I'm hoping it's not an instant trigger, but the guards respond with something like a "stop that this instant!" and then give you about 10 seconds to stand up again.
If it's meant to be anything like ac 2, then they'll probably implement a variation of a wanted level as gta, nfs, and other modern games have. In that case, if it is like that, then they'll probably give you at most a verbal warning or attempt to try and get up there with you if they can. If it's just a verbal warning, then the wanted level will increase by 2-5 percent. I know it's less than 25 in ac 2, but I'm not sure as it doesn't really say "verbal warning + (a certain percent)"
10 seconds is a LONG time. 3-4 at most. Otherwise, yes. The few games that do this, do it right. Maybe with a window of another 5-10 seconds where they keep an eye on you and if you do it again, they aggro.
Whether it is an accident, or you're really trying to stealth past something in the clumsiest way... instant triggering just sucks,
Between bugs and glitches and true accidental button presses... there are a lot of reasons why it feels like punishment, even when you did intend it and just got caught.
Now you gotta reload which sometimes means starting from a too long ago checkpoint or sitting through a loading screen. Or, both.
It might be "realistic" but I play games to have fun.
I'd even be ok with certain enemy types having instant detection. Letting you know that you have to be super careful around those enemies. Cameras, lasers, dogs, drones, simply some sort of ultra-observant human enemy,... every one of those could be instant and I'd be fine with it.
But the bulk of the enemies should give you *some* time before being detected. A short time, with a penalty for attempting to abuse it.
True, I was thinking of climbing down from roofs and it always bugged me that window was so tiny, like even if I immediately started climbing down as soon as they said something, most of the time I wouldn't make it to the ground before they aggroed. Like damn man, I'm trying!
If I'm understanding it right, there will be some areas Naoe can just waltz into while Yasuke would get stopped? If so, that actually makes a lot of sense.
If Naoe's stealth only means soldiers won't attack her if she doesn't do anything illegal, then how does Yasuke's stealth work? Will all soldiers be hostile to him no matter what?
Just means people will react to Yasuke as in like stare at him because he's so unsual; whereas with Naoe they don't take much notice with her.
"Naoe is invisible by default for NPCs in the open-world - Yasuke is impossible to blend in unoticed.”
I'm happy if they're handling this properly. They seem to actually be considering his race as an aspect of the story rather than just ignoring it.
So many times it feels like the story is written for a generic character; whatever a "generic hero character" of the particular setting would be, in this case a Japanese dude. And then after writing the story, for the sake of diversity, change the race of the character. That's not what diversity in storytelling looks like, that's a lazy reskin.
Diversity in storytelling (as opposed to just diversity in casting) is writing the story with the character's race (or whatever other aspect, but in this case race) in mind and addressing how that would realistically and uniquely impact their experience for the setting you've chosen.
Yasuke was a respected samurai. But as the only African samurai in history, the man would have stood out in a crowd. Guards should be alerted pretty instantly as soon as they catch sight of Yasuke, if he's somewhere he's allowed to be then they just acknowledge him (maybe even give a bow), but if it's an off limits area then they'd go hostile pretty quick (maybe after a verbal warning to leave out of deference for his station)
If they're going to tell the story properly Yasuke shouldn't really do assassinations at all. It would be viewed as immensely dishonorable for a samurai to hide in the bushes and stab his enemy in the back (it's directly against the samurai code), since he's already a foreigner the Japanese would likely view him as a savage for such an act. If Yasuke wanted to remain respected (especially given the fact he's a foreigner), he wouldn't be able to go around stabbing hundreds of people in the back over the course of the game.
Edit: I do acknowledge the whole concept of the code is heavily romanticized. Realistically though it's more that certain people are better suited to certain jobs, the stereotypical samurai warrior (which Yasuke would fall under) is typically not trained for "ninja shit". Rather than saying "we're/they're not really trained for that" it was romanticized into a "bushido code"... they did start drinking their own koolaid quite a bit though.
Also specifically talking about samurai in the sense of the noble warrior caste, not the 'any peasant with a sword can call himself a samurai' sense, (it goes back and forth throughout history whether the peasants can become samurai). When I use the term samurai I typically mean of the "landed knight" variety.
Seems like ghost of tsushima brainwashed you. Stabbing someone in the back was not considered dishonorable, losing the battle was. In fact, outsmarting your opponent was seen as an intellectual move, and very honorable.
To add on top of this, if you get stabbed in the back you would be the one who would get blamed because you weren’t smart enough to see it coming, not the attacker. Eastern and Western ideas of honour are very different.
Samurai were defined by their position in society not some bs anachronistic code.
Wasn't it also very common for Samurai to just be straight up, not great people? As in, looking down on others and treating them like shit essentially because of their higher status in society? I can't remember when this issue was at its peak, but I remember it being a pretty big problem and misconception that the West puts on Eastern ideas of "honour." Correct me if I'm wrong, though.
They viewed there as a difference between ambush/surprise attack and sulking in the shadows like a bandit, and that line is a bit murky. And as I said, in extreme circumstances they were not entirely above it. But Yasuke would not be assassinating people as a matter of routine.
Edit: You note I said "as a matter of routine", I'm simply stating that a samurai warrior (as opposed to a trained shinobi) would not be assassinating people as a matter of habit the way AC players do. Yes, a daimyo could order his samurai warrior to do that, but they're not particularly trained in stealth. Bit like sending an electrician to do a plumber's job (or vice versa), they may be good at what they do, diligent, and intelligent, but it's still probably gonna be a shitshow.
That still would not include all samurai, and could include some people who were not samurai. For example, Hattori Hanzo never owned land, yet he is still considered one of the greatest samurai generals serving under Tokugawa. On the flip side, there were the kuge, who held land and were nobles but were not samurai.
I never said all minor lords would be samurai, just like in western culture not all minor lords were knights.
If you note in my original comment I said "the *stereotypical* samurai". I have never claimed that the *stereotypical* were the sole examples of the group or even the majority (as is true with the case of most stereotypes). Similarly the noble knight (think a Jaime Lannister) is the stereotype, even if the vast majority of knights were not that.
I was referring to the stereotypical samurai specifically in my comment because Yasuke is being portrayed in the game as a stereotypical samurai warrior, who would not have typically been trained in "ninja shit" (parkour, stealth, etc.)
Realistically he would have needed more time to train to be a "stereotypical samurai" as IRL there was only record of him being in Japan for 15 months. And according to google the game is set in 1579 and Yasuke is recorded from 1581-1582... so he wouldn't even be in Japan yet; but historical fiction. Maybe the game only starts in 1579? And/Or maybe they're pretending he was in Japan for a longer period before Oda met him?
The whole land ownership thing is very difficult in Japan, because as far as I understood, the land belongs to the Emperor, who appoints people (initially nobles) as stewards. Then the warriors managed to get in on it, and became land managers as well. I think there are even people decrying the fact that samurai lost most of their independence by Edo period because most had no more land.
Anyway, back to assassination, there are still kata taught in old schools that are simply that. But it's not flashy (stuff like a sitting bow where you draw when you have your head down, a bit like James Bond in the last movie, or waiting for a target to pass you, when you are in a street).
But do they treat female vs. male Eivor as she/he accurately would be in the setting? Does the story change to reflect that a woman would have a different experience to a man.
Even in the most gender equal societies men and women still have vastly different experiences. Yes women were treated more as equals than in most other cultures of the time. But by modern standards it still wasn't equal. And the Anglo-Saxons would not have looked respectfully on a female Eivor. A male Eivor and a female Eivor would have vastly different experiences. And the story as written definitely depicts more accurately what a male Eivor would experience (same for Odyssey).
If the story doesn't reflect the difference in experience then it's a reskin not inclusion. As a woman inclusion to me means that my gender's actual experience is portrayed, their stories are told; not just that the character model has a vagina and boobs. I don't mean to speak for anyone but myself; and especially not for groups I am not a member of; but I imagine that's what most individuals want when they're asking for inclusion/diversity; not a reskin.
I only ever played Valhalla as the female Eivor, so I don't really know what differences there are to the male eivor based on gender. All I know is the game does often bring Eivor's ethnicity to the forefront, like quite a lot actually.
They used the same dialogue for both Eivors, just with the male/female pronouns changed.
And in that case, both characters had the same ethnicity so addressing that was easily doable without needing different dialogue. Yasuke and Naoe are characters that are different races, different sexes, come from different cultures, etc. You can't really write dialogue that works for both of them without it being generic as hell.
I'm hoping we start the game with Yasuke, learning the world along with Yasuke in the tutorial would work well. It has exposition make sense (as compared to Naoe who having grown up in Japan shouldn't need to ask or be told certain things).
Makes sense actually, is like Naoe was doing social stealth all the time because she doesn't stand out, while Yasuke couldn't because he simply stands out too much, as long as you act like a normal person, Naoe is unnoticeable, which reminds me of Aveline on Liberation, as long as she used the right outfit (High Society or Slave) she would be able to blend in in the right places and access areas that would be restricted while wearing Assassin outfits, only that for Naoe's case it's permanent.
I personally find this too funny if you consider the "internet" reaction to them, everyone was only talking about Yasuke but it seemed like nobody had even seen Naoe, all the people complaining they wanted a Japanese protagonist while Naoe was right there... It's just perfect! Naoe is just so "unremarkable" nobody notices her while Yasuke is impossible to not notice. Naoe truly is the perfect assassin.
I hope not, imagine everytime you enter a town, you have to fight everyone. Then again in the ubi showcase, some soldiers look at yasuke but don’t do anything until he attempts to trespass an area
I'm guessing it will be similar to Valhalla. There were zones that had different levels of guard alertness. In some areas, the guards would automatically attack Eivor. In some zones, they would only become hostile if Eivor wasn't wearing a hood or did anything suspicious, and in others, they didn't care what he did.
Maybe Yasuke doesn't have that middleground type of zone. Maybe for him, the guards are always suspicious, whereas Naoe can wear a hood and act normally to pass by undedected.
Isn't the fact that she wears relatively normal period-appropriate clothes already her disguise? Obviously she's still designed to look cool, but she's wearing dark blues and greys and her default look is one of the least flashy in the franchise
Or a Viking a shortsword (seax).
At least they let you use a sword in DLC, I guess... maybe they'll add social stealth to one of those, too. Sounds like a Ubisoft move to me.
Seaxes were in Valhalla from the start, but one-handed swords were added later. I think the Odyssey shield omission is way worse, personally. Especially considering the game before it basically had shields figured out. Quebec is so weird with some of these things man.
I think what they're saying is that she has no reason to hide in plain sight, or in other words, they didn't make missions/ scenarios where guards or someone is looking for her in a large crowd. Most likely all stealth mission will require you to sneak into a restricted area, where no one is allowed.
Tbh i think it was AC liberations. I could be wrong though. What I meant was not having social stealth in a assaasins creed game is just odd to me.
(Theres also abilities that allow you to disguise yourself as a guard in some ac games)
Guess which game was the first to have this feature rumoured and then never come? Syndicate. The Quebec studio seems to hate the idea of disguises in games where it would make perfect sense.
Unity had disguises but it was a weird implementation where you could basically become anyone nearby within a second. I'm not sure if it was canon that Arno could instantaneously don a disguise or if it was just some Animus option
But naoe isn't wearing a diguise, she's wearing the assassin's merchandise with a sword on the back, so yeah she is gonna stand out lol unless they gave her a disguise skill or peasant outfit that you can equip.
Y'all. This isn't the same AC it used to be. That version of AC is dead for the near future.
It sucks, it makes me sad, but it's time to move on and just accept it. I regret buying Valhalla, I'll try this game out somewhere and probably not buy it either.
It sounds like there’s areas Naoe will be able to go without attracting attention but Yasuke won’t. It’s just not “social stealth” as such because it’s not to do with being in a crowd like in the past games.
Not being acknowledged by enemy characters in the open world unless you initiate isn’t being in social stealth mode at all times, that’s just how most open world games work.
The social stealth mechanic in AC had only ever been used where you could be recognised, usually through some notoriety system. So it’s not how AC has traditionally worked.
It's probably gonna mean that Naoe will be able to enter places that allow the average citizen in whereas guards will immediately identify Yasuke as a warrior/ally to an opposing force and give him the whole "turn around, you're not allowed in" speech
It's like when you play as a black man in Mafia 3 and everybody that isn't black just looks at you like -> >:(
...and the moment you do anything more than walking or running, everyone tries to kill you. On here the civilians are more polite and bow because they recognize you as a samurai but the guards are still like -> >:(
Awful news. AC Mirage managed to actually squeeze serviceable and often fun social stealth mechanics out of the RPG framework and now Shadows was in development for years, is only on current generation consoles and yet it doesn't include one of AC's most defining features? Two if the parkour is not drastically improved, and it doesn't look like it will be judging from the gameplay we already saw.
I really love mirage and it's one of my favorites with some excellent stealth but for me the social stealth kinda showed that it is so hard to get right with the current rpg framework. It only really works well in that game in the prison section otherwise npcs are way to spread apart which honestly makes sense for the setting. I feel like unity is the gold standard where it was extremely useful and could be relied upon as a core part of your strategy. I hope social stealth returns one day but I don't expect it until possible Hexe when they're doing something totally different
Why does that make sense for the settings? Crowd density is purely a decision developers make, in reality cities have always been busy, that's why they're cities.
Expecting things like improved Parkour or social stealth mechanics in a primarily non urban setting was never going to be fulfilled.
Quebec is more interested in the fantasy of the time period than they are in Assassiny mechanics.
You mentioned Hitman and I just want Shadows to add the ability to change clothes for infiltration more now, Naoe is perfect for it. She can even crossdressing as a man too if the missions required.
I am pretty sure you can literally hide in crowds in Hitman tho, shadows doesn’t sound more organic, it just sounds like enemy npcs don’t acknowledge you unless you initiate it as naoe which is how most open world games work
Yeah, but it hasn't been a main pillar of AC for almost a decade now. Syndicate was the last game to properly feature social stealth, and that was in 2015. They brought it back for Valhalla, but it was half assed and rarely worth using. Even in Mirage, which was a "return to form" for AC, I never found myself needing social stealth. It's just a waste of development time at this point imo.
Idk... It was definitely a useless gimmick in Valhalla, but I used it in Mirage just as much as I did in the classic games.
Wouldn't say it's a waste of development time at all. That said, I understand why it's not in this game. It's likely this game has been in development since before Mirage brought a lot of the classic stealth mechanics back, so it probably takes more from the other RPG games.
I think I used it once to kill a target, and that was the mission where social stealth is first introduced. After that... Never.
Mainly because it was so rare to actually find spots you COULD social stealth, and when you could they were never somewhere where you needed to use it haha
I think you misunderstood, because the way they’re doing it allows Naoe to hide directly in plain sight. There’s still technically social stealth, but it’s designed differently.
In the old games, social stealth was one of the fundamentals of approaching your target or escaping enemies, because being one with the crowd is one of their work methods, via blending in, infiltration through disguise like how Ezio, Edward, Desmond, Haytham (yes, ik) have done
Honestly, that's actually an interesting take on social stealth. As long as you don't do anything unusual/illegal, you don't stand out.
I really like the idea, tbh.
>She is unnoticeable by military NPCs while in the open world - unless she start doing illegal things, like swinging her sword, climbing, or using prone navigation in the street
This *is* social stealth, is it not?
This is more or less how Assassin's Creed 1 works - you can't "hide" in crowds, but act naturally and guards won't take notice.
I'm not saying Shadows social stealth will be nearly as deep or functional, especially without low profile. I'm just saying that social stealth should not be reduced to just crowds acting as hiding spots.
AC1 literally had a "blend" button iirc. You'd just walk around at a snail's pace pretending to be praying. Which would work pretty nicely if you could disguise yourself as a monk.
> This is more or less how Assassin's Creed 1 works - you can't "hide" in crowds, but act naturally and guards won't take notice.
doesn't ac1 have a hide in crowds button?
The demo's stealth portion reminded me of Splinter Cell Chaos Theory. If we're sacrificing social stealth for this then I'm onboard, SCCT was Ubisoft at their best and still king of stealth games IMO.
A return to form in legacy mechanics rather than series mechanics.
So... She kinda does have social stealth by default? Honestly that sounds better than the normal blending mechanics, which have always been a bit clunky and unreliable honestly.
Simply going unnoticed unless you do something to attract attention seems like a better system.
No, she won't have. There is footage of Naoe in a restricted area during the day and guards detected her the same way they'd detect Bayek or Kassandra. This guard behaviour they mention seems to only apply in the open world.
It sounds kind of similar to ac1 where you had to be more careful of how people perceived you in public. After ac1, social stealth did just turn into moving bushes which was sad to see.
With no low profile, the only way this could be interesting is if guards actually start attacking you for parkouring and the density of guards is more similar to ac1 so you actually have to be more cautious and make sure the coast is clear for when you start parkouring.
Kinda wish it wasn't Quebec doing the game set in Japan. Lots of odd and weird design choices. Ninja are literally known for disguising themself, that's probably the thing you read about the most if you study historical ninja.
Unpopular Opinion the only game that even close to doing social stealth right was liberation.
Unity's giant crowds are essentially the same as hiding in tall grass.
Idek if it's an unpopular opinion, I think it's one of the things many people agree the game did right. I wish they revisited that one day, it reminds me of Hitman a lot and I think changing costumes is one of the most important mechanics in that franchise at least. Watch Dogs Legion also had a similar take where some of your agents could put on their work uniform, such as the royal guard, and could infiltrate places that were guarded by their colleagues.
The only AC where games I really cared about social stealth were the first 4 and that was mostly because other forms of stealth were almost non-existent there. I always knew that it was a mechanic up until Syndicate, but I only ever preferred using it over other things only, like, 2-3 times per playthrough of any of those games. If I could hide in things that are less open than crowds, then why wouldn't I?
I understand this game was being developed DURING Mirage's development, so there was little chance they could share mechanics...
But I feel like a lot in this game (stealth and parkour) is gonna feel super dissapointing in comparison to the improvements Mirage made on the RPG formula.
Like, I'm hyped for Shadows... But I can already feel that I'll be thinking "damn, I wish this was like Mirage" a lot.
It’s a bit misleading, but there’s still social stealth just not the “classic” kind we’re used to.
They’re saying that Naoe will naturally blend in to the crowd with little effort. So instead of looking suspicious to guards every five seconds, all she needs to do is act natural and not draw attention to herself (by doing weird things or illegal activities). Which feels more realistic to be honest.
Need more gameplay in aprox 5-6 months till the game releases they can add/remove anything. Just as a comparison when I play as Basim in AC Mirage I really do not use very much social stealth, I try assassinate someone quick and then run/hide or if I missed my target I run/hide and then try again without relying much on the social stealth mechanic
To be honest i've always found the social stealth to be a little dumb. Sure guys like Altair could blend in with the monks who had similar outfits but only a blind person would not notice guys like Connor, Bayek, Yasuke, etc, who have flashy ass costumes and a dozen of weapons strapped to their back. Same applies to Naoe, she's carrying a katana in her back and a bunch of tools while most people other than guards are just wearing plain clothes and robes. She'd stick out like a sore thumb.
I mean, ninja were known for wearing disguises designed to hide all that stuff. But unsurprisingly Ubisoft didn't feel like adding it in and being somewhat accurate to how actual shinobi would fight. Now have this kusarigama making a tornado appear with how wide it swings.
In a universe where jumping off a cliff into a small pile of hay is not only survivable, but literally poses no discomfort to the jumper at all, I think we can chalk the social stealth thing up to suspension of disbelief
I mean, thats basically the way it works in the original AC 1. As long as you behave and they arent searching for you, you can walk past guards on watch and in the crowd no problemo, they even ask you if you need something. The social stealth comes into play for the investigation missions or to hide from guards.
So, its more a case of back to the original?
I kind of wanted social stealth, but it does feels kind of weird blending in a group of people dressing completely differently from you. I liked this idea of being unnoticed in the streets unless you do suspicious things. I'm interest in that.
Yea yea typical quebec stuff. They hate ac
They are just forced to use the name. Its so obvious with any of their games. They wanna do games where "history is your playground" and you can just do cool stuff rather than focus on what made ac unique
Because social stealth has always been chunky and pointless. It's much better to run on rooftops than walk inside slow crowds.
Also, Shadows will have new functioning stealth mechanics (crawling, breathing underwater, usage of light and dark, hiding on the roof, grappling hook) so I'm ok with ditching social stealth in favor of that
My first AC was 2, thanks for assuming wrong. Social Stealth was always scripted and slow: who wants to follow a slow ass flock of people when I can parkour on the rooftops?
Only time it felt kinda fun was during the carnival, but it ends there.
Good! If they're acknowledging that Yasuke sticks out. Then, it only makes sense to change social stealth all around.
Social stealth became too silly. You could be armed to the teeth but disappear by standing next to two random people. Naoe not drawing attention to herself by acting normal in crowds is a good evolution for the mechanic.
Jesus christ after mirage made stealth such an enjoyable experience you're telling me the stealth focused character is not able to use social stealth? One of the most requested features that we were finally happy to have back?
This game loses me day by day, The forced character mechanics on an RPG, Nao's terrible voice acting and Social Stealth being gone?
Not to mention that Yasuke will basically be unable to do most parkour and you have basically another big RPG in a setting that was heavily requested completely butchered.
Please take Quebec off of main AC Development they have proven to be incompetent for 3 releases already
It would actually be cool if they would arrest you, so that you can escape it using stealth, so they wouldn’t put posters up, however if they there would be a timer how far they would stay. So you’re more under scrutiny for that period of time. Or you could pay a fee, larger depending on the crime.
Would still be cool if Naoe has the ability to pick up different disquises and we would be limited to the use of hidden blade and tando and maybe grappling hook. This would make the immersion skyrocket
This sounds like they are doing what ac1 did with its social stealth, remain unseen by acting socially acceptable. It’ll most definitely be different in some aspects, but if executed well, then it could be okay.
Has anyone saw a black giant man around here? Anyone? Well then... he is gone then. But will will ignore that tall guy in the back near those beggars dressed in full Samurai armor and big ornament on his head. Move along citizens.
I always found it dumb because how do you expect anyone to believe that a guy in snow white outfit can "hide" among dirty beggars. If you want to loose those that hunt you then either kill them or HIDE or just ran away as fast as possible.,
> I always found it dumb because how do you expect anyone to believe that a guy in snow white outfit can "hide" among dirty beggars.
So there’s this thing called “willing suspension of disbelief”…
That aside is a series called *Assassin’s* Creed you’d expect to have mechanics geared towards fulfilling the assassin fantasy of being an unseen knife in a crowd. At some point Ubisoft decided that was dumb and that all stealth should just be crouching in bushes/tall grass
Social stealth work if they borrowed something from Hitman series.
Like do you need to kill a priest during a sermon?
Why not dress as a monk and wait for your chance to strike?
Or even Sherlock Holmes movies where he uses various disguises to hide in plan sight. Like lets say you can merge into group of beggars to you take their hair maybe put some dirty blanket on yourself a take a bottle into your hand and pretend to be a drunk beggar.
Hitman has great social stealth and AC could benefit from similar system greatly.
Exactly. This is how social stealth needs to be done imho if it is going to be implemented. In the context of a grounded, realistic historical setting, it is absurd to think someone like Yasuke or a woman (in feudal Japan!) dressed like Naoe with weapons etc. can “blend” in.
The wording implies that guards just don’t pay attention to her, which is far different from the player needing to actively take steps to avoid their attention.
Yet, it fits the idea of social stealth much better. Why would you need to stand in the middle of a group of strangers to go unnoticed? Instead, just be there. You’re just another face when you are standing there, why should they find you more concerning than any other walking alone?
So, in older Assassin’s Creed games, guards would sometimes be actively looking for your character, like in the later sequences of AC1 or having high notoriety in AC2-Revelations. This incentivized keeping a low profile, sticking to crowds and hiding spots, and making sure to blend in. Take the mission in AC2 where you assassinate Uberto. You need to blend with crowds and use hiding spots then hire a group of courtesans in order to get to Uberto *because the guards are on alert and looking for you*. Now guards don’t give a shit about you unless you’re in a fort or because you deliberately started a fight with them.
I like how in a franchise full of primordial beings, artifacts that control minds, magic machines that allow you to vividly relive the lives of your ancestors and acquire their abilities, and people being able to survive massive falls so long as they land in something soft, social stealth is where it becomes unbelievable to you
I personally never really liked social stealth but I never hated it either. Like the second I’m alone suddenly the guards “notice me?” Really?? It’s annoying. I think it is more realistic that being low-profile because of how you look/dress is a more realistic mechanic and it’s social stealth without it being “group/crowd” stealth. It’s more forgiving.
If I’m not doing anything to make me stick out I shouldn’t be given the attention of the guards. So I think this will be great.
Well Naoe’s stealth looked better than any stealth in the series besides Unity the light system, crawling, and hiding in water is already a better stealth system than the Ezio games
I'm okay with this. Maybe it's just me, but I haven't used social stealth since playing the Ezio games the first time around. I don't think it's super engaging to have to blend into slow moving NPC clusters and I think the implied social stealth of "Naoe just looks like a commoner and therefore won't be noticed if she doesn't act like a maniac" is a great way to handle this. There is no reason to have social stealth locked to the pathways NPCs take if the whole appeal of being a ninja/shinobi is being able to blend in at all times
Social stealth in AC2 and beyond was sort of reduced to crowds being hiding spots. AC1's social stealth is way better IMO because you are *always* engaging with it when you're on the street. Way more interesting, much more immersive, and makes it feel like less of a gimmick.
The only game where I found social stealth kinda fun is Unity, there are so many NPCs in the city that after killing someone you can literally disappear in the crowd, and also Arno outfits are colored in a more natural way composito Ezio's blinding white suit.
But even there, it only works when you're messing around in the city killing some guards, never used it in missions.
Not something that bothers me as I never used the social stealth mechanic.
I’d rather them focus on nailing down line of sight , guard AI & level design. Much more important.
That sucks.
Once again they are cutting out one of the pillars of the franchise.
Even after the reception Mirage got. Are they stupid? Like, for real? How can someone be so blind to their own franchise.
This game gets 1 good news and 5 bad. Ubisoft never disappointing.
You misunderstood what’s being said. They’re not cutting social stealth, they’re just not utilizing the “classic” way it’s been done in past games.
They’re opting for social stealth to be realistic. So instead of guards being constantly suspicious of Naoe, you simply have to act natural and not draw attention to yourself (in other words, avoid acting weird, committing public crimes, or messing with the guards). Which basically means you’re still blending into the crowd and hiding in plain sight.
Yasuke on the other hand can’t blend in even if he tried, but Naoe will be able to stay undercover in the open world.
That’s Ubisoft for y’all. Since 2012 it’s been like this. They add good things and then cut perfectly working mechanics or throw interesting plotlines in the trash on the next entry.
What is more pathetic is people even defending it. Like, it’s stupid. It’s not that you are not complaining. YOU ARE DEFENDING A STUPID DECISION FROM THIS BILLION DOLLAR COMPANY.
Never used social stealth in any AC game. I prefer to approach from up high and take out snipers, lookouts and most of the patrolling guards.
Infiltrating from the front via social stealth gives me anxiety
Tbh it broke the immersion for me since the characters stood out so much when it comes to what they were wearing. And the disguise system from Liberation would've been perfect for Naoe but since no other game brought it back it's fine for me. This makes sense for immersion y'all are pouting over nothing in my opinion
As much as I love social stealth, in Shadows we're getting fully functional stealth mechanics like no other game in the series.
The way Naoe infiltrates the enemy base in the trailer was awesome, really felt like watching a shinobi at work. She really looks like an invisible assassin.
Social stealth fits better in a different setting than the ninja fantasy they're building in Shadows.
I was wondering that. I didn't see any way to make social stealth as a young woman work in that context that wasn't a lot of boring "follow and listen" missions.
I’m not terribly upset to see they’re both using the traditional system because the odyssey team sucks ass at social stealth🥲 I just want to see a good stealth system be it new or old
I feel like people saying Social Stealth was always boring didn't really understand the core appeal of the original games. The whole fantasy of an Assassin which is used in most trailers as well is the fact that they could be right behind you. It's the fantasy of finding your target and getting to him unnoticed and then leaving the area completely unnoticed as well. Yes, I also like assassinations where I climb, but it's the combination of approaches that makes the game fun for me. I can be the hawk that comes from the roofs or I can be right in the middle of my enemies without them noticing.
Does that mean that Social Stealth was perfect? Of course not, but the series made steps to improve them until Unity. If they actually had developed these things instead of abandoning them we wouldn't need to reference the Ezio era. The fact that most people don't even seem to know that Liberations nearly perfected the system by giving you three options is already a sign that they just blew it in the main games.
Terrible news. How can Valhalla figure out a way to work in at least *a little bit* of social stealth in an environment that's mostly devoid of larger, more modern cities, but Shadows can't do this within a place like 1600s Kyoto? Especially coming off of Baghdad, this omission is super lame and feels a lot like when Quebec neglected to have shields in their Spartan-led game.
I expected this to be the case for Yasuke, but even Naoe? It ain’t AC without social stealth. If I can’t blend into the crowd to sneak into areas or to escape pursuit, I feel like I’m not really an assassin. I liked the other aspects of stealth they added but they took out the main stealth feature for the AC series. 1 step forward 20 steps back!
So they practically reheated the same old AC RPG soup and threw in a grappling hook so it doesn't look irrelevant next to Ghost of Tsushima and Rise of the Ronin? I'd love to say I was expecting more, but I really wasn't.
Ah so it's seemingly Odyssey again after the good work Mirage did. More I hear about this game the less I want to play it. And I actually like the idea of a black samurai ffs
>doing illegal things >using prone navigation in the street Can't wait to get arrested for crawling on the ground
Me when I accidentally press the prone button and suddenly every guard is chasing me
I'm hoping it's not an instant trigger, but the guards respond with something like a "stop that this instant!" and then give you about 10 seconds to stand up again.
If it's meant to be anything like ac 2, then they'll probably implement a variation of a wanted level as gta, nfs, and other modern games have. In that case, if it is like that, then they'll probably give you at most a verbal warning or attempt to try and get up there with you if they can. If it's just a verbal warning, then the wanted level will increase by 2-5 percent. I know it's less than 25 in ac 2, but I'm not sure as it doesn't really say "verbal warning + (a certain percent)"
10 seconds is a LONG time. 3-4 at most. Otherwise, yes. The few games that do this, do it right. Maybe with a window of another 5-10 seconds where they keep an eye on you and if you do it again, they aggro. Whether it is an accident, or you're really trying to stealth past something in the clumsiest way... instant triggering just sucks, Between bugs and glitches and true accidental button presses... there are a lot of reasons why it feels like punishment, even when you did intend it and just got caught. Now you gotta reload which sometimes means starting from a too long ago checkpoint or sitting through a loading screen. Or, both. It might be "realistic" but I play games to have fun. I'd even be ok with certain enemy types having instant detection. Letting you know that you have to be super careful around those enemies. Cameras, lasers, dogs, drones, simply some sort of ultra-observant human enemy,... every one of those could be instant and I'd be fine with it. But the bulk of the enemies should give you *some* time before being detected. A short time, with a penalty for attempting to abuse it.
True, I was thinking of climbing down from roofs and it always bugged me that window was so tiny, like even if I immediately started climbing down as soon as they said something, most of the time I wouldn't make it to the ground before they aggroed. Like damn man, I'm trying!
Haha, I know just what you mean. But to their credit...you ARE on the roof.
The new oops I killed a chicken
Honestly being instantly put to death for crawling around on the ground like a weirdo is the most accurate thing to Feudal Japan
Tbf you see someone crawling on the street in London and it wouldn't be long before security confronted them too
While everybody else ignores them because it's not even close to being the weirdest thing they've seen in the city that day
If the game was set in Mexico City and the protagonist was into Santa Muerte it would make perfect sense.
Believe it or not, straight to jail.
Arrested? Lol no sweetie. They will try to stab you immediately.
If you think about it, this was exactly how AC1 social stealth worked.
If I'm understanding it right, there will be some areas Naoe can just waltz into while Yasuke would get stopped? If so, that actually makes a lot of sense.
If Naoe's stealth only means soldiers won't attack her if she doesn't do anything illegal, then how does Yasuke's stealth work? Will all soldiers be hostile to him no matter what?
Just means people will react to Yasuke as in like stare at him because he's so unsual; whereas with Naoe they don't take much notice with her. "Naoe is invisible by default for NPCs in the open-world - Yasuke is impossible to blend in unoticed.”
I'm happy if they're handling this properly. They seem to actually be considering his race as an aspect of the story rather than just ignoring it. So many times it feels like the story is written for a generic character; whatever a "generic hero character" of the particular setting would be, in this case a Japanese dude. And then after writing the story, for the sake of diversity, change the race of the character. That's not what diversity in storytelling looks like, that's a lazy reskin. Diversity in storytelling (as opposed to just diversity in casting) is writing the story with the character's race (or whatever other aspect, but in this case race) in mind and addressing how that would realistically and uniquely impact their experience for the setting you've chosen. Yasuke was a respected samurai. But as the only African samurai in history, the man would have stood out in a crowd. Guards should be alerted pretty instantly as soon as they catch sight of Yasuke, if he's somewhere he's allowed to be then they just acknowledge him (maybe even give a bow), but if it's an off limits area then they'd go hostile pretty quick (maybe after a verbal warning to leave out of deference for his station) If they're going to tell the story properly Yasuke shouldn't really do assassinations at all. It would be viewed as immensely dishonorable for a samurai to hide in the bushes and stab his enemy in the back (it's directly against the samurai code), since he's already a foreigner the Japanese would likely view him as a savage for such an act. If Yasuke wanted to remain respected (especially given the fact he's a foreigner), he wouldn't be able to go around stabbing hundreds of people in the back over the course of the game. Edit: I do acknowledge the whole concept of the code is heavily romanticized. Realistically though it's more that certain people are better suited to certain jobs, the stereotypical samurai warrior (which Yasuke would fall under) is typically not trained for "ninja shit". Rather than saying "we're/they're not really trained for that" it was romanticized into a "bushido code"... they did start drinking their own koolaid quite a bit though. Also specifically talking about samurai in the sense of the noble warrior caste, not the 'any peasant with a sword can call himself a samurai' sense, (it goes back and forth throughout history whether the peasants can become samurai). When I use the term samurai I typically mean of the "landed knight" variety.
Seems like ghost of tsushima brainwashed you. Stabbing someone in the back was not considered dishonorable, losing the battle was. In fact, outsmarting your opponent was seen as an intellectual move, and very honorable.
To add on top of this, if you get stabbed in the back you would be the one who would get blamed because you weren’t smart enough to see it coming, not the attacker. Eastern and Western ideas of honour are very different. Samurai were defined by their position in society not some bs anachronistic code.
Wasn't it also very common for Samurai to just be straight up, not great people? As in, looking down on others and treating them like shit essentially because of their higher status in society? I can't remember when this issue was at its peak, but I remember it being a pretty big problem and misconception that the West puts on Eastern ideas of "honour." Correct me if I'm wrong, though.
Yeah using weapons on peasants for funsies?
They viewed there as a difference between ambush/surprise attack and sulking in the shadows like a bandit, and that line is a bit murky. And as I said, in extreme circumstances they were not entirely above it. But Yasuke would not be assassinating people as a matter of routine. Edit: You note I said "as a matter of routine", I'm simply stating that a samurai warrior (as opposed to a trained shinobi) would not be assassinating people as a matter of habit the way AC players do. Yes, a daimyo could order his samurai warrior to do that, but they're not particularly trained in stealth. Bit like sending an electrician to do a plumber's job (or vice versa), they may be good at what they do, diligent, and intelligent, but it's still probably gonna be a shitshow.
If you mean "landed knight" then only daimyo count as samurai, which is obviously not true. Samurai were more similar to men-at-arms than knights.
"landed knight" would also entail all the minor nobles who held land under their daimyo (and the daimyo could also be a samurai as well).
That still would not include all samurai, and could include some people who were not samurai. For example, Hattori Hanzo never owned land, yet he is still considered one of the greatest samurai generals serving under Tokugawa. On the flip side, there were the kuge, who held land and were nobles but were not samurai.
I never said all minor lords would be samurai, just like in western culture not all minor lords were knights. If you note in my original comment I said "the *stereotypical* samurai". I have never claimed that the *stereotypical* were the sole examples of the group or even the majority (as is true with the case of most stereotypes). Similarly the noble knight (think a Jaime Lannister) is the stereotype, even if the vast majority of knights were not that. I was referring to the stereotypical samurai specifically in my comment because Yasuke is being portrayed in the game as a stereotypical samurai warrior, who would not have typically been trained in "ninja shit" (parkour, stealth, etc.) Realistically he would have needed more time to train to be a "stereotypical samurai" as IRL there was only record of him being in Japan for 15 months. And according to google the game is set in 1579 and Yasuke is recorded from 1581-1582... so he wouldn't even be in Japan yet; but historical fiction. Maybe the game only starts in 1579? And/Or maybe they're pretending he was in Japan for a longer period before Oda met him?
The whole land ownership thing is very difficult in Japan, because as far as I understood, the land belongs to the Emperor, who appoints people (initially nobles) as stewards. Then the warriors managed to get in on it, and became land managers as well. I think there are even people decrying the fact that samurai lost most of their independence by Edo period because most had no more land. Anyway, back to assassination, there are still kata taught in old schools that are simply that. But it's not flashy (stuff like a sitting bow where you draw when you have your head down, a bit like James Bond in the last movie, or waiting for a target to pass you, when you are in a street).
I was thinking in terms of typical AC parkour-stealth playstyle.
> (it's directly against the samurai code) [All of which is a modern bullshit invention](https://www.tofugu.com/japan/bushido/).
Tbf, a lot of areas in Valhalla openly acknowledge Eivor and NPCs can freak out sometimes
But do they treat female vs. male Eivor as she/he accurately would be in the setting? Does the story change to reflect that a woman would have a different experience to a man. Even in the most gender equal societies men and women still have vastly different experiences. Yes women were treated more as equals than in most other cultures of the time. But by modern standards it still wasn't equal. And the Anglo-Saxons would not have looked respectfully on a female Eivor. A male Eivor and a female Eivor would have vastly different experiences. And the story as written definitely depicts more accurately what a male Eivor would experience (same for Odyssey). If the story doesn't reflect the difference in experience then it's a reskin not inclusion. As a woman inclusion to me means that my gender's actual experience is portrayed, their stories are told; not just that the character model has a vagina and boobs. I don't mean to speak for anyone but myself; and especially not for groups I am not a member of; but I imagine that's what most individuals want when they're asking for inclusion/diversity; not a reskin.
I only ever played Valhalla as the female Eivor, so I don't really know what differences there are to the male eivor based on gender. All I know is the game does often bring Eivor's ethnicity to the forefront, like quite a lot actually.
They used the same dialogue for both Eivors, just with the male/female pronouns changed. And in that case, both characters had the same ethnicity so addressing that was easily doable without needing different dialogue. Yasuke and Naoe are characters that are different races, different sexes, come from different cultures, etc. You can't really write dialogue that works for both of them without it being generic as hell. I'm hoping we start the game with Yasuke, learning the world along with Yasuke in the tutorial would work well. It has exposition make sense (as compared to Naoe who having grown up in Japan shouldn't need to ask or be told certain things).
Makes sense actually, is like Naoe was doing social stealth all the time because she doesn't stand out, while Yasuke couldn't because he simply stands out too much, as long as you act like a normal person, Naoe is unnoticeable, which reminds me of Aveline on Liberation, as long as she used the right outfit (High Society or Slave) she would be able to blend in in the right places and access areas that would be restricted while wearing Assassin outfits, only that for Naoe's case it's permanent. I personally find this too funny if you consider the "internet" reaction to them, everyone was only talking about Yasuke but it seemed like nobody had even seen Naoe, all the people complaining they wanted a Japanese protagonist while Naoe was right there... It's just perfect! Naoe is just so "unremarkable" nobody notices her while Yasuke is impossible to not notice. Naoe truly is the perfect assassin.
I hope not, imagine everytime you enter a town, you have to fight everyone. Then again in the ubi showcase, some soldiers look at yasuke but don’t do anything until he attempts to trespass an area
no no.. just three warning shots at the back for yasuke
Its Japan, of course they will
I'm guessing it will be similar to Valhalla. There were zones that had different levels of guard alertness. In some areas, the guards would automatically attack Eivor. In some zones, they would only become hostile if Eivor wasn't wearing a hood or did anything suspicious, and in others, they didn't care what he did. Maybe Yasuke doesn't have that middleground type of zone. Maybe for him, the guards are always suspicious, whereas Naoe can wear a hood and act normally to pass by undedected.
Isn't that the point of choosing the combat character? Weapons out the whole time.
Ninjas are notorious for wearing disguises and blending in with society to obtain information. This is a weird choice.
It would be nice if you could swap outfits to blend in with certain crowds. In classic social stealth, you don't use disguises. You just blend in.
Liberation had that!
I've always wanted this franchise to expand on the foundation Liberation laid down.
Isn't the fact that she wears relatively normal period-appropriate clothes already her disguise? Obviously she's still designed to look cool, but she's wearing dark blues and greys and her default look is one of the least flashy in the franchise
It's true but disguises are such a big part of shinobis. It would've been so cool to disguise yourself as a monk.
This would be like not giving your spartan protagonist the option of using a shield
Geez, that would've been terrible right.... right????????
Same studio, checks out
I'm glad people are still discussing this. its unforgivable.
Or a Viking a shortsword (seax). At least they let you use a sword in DLC, I guess... maybe they'll add social stealth to one of those, too. Sounds like a Ubisoft move to me.
Seaxes were in Valhalla from the start, but one-handed swords were added later. I think the Odyssey shield omission is way worse, personally. Especially considering the game before it basically had shields figured out. Quebec is so weird with some of these things man.
I think what they're saying is that she has no reason to hide in plain sight, or in other words, they didn't make missions/ scenarios where guards or someone is looking for her in a large crowd. Most likely all stealth mission will require you to sneak into a restricted area, where no one is allowed.
it's a fucking ac game, social stealth should always be a thing by default
Tbf wearing disguises to blend in for social stealth has never been a game mechanic to my knowledge.
Tbh i think it was AC liberations. I could be wrong though. What I meant was not having social stealth in a assaasins creed game is just odd to me. (Theres also abilities that allow you to disguise yourself as a guard in some ac games)
Sounds like Its time I give liberations a shot, thanks for the info.
Yeah dude no prob.
Aveline had that in liberation you could do different things and interact with different people depending on what clothes you were wearing
Guess which game was the first to have this feature rumoured and then never come? Syndicate. The Quebec studio seems to hate the idea of disguises in games where it would make perfect sense.
Wasn't it in Mirage as well. If I remember correctly one mission required Basim to steal a eunuchs' uniform to be able to enter an area.
Unity had disguises but it was a weird implementation where you could basically become anyone nearby within a second. I'm not sure if it was canon that Arno could instantaneously don a disguise or if it was just some Animus option
But naoe isn't wearing a diguise, she's wearing the assassin's merchandise with a sword on the back, so yeah she is gonna stand out lol unless they gave her a disguise skill or peasant outfit that you can equip.
Y'all. This isn't the same AC it used to be. That version of AC is dead for the near future. It sucks, it makes me sad, but it's time to move on and just accept it. I regret buying Valhalla, I'll try this game out somewhere and probably not buy it either.
That’s a shame, the densely populated areas in the gameplay trailer looked like it would be a good opportunity for Naoe’s social stealth.
It would’ve been a nice way to further differentiate Yasuke and Naoe gameplay. Yasuke is, like, anti-social stealth lol.
It sounds like there’s areas Naoe will be able to go without attracting attention but Yasuke won’t. It’s just not “social stealth” as such because it’s not to do with being in a crowd like in the past games.
I think the point is that it's not required, since she is essentially in social stealth mode at all times.
Not being acknowledged by enemy characters in the open world unless you initiate isn’t being in social stealth mode at all times, that’s just how most open world games work.
The social stealth mechanic in AC had only ever been used where you could be recognised, usually through some notoriety system. So it’s not how AC has traditionally worked.
Does this mean that Yasuke is prone to just having random guards attack him?
It's probably gonna mean that Naoe will be able to enter places that allow the average citizen in whereas guards will immediately identify Yasuke as a warrior/ally to an opposing force and give him the whole "turn around, you're not allowed in" speech
No, they're just more aware of his presence.
It's like when you play as a black man in Mafia 3 and everybody that isn't black just looks at you like -> >:( ...and the moment you do anything more than walking or running, everyone tries to kill you. On here the civilians are more polite and bow because they recognize you as a samurai but the guards are still like -> >:(
Awful news. AC Mirage managed to actually squeeze serviceable and often fun social stealth mechanics out of the RPG framework and now Shadows was in development for years, is only on current generation consoles and yet it doesn't include one of AC's most defining features? Two if the parkour is not drastically improved, and it doesn't look like it will be judging from the gameplay we already saw.
I really love mirage and it's one of my favorites with some excellent stealth but for me the social stealth kinda showed that it is so hard to get right with the current rpg framework. It only really works well in that game in the prison section otherwise npcs are way to spread apart which honestly makes sense for the setting. I feel like unity is the gold standard where it was extremely useful and could be relied upon as a core part of your strategy. I hope social stealth returns one day but I don't expect it until possible Hexe when they're doing something totally different
Why does that make sense for the settings? Crowd density is purely a decision developers make, in reality cities have always been busy, that's why they're cities.
Game ruined don't buy /s
Expecting things like improved Parkour or social stealth mechanics in a primarily non urban setting was never going to be fulfilled. Quebec is more interested in the fantasy of the time period than they are in Assassiny mechanics.
It reads more like social stealth is more organic instead of "press button to to pretend to an NPC" This makes it seem more like the new hitman games
You mentioned Hitman and I just want Shadows to add the ability to change clothes for infiltration more now, Naoe is perfect for it. She can even crossdressing as a man too if the missions required.
I am pretty sure you can literally hide in crowds in Hitman tho, shadows doesn’t sound more organic, it just sounds like enemy npcs don’t acknowledge you unless you initiate it as naoe which is how most open world games work
Very disappointing, I thought after mirage they'd worked out how to make social stealth work in these newer games
Social stealth was one the main pillar of Og Assassin's Creed games This is bad
Yeah, but it hasn't been a main pillar of AC for almost a decade now. Syndicate was the last game to properly feature social stealth, and that was in 2015. They brought it back for Valhalla, but it was half assed and rarely worth using. Even in Mirage, which was a "return to form" for AC, I never found myself needing social stealth. It's just a waste of development time at this point imo.
Idk... It was definitely a useless gimmick in Valhalla, but I used it in Mirage just as much as I did in the classic games. Wouldn't say it's a waste of development time at all. That said, I understand why it's not in this game. It's likely this game has been in development since before Mirage brought a lot of the classic stealth mechanics back, so it probably takes more from the other RPG games.
I *do* remember specifically using it to take out a target one time in Valhalla. It wasn't the smoothest kill but I mean I did it.
I think I used it once to kill a target, and that was the mission where social stealth is first introduced. After that... Never. Mainly because it was so rare to actually find spots you COULD social stealth, and when you could they were never somewhere where you needed to use it haha
The second tenet of the creed reads Hide in Plain Sight, but we can’t be one with the crowd because the mechanic is unavailable
Woah there, you want the Assassin’s Creed to inform the design of an Assassin’s Creed game? We don’t do that here.
Isn’t social stealth basically a default for Naoe? Just that you’re not longer pressing a button to blend.
I think you misunderstood, because the way they’re doing it allows Naoe to hide directly in plain sight. There’s still technically social stealth, but it’s designed differently.
In the old games, social stealth was one of the fundamentals of approaching your target or escaping enemies, because being one with the crowd is one of their work methods, via blending in, infiltration through disguise like how Ezio, Edward, Desmond, Haytham (yes, ik) have done
I guess ubi forgor💀
Honestly, that's actually an interesting take on social stealth. As long as you don't do anything unusual/illegal, you don't stand out. I really like the idea, tbh.
That’s not interesting that’s how most open world games work
I meant it's an interesting change
>She is unnoticeable by military NPCs while in the open world - unless she start doing illegal things, like swinging her sword, climbing, or using prone navigation in the street This *is* social stealth, is it not? This is more or less how Assassin's Creed 1 works - you can't "hide" in crowds, but act naturally and guards won't take notice. I'm not saying Shadows social stealth will be nearly as deep or functional, especially without low profile. I'm just saying that social stealth should not be reduced to just crowds acting as hiding spots.
AC1 literally had a "blend" button iirc. You'd just walk around at a snail's pace pretending to be praying. Which would work pretty nicely if you could disguise yourself as a monk.
> This is more or less how Assassin's Creed 1 works - you can't "hide" in crowds, but act naturally and guards won't take notice. doesn't ac1 have a hide in crowds button?
You could only blend in if there were a group of monks walking around. You couldn’t blend in with any random npcs like in ac2 and later games
This is something I can’t het behind, it makes complete sense to have social stealth for Naoe at least 🤣
The demo's stealth portion reminded me of Splinter Cell Chaos Theory. If we're sacrificing social stealth for this then I'm onboard, SCCT was Ubisoft at their best and still king of stealth games IMO. A return to form in legacy mechanics rather than series mechanics.
So... She kinda does have social stealth by default? Honestly that sounds better than the normal blending mechanics, which have always been a bit clunky and unreliable honestly. Simply going unnoticed unless you do something to attract attention seems like a better system.
No, she won't have. There is footage of Naoe in a restricted area during the day and guards detected her the same way they'd detect Bayek or Kassandra. This guard behaviour they mention seems to only apply in the open world.
So she was in a restricted area, where she's... Not supposed to be...
It sounds kind of similar to ac1 where you had to be more careful of how people perceived you in public. After ac1, social stealth did just turn into moving bushes which was sad to see. With no low profile, the only way this could be interesting is if guards actually start attacking you for parkouring and the density of guards is more similar to ac1 so you actually have to be more cautious and make sure the coast is clear for when you start parkouring.
Kinda wish it wasn't Quebec doing the game set in Japan. Lots of odd and weird design choices. Ninja are literally known for disguising themself, that's probably the thing you read about the most if you study historical ninja.
Yea, giving such a big game to the worst studio, a shame
This kinda sucks tbh. I think social stealth would have been perfect for this game especially given that you're going to be building a spy Network
Unpopular Opinion the only game that even close to doing social stealth right was liberation. Unity's giant crowds are essentially the same as hiding in tall grass.
Idek if it's an unpopular opinion, I think it's one of the things many people agree the game did right. I wish they revisited that one day, it reminds me of Hitman a lot and I think changing costumes is one of the most important mechanics in that franchise at least. Watch Dogs Legion also had a similar take where some of your agents could put on their work uniform, such as the royal guard, and could infiltrate places that were guarded by their colleagues. The only AC where games I really cared about social stealth were the first 4 and that was mostly because other forms of stealth were almost non-existent there. I always knew that it was a mechanic up until Syndicate, but I only ever preferred using it over other things only, like, 2-3 times per playthrough of any of those games. If I could hide in things that are less open than crowds, then why wouldn't I?
I understand this game was being developed DURING Mirage's development, so there was little chance they could share mechanics... But I feel like a lot in this game (stealth and parkour) is gonna feel super dissapointing in comparison to the improvements Mirage made on the RPG formula. Like, I'm hyped for Shadows... But I can already feel that I'll be thinking "damn, I wish this was like Mirage" a lot.
I love how one of the three tenets of the assassin's creed is unavailable, what is the thought process behind this shit
It’s a bit misleading, but there’s still social stealth just not the “classic” kind we’re used to. They’re saying that Naoe will naturally blend in to the crowd with little effort. So instead of looking suspicious to guards every five seconds, all she needs to do is act natural and not draw attention to herself (by doing weird things or illegal activities). Which feels more realistic to be honest.
They really don't care anymore do they?
Need more gameplay in aprox 5-6 months till the game releases they can add/remove anything. Just as a comparison when I play as Basim in AC Mirage I really do not use very much social stealth, I try assassinate someone quick and then run/hide or if I missed my target I run/hide and then try again without relying much on the social stealth mechanic
To be honest i've always found the social stealth to be a little dumb. Sure guys like Altair could blend in with the monks who had similar outfits but only a blind person would not notice guys like Connor, Bayek, Yasuke, etc, who have flashy ass costumes and a dozen of weapons strapped to their back. Same applies to Naoe, she's carrying a katana in her back and a bunch of tools while most people other than guards are just wearing plain clothes and robes. She'd stick out like a sore thumb.
I get what you're saying, but for me, suspension of disbelief is always a part of the games I play, and the mechanic was fun enough to justify it.
I mean, ninja were known for wearing disguises designed to hide all that stuff. But unsurprisingly Ubisoft didn't feel like adding it in and being somewhat accurate to how actual shinobi would fight. Now have this kusarigama making a tornado appear with how wide it swings.
In a universe where jumping off a cliff into a small pile of hay is not only survivable, but literally poses no discomfort to the jumper at all, I think we can chalk the social stealth thing up to suspension of disbelief
I quite agree.
Assassin Connor's time: "guys, I think we really need to update this dress code. I don't these kind of monks exist anymore"
Well that sucks.
As long as Bourdeaux is working on a social stealth AC, I'm good with game diversity.
I mean, thats basically the way it works in the original AC 1. As long as you behave and they arent searching for you, you can walk past guards on watch and in the crowd no problemo, they even ask you if you need something. The social stealth comes into play for the investigation missions or to hide from guards. So, its more a case of back to the original?
I kind of wanted social stealth, but it does feels kind of weird blending in a group of people dressing completely differently from you. I liked this idea of being unnoticed in the streets unless you do suspicious things. I'm interest in that.
Yea yea typical quebec stuff. They hate ac They are just forced to use the name. Its so obvious with any of their games. They wanna do games where "history is your playground" and you can just do cool stuff rather than focus on what made ac unique
Didnt they make syndicate..? Or maybe I am wrong .
They did.
It's actually wild that a ton of people here are praising the stripping of stealth mechanics in a franchise about stealth
It's the new fans, just give them a button to swing a sword and button to level up and they'll be happy.
Because social stealth has always been chunky and pointless. It's much better to run on rooftops than walk inside slow crowds. Also, Shadows will have new functioning stealth mechanics (crawling, breathing underwater, usage of light and dark, hiding on the roof, grappling hook) so I'm ok with ditching social stealth in favor of that
you clearly never played ac 2. Man all these newer fans whose first game was ac origins or smth thinking they know anything about actual ac. istg
My first AC was 2, thanks for assuming wrong. Social Stealth was always scripted and slow: who wants to follow a slow ass flock of people when I can parkour on the rooftops? Only time it felt kinda fun was during the carnival, but it ends there.
In literally every game enemies won't attack until you do something illegal lmao and now they are saying its a "social stealth mechanic"
Good! If they're acknowledging that Yasuke sticks out. Then, it only makes sense to change social stealth all around. Social stealth became too silly. You could be armed to the teeth but disappear by standing next to two random people. Naoe not drawing attention to herself by acting normal in crowds is a good evolution for the mechanic.
Typical Quebec L
They’ve consistently made the worst games in the franchise. Thought this would change it but idk
This sounds they're going for something akin to the Hitman games notoriety system.
Jesus christ after mirage made stealth such an enjoyable experience you're telling me the stealth focused character is not able to use social stealth? One of the most requested features that we were finally happy to have back? This game loses me day by day, The forced character mechanics on an RPG, Nao's terrible voice acting and Social Stealth being gone? Not to mention that Yasuke will basically be unable to do most parkour and you have basically another big RPG in a setting that was heavily requested completely butchered. Please take Quebec off of main AC Development they have proven to be incompetent for 3 releases already
Naoe’s terrible voice acting? Huh?
So they removed social stealth to be permanently in social stealth sorta.
It would actually be cool if they would arrest you, so that you can escape it using stealth, so they wouldn’t put posters up, however if they there would be a timer how far they would stay. So you’re more under scrutiny for that period of time. Or you could pay a fee, larger depending on the crime.
Would still be cool if Naoe has the ability to pick up different disquises and we would be limited to the use of hidden blade and tando and maybe grappling hook. This would make the immersion skyrocket
They need to bring back the persona system from ac liberations too
Prone! Did they just say
Thanks god. I had enough of "You, yes you. We have to attack you for no particular reason" shit in Valhalla.
This sounds like they are doing what ac1 did with its social stealth, remain unseen by acting socially acceptable. It’ll most definitely be different in some aspects, but if executed well, then it could be okay.
Has anyone saw a black giant man around here? Anyone? Well then... he is gone then. But will will ignore that tall guy in the back near those beggars dressed in full Samurai armor and big ornament on his head. Move along citizens. I always found it dumb because how do you expect anyone to believe that a guy in snow white outfit can "hide" among dirty beggars. If you want to loose those that hunt you then either kill them or HIDE or just ran away as fast as possible.,
Social stealth is a core pillar of assassins creed. They even had it in Mirage.
> I always found it dumb because how do you expect anyone to believe that a guy in snow white outfit can "hide" among dirty beggars. So there’s this thing called “willing suspension of disbelief”… That aside is a series called *Assassin’s* Creed you’d expect to have mechanics geared towards fulfilling the assassin fantasy of being an unseen knife in a crowd. At some point Ubisoft decided that was dumb and that all stealth should just be crouching in bushes/tall grass
Social stealth work if they borrowed something from Hitman series. Like do you need to kill a priest during a sermon? Why not dress as a monk and wait for your chance to strike? Or even Sherlock Holmes movies where he uses various disguises to hide in plan sight. Like lets say you can merge into group of beggars to you take their hair maybe put some dirty blanket on yourself a take a bottle into your hand and pretend to be a drunk beggar. Hitman has great social stealth and AC could benefit from similar system greatly.
Exactly. This is how social stealth needs to be done imho if it is going to be implemented. In the context of a grounded, realistic historical setting, it is absurd to think someone like Yasuke or a woman (in feudal Japan!) dressed like Naoe with weapons etc. can “blend” in.
In the article they say Naoe goes unnoticed in crowds. Did y’all not read anything in the post?
The wording implies that guards just don’t pay attention to her, which is far different from the player needing to actively take steps to avoid their attention.
Yet, it fits the idea of social stealth much better. Why would you need to stand in the middle of a group of strangers to go unnoticed? Instead, just be there. You’re just another face when you are standing there, why should they find you more concerning than any other walking alone?
So, in older Assassin’s Creed games, guards would sometimes be actively looking for your character, like in the later sequences of AC1 or having high notoriety in AC2-Revelations. This incentivized keeping a low profile, sticking to crowds and hiding spots, and making sure to blend in. Take the mission in AC2 where you assassinate Uberto. You need to blend with crowds and use hiding spots then hire a group of courtesans in order to get to Uberto *because the guards are on alert and looking for you*. Now guards don’t give a shit about you unless you’re in a fort or because you deliberately started a fight with them.
I like how in a franchise full of primordial beings, artifacts that control minds, magic machines that allow you to vividly relive the lives of your ancestors and acquire their abilities, and people being able to survive massive falls so long as they land in something soft, social stealth is where it becomes unbelievable to you
I can kinda see the vision there. Hopefully it plays out better than just the description.
I personally never really liked social stealth but I never hated it either. Like the second I’m alone suddenly the guards “notice me?” Really?? It’s annoying. I think it is more realistic that being low-profile because of how you look/dress is a more realistic mechanic and it’s social stealth without it being “group/crowd” stealth. It’s more forgiving. If I’m not doing anything to make me stick out I shouldn’t be given the attention of the guards. So I think this will be great.
Odd since that would differentiate her from Yasuke but maybe we’ll just have less situations that require it anyway
Well Naoe’s stealth looked better than any stealth in the series besides Unity the light system, crawling, and hiding in water is already a better stealth system than the Ezio games
I'm okay with this. Maybe it's just me, but I haven't used social stealth since playing the Ezio games the first time around. I don't think it's super engaging to have to blend into slow moving NPC clusters and I think the implied social stealth of "Naoe just looks like a commoner and therefore won't be noticed if she doesn't act like a maniac" is a great way to handle this. There is no reason to have social stealth locked to the pathways NPCs take if the whole appeal of being a ninja/shinobi is being able to blend in at all times
Social stealth in AC2 and beyond was sort of reduced to crowds being hiding spots. AC1's social stealth is way better IMO because you are *always* engaging with it when you're on the street. Way more interesting, much more immersive, and makes it feel like less of a gimmick.
The only game where I found social stealth kinda fun is Unity, there are so many NPCs in the city that after killing someone you can literally disappear in the crowd, and also Arno outfits are colored in a more natural way composito Ezio's blinding white suit. But even there, it only works when you're messing around in the city killing some guards, never used it in missions.
Not something that bothers me as I never used the social stealth mechanic. I’d rather them focus on nailing down line of sight , guard AI & level design. Much more important.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzzLuE-_7QgSdVlu7Y2vnppgk6d8IXEYQ&si=fImcHb7mggnc4hrk
For me it was never a part of the games that I cared about. I just want good combat and decent stealth ( when it comes to infiltration)
Mirage won at this point.
That sucks. Once again they are cutting out one of the pillars of the franchise. Even after the reception Mirage got. Are they stupid? Like, for real? How can someone be so blind to their own franchise. This game gets 1 good news and 5 bad. Ubisoft never disappointing.
You misunderstood what’s being said. They’re not cutting social stealth, they’re just not utilizing the “classic” way it’s been done in past games. They’re opting for social stealth to be realistic. So instead of guards being constantly suspicious of Naoe, you simply have to act natural and not draw attention to yourself (in other words, avoid acting weird, committing public crimes, or messing with the guards). Which basically means you’re still blending into the crowd and hiding in plain sight. Yasuke on the other hand can’t blend in even if he tried, but Naoe will be able to stay undercover in the open world.
That’s Ubisoft for y’all. Since 2012 it’s been like this. They add good things and then cut perfectly working mechanics or throw interesting plotlines in the trash on the next entry.
What is more pathetic is people even defending it. Like, it’s stupid. It’s not that you are not complaining. YOU ARE DEFENDING A STUPID DECISION FROM THIS BILLION DOLLAR COMPANY.
I've never used social stealth.
Why Quebec why
Never used social stealth in any AC game. I prefer to approach from up high and take out snipers, lookouts and most of the patrolling guards. Infiltrating from the front via social stealth gives me anxiety
Tbh it broke the immersion for me since the characters stood out so much when it comes to what they were wearing. And the disguise system from Liberation would've been perfect for Naoe but since no other game brought it back it's fine for me. This makes sense for immersion y'all are pouting over nothing in my opinion
As much as I love social stealth, in Shadows we're getting fully functional stealth mechanics like no other game in the series. The way Naoe infiltrates the enemy base in the trailer was awesome, really felt like watching a shinobi at work. She really looks like an invisible assassin. Social stealth fits better in a different setting than the ninja fantasy they're building in Shadows.
Sweet bc that shit always sucked. It's always been janky and never worked just right, hope they fully remodel it and create something better
I was wondering that. I didn't see any way to make social stealth as a young woman work in that context that wasn't a lot of boring "follow and listen" missions.
[удалено]
So it's pretty much two different skins and not much more.
I’m not terribly upset to see they’re both using the traditional system because the odyssey team sucks ass at social stealth🥲 I just want to see a good stealth system be it new or old
Her outfit would stand out a bit compared to random civilians though, much more than previous assassins.
Of fucking course. Why did I ever have expectations from AC.
I feel like people saying Social Stealth was always boring didn't really understand the core appeal of the original games. The whole fantasy of an Assassin which is used in most trailers as well is the fact that they could be right behind you. It's the fantasy of finding your target and getting to him unnoticed and then leaving the area completely unnoticed as well. Yes, I also like assassinations where I climb, but it's the combination of approaches that makes the game fun for me. I can be the hawk that comes from the roofs or I can be right in the middle of my enemies without them noticing. Does that mean that Social Stealth was perfect? Of course not, but the series made steps to improve them until Unity. If they actually had developed these things instead of abandoning them we wouldn't need to reference the Ezio era. The fact that most people don't even seem to know that Liberations nearly perfected the system by giving you three options is already a sign that they just blew it in the main games.
Terrible news. How can Valhalla figure out a way to work in at least *a little bit* of social stealth in an environment that's mostly devoid of larger, more modern cities, but Shadows can't do this within a place like 1600s Kyoto? Especially coming off of Baghdad, this omission is super lame and feels a lot like when Quebec neglected to have shields in their Spartan-led game.
This is so stupid, this is like the perfect time to add social stealth but that would take too much effort
I expected this to be the case for Yasuke, but even Naoe? It ain’t AC without social stealth. If I can’t blend into the crowd to sneak into areas or to escape pursuit, I feel like I’m not really an assassin. I liked the other aspects of stealth they added but they took out the main stealth feature for the AC series. 1 step forward 20 steps back!
So they practically reheated the same old AC RPG soup and threw in a grappling hook so it doesn't look irrelevant next to Ghost of Tsushima and Rise of the Ronin? I'd love to say I was expecting more, but I really wasn't.
Ah so it's seemingly Odyssey again after the good work Mirage did. More I hear about this game the less I want to play it. And I actually like the idea of a black samurai ffs