Assassin's Creed Shadows' open-world will feature seasons that impact combat and traversal

Assassin's Creed Shadows will feature changing seasons that will impact gameplay.

Speaking in a recent interview with IGN about Ubisoft's upcoming Assassin's Creed title, producer Karl Onnée revealed that the Shadows will feature a dynamic weather system that will change according to the season.

Specifically, as players spend time exploring the open-world of Japan in 1579 and progressing through the campaign, the game will progress through spring, summer, autumn, and winter, with each season bringing its own weather conditions that will introduce new challenges while also bringing a sense of realism to the environment you explore.

“We've really been pushing about making sure that gameplay and art are not separate, but they're intertwining,” Onnée said.

Onnée goes on to explain that during summer, players will be able to prone stance or crawl beneath a body of water and hide from enemies, however, when winter arrives, the water will be frozen over.

Similarly, during spring, grass will grow tall and bushes will become leafy, allowing players to hide from patroling enemies, but will become bare and wither away during winter. 

While you're scaling rooftops during, icicles can also snap and fall, revealing your position to foes, but loud winds will hide your movements. Guards will also stick to warmer areas when it's old, meaning players need to adjust their paths to counter the weather conditions.

"Players will have to adapt constantly to what the environment is giving them,” said creative director Jonathan Dumont.

Art director Thierry Dansereau explains that the reason the seasons change according to the players' progression in the story is to make sure the world stays "authentic as possible to match historical events," but that during side quests "it might happen that you will play a quest in autumn and I will play the same quest and I'm going to be in summer."

“So that's up to the system and the way you play your game," he adds.

Assassin's Creed Shadows launches on November 15 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series , Xbox Series S, Amazon Luna, and PC.

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