Assassin’s Creed Shadows Boss Hopes Players Can Stay “Open-Minded” Amid Musk Criticism

Assassin’s Creed has finally listened to what players have wanted for years and has dived head-on into 1579 feudal Japan during the Azuchi-Momoyama period. This exciting news was initially met with excitement but, like so many gaming triumphs of late, the Ubisoft title was in the firing line due to its inclusion of the historical African samurai, Yasuke. where many voiced their opinion that the game was “woke”.

Naturally, X owner Elon Musk joined these voices by saying “DEI kills art.” in response to a tweet that stated the game should be delayed due to the backlash over the game’s injection of DEI. Assassin’s Creed boss Marc-Alexis Côté has responded to the discourse and why he never felt the need to hit back at Musk’s criticism.

Speaking to Game File, which is behind a paywall and retold by Eurogamer, Marc-Alexis Côté expressed his thoughts on the feelings that arose in him regarding the Musk tweet reply. Côté had previously deleted Twitter/X, and it was probably the best thing he could have done. “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,” Côté said “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.”

Côté went on to say that he thought how Elon conducted himself in his reply was merely fanning the flames of hate. “For me, Elon, it’s sad, he’s just feeding hatred. I had a lot of three-word replies that came to mind.” Thankfully, due to Côté deleting Twitter, he didn’t have a knee-jerk desire to respond and even if he did, it wouldn’t achieve anything and only hurt Ubisoft more. “By attacking someone like Elon… I will not convince people about our point of view as a team,” Côté expressed. “Yasuke is very, very grounded in the history of the franchise and how we make our choices.”

Pushing Musk’s statement to the side, Côté wants players to think for themselves when it comes to Assassin’s Creed Shadows and not to be swayed by other people’s opinions. “I was reviewing the game very recently, and I was like, ‘The answer is there!’ I just hope and wish that people can keep an open mind about this and see the game for what it is. It’s an Assassin’s Creed game, and I believe the best one we’ve ever built.”

Côté also believes that players will either trust the team on what they are doing with Shadows or not within the first 11 minutes and 47 seconds, a very specific timeframe. “People will have to play the game for themselves. And if, within the first 11 minutes and 47 seconds, they are not convinced of what we’re doing, we can have the discussion.”

Of the more recent Assassin’s Creed titles, I particularly loved Valhalla the most, so this will be a fascinating time in Japanese history to explore, and I’m very interested in Ubisoft’s take on this period when it launches for PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S on 15th November 2024.

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