If you try to recall an Edgar Wright movie, the first thing you’ll likely think of is an iconic fight. Shaun of the Dead’s cricket bat escapades, Scott Pilgrim’s rock band showdowns, or Baby Driver’s musically-driven gunfights. It’s a staple of the style in these films, and something that elevates these kinds of scenes beyond that of Hollywood’s standard fare.
So the last thing I expected fromAssassin’s Creed Shadows, for the first time in the entire series, was to see a scene play out just like this. And I loved it.
The moment I’m referring to is the game’s first real boss fight, taking place in a flashback when Naoe meditates at one of the Kuji-Kiri spots on the map. It involves the first time she takes someone’s life, sneaking past heavily armoured enemies, and catching up to an ambush carried out by the Iga villagers as the invaders are crossing a bridge.
Up until this point, I’d not been incredibly impressed with Shadow’s cutscenes - some of them are great, but most are pretty idle, and I switched the voices to Japanese just to make it more interesting. But this scene, as the ambush played out, won me over.
The fact that you have to go out of your way to initiate this flashback means you could miss this. Please don’t miss this.
…Hot Fuzz But The World’s End But Ninjas And Samurai
As the combat kicks off, music kicks in - still in theme with rural Japanese culture, but kind of… rock? Naoe’s father throws the chain of a kusarigama around an unsuspecting enemy’s neck, and the music begins; then, as smoke bombs rain down, so does the beat.
A short scene follows the Iga villagers taking down the samurai amid the chaos, but the way it weaves the combat into the music is fantastic. It’s exciting, upbeat, and makes the whole moment refreshing - and, clearly, memorable. With a standard soundtrack, it would have been just like any other brief combat situation in any other game.
It quietens down for a moment as Naoe is pushed off a ledge, and is faced with a large warrior. This begins a boss fight, and, as I was hoping for in this moment, the music kicks back in. Hell yes.
This whole experience was great. It stands out to me as a highlight at a point where I felt unsure about the game up to that point. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen in any Assassin’s Creed game.
Beyond this, it’s a scene that immediately stood out to me across games as a genre.Baby Driver is one of my favourite films, so this style appeals to me, but I hadn’t realised that we don’t have many games that deliver action in this way. There are a couple that spring to mind, sure, but it’s something I would love to see a lot more of. It elevates not only scenes but entire movies in Hollywood’s output, and I think Shadows shows it could do the same for games.
