creed: Shadows and its historically revisionist Black samurai protagonist.
In the piece, a former Sweet Baby Inc. employee who had worked on previous Ubisoft titles dismissed the backlash, claiming that the outrage over the game and its protagonist primarily came from “racist Westerners pretending to be Japanese.”
Meanwhile, a petition on Change.org calling for the ban of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows in Japan has gained over 100,000 signatures, highlighting the intensity of the controversy.
It’s ironic that Ubisoft, a company that has heavily invested in pushing woke leftist ideology and tokenized diversity in its games, partnering with third-party firms to ensure “inclusive, tolerant, and authentic” representation for various cultures and races would simultaneously offend and desecrate Japanese culture and history.
Obviously it goes without saying that DEI mandated diversity initiatives are nothing more than hypocritical bullshit which is applied selectively, with little regard for cultures perceived as “White” or “White-adjacent,” leading to an absence of authentic representation and sensitivity for these groups.
As a result, there is little sympathy for Ubisoft, which is hemorrhaging money. The company’s abrupt delay of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows seems like an attempt to hide behind movements like Black Lives Matter to soften the blow of what everyone expects to be a monumental failure.
The game, criticized for its DEI-driven protagonist and its revisionist approach to history, is poised to be a financial disaster, with its controversial focus on racial politics overshadowing the franchise’s former appeal as its controversy continues to cost Ubisoft more money prior to its release much to my own amusement.
