It hasn’t been long since allegations against Ubisoft’s culture of sexism and harassment surfaced, and while the company has made statements about correcting this, there’s no erasing the past. However, these matters aren’t just a problem of the past, as despite these critiques, a recent Assassin’s Creed video dedicated to the franchise’s best characters throughout the years omitted every single female Assassin.
In correcting its past and current mistakes, Ubisoft has to look forward and break past habits, both in the way it minimizes female Assassins like Amunet but treats the women in its company, such as Evie’s VA. But moving forward does sometimes mean looking back, and Shao Jun should lead this charge into a new era for Ubisoft.
The franchise has plenty of strong characters and thus strong females, including but not limited to, Shao Jun, Evie Frye, Lydia Frye, Kassandra, and far more. But the Assassin’s Creed franchise has been male-dominated for years, with that reason now being sadly self-evident. The first game to feature a female protagonist was Aveline de Grandpre in Assassin’s Creed 3: Liberation, a spin-off title that Ubisoft clearly never put much stock in. Every female assassin thereafter was paired with a male because “women don’t sell.”
Evie Frye was paired with her brother Jacob and forced to play second fiddle to him in terms of gameplay and marketing, while Amunet was originally the primary protagonist before being forced out for Bayek. Even Kassandra, who is the canon character of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, was forced to have a male character alternative due to Ubisoft’s company mindset. But the very first female Assassin was actually Shao Jun.
She appeared first in Assassin’s Creed Embers, a full year before the release of Liberation. She sought Ezio for his mentorship, and while this film seemed to suggest her story would continue in a main game, she was relegated to a side-scroller. As such, if Ubisoft is going to correct how it addresses its female characters, it’d be best by going back to the start.
After all, a mainline Assassin’s Creed China game has recently leaked, surprisingly in a similar way to how Assassin’s Creed Valhalla leaked. If it’s going to give China the mainline treatment, then it only makes sense to give its only Chinese Assassin the similar treatment. Shao Jun learned a lot from Ezio, and while the details of what followed are fleshed out, there’s plenty more to be explored. Shao Jun, in so many ways, was the first to be wronged by Ubisoft. And in so many ways, it’s only poetic justice she be how Ubisoft redeems itself. What comes of these leaks or the reportedly changing culture at the company remains to be seen, but every female character the company has created, as well as those minds behind them, deserve to have past wrongs righted.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla releases on PC, PS4, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X on November 10, with the PS5 version launching alongside it on November 12.
![\"IT電腦補習](\"http://itteacheritfreelance.hk/test/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/logo2-2.png\"){kind=logo}
www.itsec.hk
www.itsec.vip
www.itseceu.uk
Leave a Reply