Assassin's Creed Shadows Is Bringing Back An Unused Assassination From AC3

Summary

• Assassin's Creed Shadows and Assassin's Creed 3 will have more in common besides sharing the name of Assassin's Creed.
• That's because an unused assassination animation from 3 is making its way into Shadows.
• The animation was discovered by a super fan on Reddit, and fans are hoping more older techniques make their way into future titles.

Twelve years ago, Assassin's Creed 3 was all the rage. It was the fifth game in the franchise, and took players to the scenes of the American Revolution. Flash forward, 12 years and Assassin's Creed Shadows is set to launch later this year. It'll be the 14th game in the series, and even though 12 years will have passed between releases, the two will actually have more than one thing in common besides both being called Assassin's Creed.

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A fan-favorite assassination animation.

Super Sleuth Discovers Shadows Is Utilizing An Assassin's Creed 3 Animation

Over on Reddit, user BrunoHM posted his findings to the larger r/assassinscreed subreddit. There, they noted that the female assassin of Shadows, Naoe, has nearly the same animation as Connor of Assassin's Creed 3 fame. That animation never made it to the final cut of AC3, but it was a key part of an unreleased demo from PAX East.

Footage of that 2012 demo made its way to the internet two years ago, while the assassination technique of Naoe was showcased in the gameplay reveal from two weeks ago. The animation revolves around Connor or Naoe leaping into the air for an assassination attempt, closing in on their target, then rolling through the kill and back into a sprint. It's a novel technique, and it's especially interesting that 12 years later it'll finally be realized.

Longtime AC fans are pretty stoked to see the animation make its way back into a new entry. One user commented, "The spirit of Connor lives on in shadows!" Meanwhile, another user was reminded of how epic Assassin's Creed 3 looked, writing, "Damn, I forgot how cool AC3 looked in that first look."

Elsewhere, a couple of users opined that future AC titles should make use of older fan-favorite animations. "This is so cool and makes me wish they'd use more animations from the older games," wrote a Redditor. That sentiment was furthered by another commenter who suggested that the parkour animations from Assassin's Creed Unity should also make their way into future titles.

And perhaps there's a good chance of that happening, too. That's because Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot revealed that older Assassin's Creed titles will be getting the remake treatment in the near future. That means there's plenty of room to add the innovation of current titles to older games. We'll take that as a win.

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