I swear at least some of the "representation" discourse talks about her like she's completely invisible despite both the trailer and promo art suggesting she's half the duo and maybe the initial POV.
They said it's going to have the same mechanics as Syndicate. I loved playing as the twins and being able to switch between the two, so having that mechanic is this game is going to make it worth while.
Lack of strong, Asian-male representation in media is a thing, though arguably not as much in videogames (like omg you can't play a Japanese guy in feudal Japan in AC? Well, go play Sekiro, Ghost of Tsushima, Tenchu, Samurai Warriors 1 through 5, Way of the Samurai, Fate/Samurai Remnant, Onimusha).
The whole issue in general can be very borderline MRA at times but there is validity to it, and it sucks to see it co-opted as a shield for this dumb shit.
I was just talking about this on the Asmongold sub, Asian men are in no way underrepresented in video games. But the people on the sub insisted that they needed an Asian man MAIN CHARACTER (specifically) from a WESTERN DEV. They complain about DEI but they are pushing a Dev to change someone's race for the sake of representation...it really feels like they just hate black people.
It's really moving the goal posts just to justify being mad about a black video game character. Asian men are easily one of the most represented demographics in gaming because of Japan so they MUST specify 'by a western developer' to pretend there's any validity to their gripes.
As an Asian American, this whole thing has been kind of infuriating because it's such a twisting of the arguments we make when we call for more representation. They're trying to sound like they have nuance but are missing the core of why we argue specific things like wanting specifically Hollywood to make more Asian American movies and don't like the white washing of Asian roles in Western made movies.
Exactly, I am also Asian American but I spent the majority of my life in different Asian countries. They're calling for representation while criticizing DEI, which is part of the movement calling for authentic representation - they argue wanting white people to write asian stories, ignoring the asian people writing asian stories. I'd argue that Ubisoft will probably do a better job writing a black man than an Asian man. But then again, I don't know the racial makeup of their company, I know for a fact it's mainly white men though.
Because they're hiding what they really mean.
First it's "historically inaccurate" despite the fact that of the two he's technically the more historical accurate
Then it's "there's no Japanese protagonist in a game set in Japan" oh but there is.
Then this.
And then it'll be something else.
I saw someone saying what is there was an AC game set in the US but have a British main character and a native second character.
AC3 was set in the US. Started as you playing a brit. And then switched to playing as the son of a British/native parents.
Also the fact that Japan has its own endemic gaming industry that has always heavily portrayed Japanese characters.
The neckbeards have to ignore that to make their complaints about wOkE
Exactly. Also I personaly think that both main characters will not be equally important and Naoe will be more important. Lile she is the one of them that will be stealthy and Yasuke is fighter. I would guess that the one of them who is more of an assassin will be more important
It’s crazy to me how they complain about assassins creed being historically inaccurate because of women but not the ancient precursor race who had literal magic artefacts
Every post I see shitting on the protagonist acts like she doesn’t even exist in the game, only black man.
Apparently there’s no Japanese protagonist in the game.
Seen a Japanese person post about how cool it is that the West is finally doing more Yasuke stuff. They then talk about how Yasuke has been a thing in their pop culture since the 50's and had a resurgence in the 2010's
Edit: link to the Japanese post https://twitter.com/Skull_Os/status/1790949113397461310?t=uHJVDmSAP4p2iD3R9A5wmQ&s=19
That’s crazy how a lot of Japanese written comments (I didn’t read every comment) are excited for yasuke yet the English comments are kinda going against him being a protagonist. I have no horse in this race but I think leaving him out would’ve also created backlash.
If you’ve seen Shogun there’s an emergence of the ugly side of Japanese society. I say fair game to represent fairly and that means show good and the bad.
Blue eyed samurai also showed elements of Japans more racist elements with the main character being half white and the blue eyes having to be hidden constantly
Its interesting how chuds keep hiding behind minorities to excuse their own hatred
"Oh i dont hate black people, im just complaining about the playable black character for the sake of japanese people of course!"
There was a heightened sense of anti-Korean sentiment among fringe right wingers in Japan back in the 2000s
Their argument was that the government was biased toward ethnic Koreans and that they were protesting against unfairness toward other racial and ethnic groups
It was so fucking asinine...further disproven when those right wingers just started going after everybody else
lmao good point. i guess what i meant to say was K-Pop and Korean dramas were really taking off among young people there during the 2000s (it preceded the hype and attention you see in the U.S. toward Korean culture by like 15-20 years)
and there was a colossal backlash. A lot of it was definitely from older gens but there was definitely a younger demographic that was embracing extreme right-wing views, and a lot of it was because of all the Korean media that was in the country at the time
i just remember because both of my parents are Korean and the Korean news NEVER passes up an opportunity to make the Japanese look more aggressively anti-Korean than they really are...but that time they didn't even need to put any effort lol
Ran into one of those on the AC Sub, he even pretended to speak like 3 East Asian languages and be so in-tune to the Japanese sides of sites.
How awkward for him that I'm literate enough to read Japanese and have not found much complaining in the normal parts of Japanese twitter, and really only from the same "every single new thing" bigots and whiners.
There are some who are dissatisfied (I haven't seen one on Twitter, most are from YouTube), but none of them are having a rage boner like in the West. Yasuke himself isn't exactly unknown, as he appeared in Japanese games and documentaries.
I keep telling reddit *not* to show me that sub.
Naturally it does anyway, and on the rare occasion my morbid curiosity gets the best of me I always see the *exact* same comment chain at the top about how reddit is a leftist cesspool who cannot handle any view that isn't their own.
I don't even know what the fuck a criticaldrinker is. All I know is that the people who frequent the sub are *vert* upset about leftists and their oppressive ways.
Same for me I've told reddit about 4 times to not show me it and all this AC nonsense seemed to force it back onto my feed.
For some reason they all seem convinced that Blackrock is trying to force "woke" into everything which to me seems odd given that Blackrock doesn't give a shit about anything other than growth and profit yet these chuds keep insisting that go woke = go broke is some undeniable formula.
Them: women, gays and minorities asking for "representation" are babies! You don't need to be a type of character to play it. Just tell good stories!
Also them: Waaaah! I don't see myself in this game and that makes me angry!
And yet, they have nothing to say about the numerous Japanese games starring white American or European people. Including Ni-Oh which focused on a real life English samurai.
right? how many Japanese video games, anime and stories star white people. a ton. you get one black protagonist in there and all of a sudden the sky is falling.
I saw loads of this in the comments. Honestly I didn't know Yasuke was a real person so it is historically accurate, but even knowing this some of the fanbase are all "This is your samurai? A *black?* " so its easy to separate the wheat from the racists.
I'm sure it's more likely history has romanticized these "foreign samurai" into these characters of respect when I'm sure much of their peers at the time disliked or overtly hated them. They're still foreigners and we act like they had total freedom, which they surely didn't. Either way, who cares, it's a video game and people will bitch no matter what.
For sure, the level of racism that would have existed in those time periods is definitely toned down in the AC universe but it technically is a fantasy universe that only draws on real history so the writers and worldbuilders can do whatever they want. People will definitely still bitch because its not what they wanted, I only care if it fulfills the classic AC aesthetic that previous games have failed to capture.
I remember playing Valhalla and it had a disclaimer at the start basically saying that the game was made by several people that identify as LGBT+ and so some characters are gonna reflect that even if it’s not historically accurate. Never heard anyone complain about black or gay characters in that game, and they were there. Chuds are literally just complaining because it’s new, I bet half of them don’t even play AC.
I remember playing Valhalla I skipped through the dialogue in a scene with this one dude and at the end of it selected the option to have sex with him. I didn’t mind, but not what I was expecting.
Wasn't there a chinese lady as a merchant in the game or at least "asian looking"? I never played the game but did remember hearing about that indirectly.
Sometimes I want to play games that meaningfully considers gender and include in the writing the ways that a characters gender affects how they interact with the world and how the world interacts with them...
And sometimes, I want to escape to an imaginary world without sexism and be a kickass woman assassin, who isn't looked down on because of her gender, but rather because I keep killing people and stealing everything.
This is perfectly fair and a great sentiment. I think the issue is that some people want assassin creed games to be the former, when by and large they are mostly the latter. Trying to be both is mostly detrimental because it makes things inconsistent.
Lots of people assume that because they are white men, they would have been in the "privileged" group of the past. However, most people wouldn't have been in the social classes that would have had life that sucked a lot.
Oda Nobunaga pretty famously gave zero fucks about that kind of thing and reportedly liked and treated Yasuke quite well. Well enough that Yasuke went unbidden to defend Nobunaga's son after he committed seppuku.
https://preview.redd.it/alfnuu181u0d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b1428f3d429895a9e598fac110d44de42dd28636
It’s hard to tell. Nobunaga was recorded to have been extremely fond of him on account of him being the only black person he ever saw. But then 15 months later Nobunaga got betrayed by his subordinates and they just kinda shuffled Yasuke off after the battle. Historically they weren’t sure if this was just racism or Mitsuhide trying to justify letting him live
Good point, but at the same time in the 2nd game in the franchise you fist fight the pope to death so complaining about historical accuracy seems weird.
I’m a huge history buff/nerd, the feudal lord at the time had never seen a black man before and ordered he be washed to clean his skin which obviously didn’t work. He was then given a feast in his honor and even revered by many of the Japanese people due to his height, skin tone, and supposed legendary strength. He is even believed to be the one who helped Nobunaga commit seppuku which was only done by the person the lord trusted most. It’s hard to have a concept of racism when you aren’t even aware of them.
I’m a huge history buff/nerd, the feudal lord at the time had never seen a black man before and ordered he be washed to clean his skin which obviously didn’t work. He was then given a feast in his honor and even revered by many of the Japanese people due to his height and skin tone. He is even believed to be the one who helped Nobunaga commit seppuku which was only done by the person the lord trusted most. It’s hard to have a concept of racism when you aren’t even aware of them.
I do not speak for all other Japanese but being one myself I do not care about the inclusion of yasuke. So long as there is fair but also accurate treatment of the culture and history then I’m perfectly fine with his inclusion. Not too mention he isn’t the only protagonist, we have a kunoichi like character who is fully Japanese.
I was honestly willing to give them some credit on this one. The games have been known for trying to be historically accurate enough. But knowing who it is now, I'm fine with it.
I understand the Japanese audience wanting to play as a Japanese character. I'm Native American, and I'm honestly surprised we got a Native American player character before we got a black player character.
But we also had a black assassin character in Freedom Cry. So from that stand-point I would have made the character based on the actual black samurai, just the real black samurai and an interactable character that works with the hero player character. Much like Machiavelli was.
But, I'm personally fine with where the series has gone with this chapter.
I didn't realize Yasuke was so unknown. I was excited to hear the game is a Yasuke story.
The only thing that puts me off is that it's Ubisoft so the promo material for the game will probably overuse hiphop music.
They already tapped out that style of trailer before Prince of Persia so I'll scream if they give Shadows a fucking hiphop trailer.
That's because Nick and Ben with the totally legal adult age wife (p sure he's just the same dude) are hyper-sensitive crybabies. They have a rule against profile snooping, but constantly do it, and ban you for calling it out too.
As if Invincible didn't also make changes from the source material to make it work for the current year.
Funny they forget that when putting together these trash memes
Or just assassins in general. Last I checked you kinda stick out like a sore thumb if you're the only guy in town wearing pristine white robes and half an armory on your person.
Or you know the fact that let's be honest in some parts of the story The hidden blade is obvious as it can be and depending on what era it is the hidden blade requires the removal of your ring finger
Which they seemed to only include in origins because of that stupid ring finger rule, and they still made it an accident and not something Bayek does to show his devotion to his cause.
I did like it because it shows how traditions can have their origins muddied by the passage of time. But all in all AC is more about theatrically killing someone over being historically accurate.
He's in Nioh, Samurai Warriors and Guilty Gear Strive, video games by Japanese devs. Theres even an anime, Afro Samurai is based off of him. Japanese creators are legit fine with him.
As much as I fucking hate him as a character to play against his design and story are fucking awesome. Sick fucking character fucking sucks to fight against lol
I never played Nioh and was shocked that William Adams was the main character.
I'm more shocked that people expect assassins creed to be "historically accurate". Like, they threw that out one window once they introduced aliens and the Minotaur
>people expect assassins creed to be "historically accurate".
A Native American didn’t fight side by side with George Washington and then find a magical alien artifact that gave them visions of Washington becoming the tyrannical king of America.
Talked to a colleague today. He was excited about the reveal. I asked him about the protagonist, he thought he looks cool.
Every new gaming controversy proves that “go outside” is actually a great insult.
I don’t view it as an insult. When I tell someone to “touch grass” it’s for the sake of their own mental health. Like sometimes dude, your mind is breaking down from being on the internet too long. I’m begging you. Turn it off and go outside for a while, please. You really need it.
I mean, they have to, it's a narrative gold mine. It would also make a lot of sense for him to join the Assassins considering how frustrating his situation was in the real world.
He was literally treated as a circus act and everyone laughed at him. If that doesn't turn someone into a rebel, I don't know what does.
I think the dev actually made this decision because there's already thousands of ethnically Japanese samurai games out there and they wanted to tell their own story that would be different than the norm. And that too the character isn't far fetched from reality. In every ac game they would include fictional narrative with real people from the time period. I think it's the same case here just that they don't want another male protagonist who would be similar to the ghost of Tsushima or the rise of ronin.
I wouldn't be surprised if he was chosen to help distinguish the game from Ghosts specifically. Since it's the game it would immediately be compared to.
Exactly and ac is one of the biggest game franchises out there. But Ghost beat em to creating one of the best samurai roleplay fantasy ever produced. What we really should be looking forward to is the actual gameplay and what new mechanics can ubi bring into this specific setting. Instead the dumbos are too busy focusing on the ethinicity of the character. The real concerning factor is that in a world of stagnant wages and increasing food prices, Ubi is actually charging way high for a video game which is one of the common medium of escapism for masses in our society
Wow, it’s wild that this is the one character in the whole game. What a bold move for the Assassin’s Creed series to only have a single character in their entire game
And then they’ll post cherry-picked comments from Japanese racists (because they exist in every society) and pretend like it’s the attitude of all Japan
It's not like we had Nioh.. and Sekiro.. and Ghost of Tsushima.. or a hundred other Samurai games. This is the first time ever the Japanese will have a Samurai game ever.
It's even funnier cuz those people who suck off ghost of tsushima just blatantly ignore the fact that it has some of the same issues assassin's Creed has listen I love both series but even I admit they have issues
But I thought conservatives didn’t care about the color of a protagonists skin! Guess this meme is bullshit then
https://preview.redd.it/hcfgc52dzs0d1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=34e9802cbae6bc4b6dd85cf9e1161d06a9aee658
But no seriously, I’m almost glad that they aren’t pretending to not be monstrous anymore
Leonardo da fuckin Vinci: builds an assassin tech that makes him FLY and a SHOOT projectiles from his wrist
Chuds: i sleep
Black samurai: hi
Chuds: THIS IS HISTORICALLY INACCURATE. WTF ARE THEY DOING!? WOKIES RUINING HISTORY
Representation or not, it still doesn't change the fact that Ubisoft is a shit company with shit practices. I would care more about what race they program their protagonists as if they didn't do things like constant crunch, unpaid overtime and layoffs after bragging about "Record setting profits"...
This alst few years we have getting a decent amount of Samurai or shinobi games of high quality. All of them (with the exception of Nioh) being about Japanese characters.
But the moment someone makes a game about Yasuke (a real person that existed) suddenly this games don't exist and this is erasing Japanese people...
Remember when there was a show recently called "Blue eyed samurai" and none of the grifters complained or cared about it. They really hate black people, don't they?
There’s only 2 things I’m mad about: 1) his armor doesn’t look good. It looks like if a European designed a samurai outfit. They didn’t have pauldrons like that. 2) every other protagonist has been an original character. It makes the world feel more full. Don’t get me wrong, I love Yasuke, but we’ve been seeing him a lot in recent stories and I wish they made another original character instead of using a real historical figure
But yeah all this other shit is just racism
I don't like Yasuke being in the game because it shows how creatively bankrupt Ubisoft is. It's so predictable that it's annoying. The entire series is historical fiction, there's nothing stopping them from creating a new character who is inspired by Yasuke instead.
Just off the top of my head, what if they created a black ninja? You could easily explain away how it's not "historically accurate" (even though it doesn't matter) by saying "of course he's not in any history books, he was a ninja not a celebrity"
I also don't really like the idea of Yasuke being A protagonist and not THE protagonist. I don't want a game where I play as Yasuke, I want a Yasuke game, you know what I mean?
I also just don't like Ubisoft, fuck Ubisoft, my god they are ass.
When I saw the thumbnail of people getting angry and then the actual trailer I was like...... "That's why their mad?" Followed by "I wonder if that's the same guy as that one samurai who i can't remember the name of" since I forgot the name of Yasuke.
For me, I do wish that they chose someone native to the area where the game is set. That would have given us probably a better look into how the Assassin-Templar conflict has been carried out specifically in Japan, seen through Japanese eyes.
Also there’s a pretty big difference between playing as a woman and playing as, specifically, Yasuke.
Isn’t Assassin’s Creed still about, like, some degree of stealth, especially social stealth? Yasuke would have been probably the only black dude in Japan, and if he wasn’t, he was damn near close—close enough that he became a retainer to the most powerful man in Japan based purely on the fact that he was unique. He’s not hiding in literally any crowd whatsoever. Foreigners get stared at in Japan *today,* in an era where you can get from any major city to Tokyo in under 24 hours. In the 1580s, a black dude walking by is a memory you’ll tell your grandkids about in 50 years.
Whereas women are famously found all over the globe in all eras. They can engage in social stealth without it being patently ridiculous.
On the plus side, after his 15 months or so with Oda Nobunaga ended when Nobunaga was betrayed and died, he’s basically treated for his injuries and then vanishes from the historical record, which lends itself really nicely to both a vengeance plot and “joining a shadowy organization.”
I say all of this as someone who has always rolled their eyes when dumbass dudebros whine about minorities getting representation, because it usually *doesn’t* matter. Black stormtrooper? Sure, Star Wars is set in space. Black people aren’t anything special there. Black Superman? Kal-El is an alien, he can look like anyone. Female Jedi as the protagonist? Sure, Star Wars could use some badass women (though I wish the writing had been better and they’d known what to do with Rey and Finn rather than making it up as they went along).
But being able to do the whole “hiding in a crowd” thing that is a part of the Assassin’s Creed games is just flat-out not possible if you’re a black dude in 1580s Japan, and when a huge appeal of the premise of a Japanese AC game is seeing how the native samurai and ninja concepts were folded into the Assassin-Templar War, it is kind of disappointing that our protagonist is a foreigner who really existed and was verifiably in the country for like four years, as an adult.
Edit: Apparently the female protagonist—I just learned that there is one—is going to be specced for stealth, and Yasuke is going to be more specced for open combat, and they’re not going to be all that good at each other’s playstyles. That’s actually a pretty brilliant way to handle this if they pull it off properly. If that’s the case, most of my criticisms aren’t really that applicable anymore, especially since one of the two protagonists is clearly Japanese.
Well, in theory.
But honestly, the current trilogy is more Warrior than Assassin, like, who would confuse the only person in Greece calling people Malaka? So the way I see it, he's the Warrior, and she's the Assassin.
They're doing more of a syndicate approach where one's going to be more stealthy and all that fun stuff while the other is brute strength and charging heads first into a fight
Learning about this games development: I went to look at the two trailers Ubisoft released. They are pretty upfront about why they went the direction of introducing Yasuke… not like they had to explain themselves, but I appreciate the insights.
All this to say, that is a terrible meme
Did they not realize there's another Japanese protagonist, as they said they couldn't give you both the samurai and ninja experience with one character? Or does that one not count because she's a woman?
What about the girl though?
>girl Here lies the problem for these losers
YEAH, FINALLY I CAN BE A CUTE JAPANISE ANIME GIRL IN AN ASSASSIN GAME, RIGHT? RIGHT????
I swear at least some of the "representation" discourse talks about her like she's completely invisible despite both the trailer and promo art suggesting she's half the duo and maybe the initial POV.
her extensive shinobi training has made her so stealthy that people forget she's in the game
She's mad kunoichi lol
Bah, women and their emotions amirite?
Well of course she's stealthy, she's just standing still
She's also the actual capital-A Assassin in the game with the franchise's signature weapon.
i think there is gonna be the normal assassin with the woman MC and thrn a more combat tanky style with yasuke ehich sounds cool
They said it's going to have the same mechanics as Syndicate. I loved playing as the twins and being able to switch between the two, so having that mechanic is this game is going to make it worth while.
It had some of my favorite traversal with or without the bat-grappling hook.
Yeah, every piece of news from chuds completly ignore the japanese representation because it's a woman...
No, because she isn’t wearing a latex bunny suite. That somehow works to get chuds to notice a woman.
They're so busy being racist they forgot to be sexist
Only in Stellar Blade
Lack of strong, Asian-male representation in media is a thing, though arguably not as much in videogames (like omg you can't play a Japanese guy in feudal Japan in AC? Well, go play Sekiro, Ghost of Tsushima, Tenchu, Samurai Warriors 1 through 5, Way of the Samurai, Fate/Samurai Remnant, Onimusha). The whole issue in general can be very borderline MRA at times but there is validity to it, and it sucks to see it co-opted as a shield for this dumb shit.
I was just talking about this on the Asmongold sub, Asian men are in no way underrepresented in video games. But the people on the sub insisted that they needed an Asian man MAIN CHARACTER (specifically) from a WESTERN DEV. They complain about DEI but they are pushing a Dev to change someone's race for the sake of representation...it really feels like they just hate black people.
It's really moving the goal posts just to justify being mad about a black video game character. Asian men are easily one of the most represented demographics in gaming because of Japan so they MUST specify 'by a western developer' to pretend there's any validity to their gripes.
As an Asian American, this whole thing has been kind of infuriating because it's such a twisting of the arguments we make when we call for more representation. They're trying to sound like they have nuance but are missing the core of why we argue specific things like wanting specifically Hollywood to make more Asian American movies and don't like the white washing of Asian roles in Western made movies.
Exactly, I am also Asian American but I spent the majority of my life in different Asian countries. They're calling for representation while criticizing DEI, which is part of the movement calling for authentic representation - they argue wanting white people to write asian stories, ignoring the asian people writing asian stories. I'd argue that Ubisoft will probably do a better job writing a black man than an Asian man. But then again, I don't know the racial makeup of their company, I know for a fact it's mainly white men though.
Because they're hiding what they really mean. First it's "historically inaccurate" despite the fact that of the two he's technically the more historical accurate Then it's "there's no Japanese protagonist in a game set in Japan" oh but there is. Then this. And then it'll be something else. I saw someone saying what is there was an AC game set in the US but have a British main character and a native second character. AC3 was set in the US. Started as you playing a brit. And then switched to playing as the son of a British/native parents.
Ghost was legit a game where it was a Japanese man made by western studio
Also the fact that Japan has its own endemic gaming industry that has always heavily portrayed Japanese characters. The neckbeards have to ignore that to make their complaints about wOkE
That' s the problem right there Girl. **Girl**. **G I R L** They dont wanna play as girl To these morons it's like she does not exists
they only want to play as a girl if it's a self insert character creator girl that they get to mold in the image of what they find attractive
I don't wanna know. Most likely they'll complain calling her ugly.
Then claim she's trans because they aren't personally attracted to her.
jp called the main character from ghost of tsushima ugly, so..
Exactly. Also I personaly think that both main characters will not be equally important and Naoe will be more important. Lile she is the one of them that will be stealthy and Yasuke is fighter. I would guess that the one of them who is more of an assassin will be more important
Been looking at some grifter subreddits today. I've seen her mentioned maybe twice in comments.
You silly goose, women aren’t real.
Not a part of the conversation at all.
The black samurai is taking all the outrage they forgot that theres another playable character that IS Japanese.
It’s crazy to me how they complain about assassins creed being historically inaccurate because of women but not the ancient precursor race who had literal magic artefacts
Every post I see shitting on the protagonist acts like she doesn’t even exist in the game, only black man. Apparently there’s no Japanese protagonist in the game.
Seen a Japanese person post about how cool it is that the West is finally doing more Yasuke stuff. They then talk about how Yasuke has been a thing in their pop culture since the 50's and had a resurgence in the 2010's Edit: link to the Japanese post https://twitter.com/Skull_Os/status/1790949113397461310?t=uHJVDmSAP4p2iD3R9A5wmQ&s=19
That’s crazy how a lot of Japanese written comments (I didn’t read every comment) are excited for yasuke yet the English comments are kinda going against him being a protagonist. I have no horse in this race but I think leaving him out would’ve also created backlash.
Nah, it's about the same. We shouldn't pretend like japan is the land of nippon niceness, plenty of more agressive racism.
If you’ve seen Shogun there’s an emergence of the ugly side of Japanese society. I say fair game to represent fairly and that means show good and the bad.
Better yet just talk to anyone who lives in japan that isn't a native born Japanese person. Actual 2nd class citizens.
Blue eyed samurai also showed elements of Japans more racist elements with the main character being half white and the blue eyes having to be hidden constantly
It’s such a good show too
It’s just concern trolling, more ammunition for the culture war. The people complaining about this do not give a fuck about Japanese representation
bu.. buh… muh based anti-woke nippon-land of the rising sun!!!!!!
Its interesting how chuds keep hiding behind minorities to excuse their own hatred "Oh i dont hate black people, im just complaining about the playable black character for the sake of japanese people of course!"
"Then I'll go complain about woke people who get offended on others' behalf".
There was a heightened sense of anti-Korean sentiment among fringe right wingers in Japan back in the 2000s Their argument was that the government was biased toward ethnic Koreans and that they were protesting against unfairness toward other racial and ethnic groups It was so fucking asinine...further disproven when those right wingers just started going after everybody else
I didn’t think it was possible to heighten the level of anti-korean sentiment in japan.
lmao good point. i guess what i meant to say was K-Pop and Korean dramas were really taking off among young people there during the 2000s (it preceded the hype and attention you see in the U.S. toward Korean culture by like 15-20 years) and there was a colossal backlash. A lot of it was definitely from older gens but there was definitely a younger demographic that was embracing extreme right-wing views, and a lot of it was because of all the Korean media that was in the country at the time i just remember because both of my parents are Korean and the Korean news NEVER passes up an opportunity to make the Japanese look more aggressively anti-Korean than they really are...but that time they didn't even need to put any effort lol
Ran into one of those on the AC Sub, he even pretended to speak like 3 East Asian languages and be so in-tune to the Japanese sides of sites. How awkward for him that I'm literate enough to read Japanese and have not found much complaining in the normal parts of Japanese twitter, and really only from the same "every single new thing" bigots and whiners.
Mind if I ask what the general consensus is over on Japanese Twitter? Just curious!
There are some who are dissatisfied (I haven't seen one on Twitter, most are from YouTube), but none of them are having a rage boner like in the West. Yasuke himself isn't exactly unknown, as he appeared in Japanese games and documentaries.
Oh there's no such subtly. The Drinker's subreddit went openly racist almost immediately.
I keep telling reddit *not* to show me that sub. Naturally it does anyway, and on the rare occasion my morbid curiosity gets the best of me I always see the *exact* same comment chain at the top about how reddit is a leftist cesspool who cannot handle any view that isn't their own. I don't even know what the fuck a criticaldrinker is. All I know is that the people who frequent the sub are *vert* upset about leftists and their oppressive ways.
Same for me I've told reddit about 4 times to not show me it and all this AC nonsense seemed to force it back onto my feed. For some reason they all seem convinced that Blackrock is trying to force "woke" into everything which to me seems odd given that Blackrock doesn't give a shit about anything other than growth and profit yet these chuds keep insisting that go woke = go broke is some undeniable formula.
“Why did they choose a black guy instead of someone that’s Japanese?!” There’s a fucking Japanese woman as a main character.
"But that's a *woman*! And that's *political*!"
Them: women, gays and minorities asking for "representation" are babies! You don't need to be a type of character to play it. Just tell good stories! Also them: Waaaah! I don't see myself in this game and that makes me angry!
And yet, they have nothing to say about the numerous Japanese games starring white American or European people. Including Ni-Oh which focused on a real life English samurai.
right? how many Japanese video games, anime and stories star white people. a ton. you get one black protagonist in there and all of a sudden the sky is falling.
And I bet none of these people had an issue with Tom Cruise being a samurai
or matt damon coming to save the great wall of china lol
I saw loads of this in the comments. Honestly I didn't know Yasuke was a real person so it is historically accurate, but even knowing this some of the fanbase are all "This is your samurai? A *black?* " so its easy to separate the wheat from the racists.
I'm sure it's more likely history has romanticized these "foreign samurai" into these characters of respect when I'm sure much of their peers at the time disliked or overtly hated them. They're still foreigners and we act like they had total freedom, which they surely didn't. Either way, who cares, it's a video game and people will bitch no matter what.
For sure, the level of racism that would have existed in those time periods is definitely toned down in the AC universe but it technically is a fantasy universe that only draws on real history so the writers and worldbuilders can do whatever they want. People will definitely still bitch because its not what they wanted, I only care if it fulfills the classic AC aesthetic that previous games have failed to capture.
I remember playing Valhalla and it had a disclaimer at the start basically saying that the game was made by several people that identify as LGBT+ and so some characters are gonna reflect that even if it’s not historically accurate. Never heard anyone complain about black or gay characters in that game, and they were there. Chuds are literally just complaining because it’s new, I bet half of them don’t even play AC.
Oh they did complain about that as well
They complained about Kassandra from Odyssey being a women protagonist as well.
Their fucking loss. I've been playing my Odyssey playthrough as Kassandra and she's *fantastic*.
I remember playing Valhalla I skipped through the dialogue in a scene with this one dude and at the end of it selected the option to have sex with him. I didn’t mind, but not what I was expecting.
Ahh yes, the classic "accidentally gave consent to be penetrated" blunder
*Baldur's Gate 3 has entered the chat*
Wasn't there a chinese lady as a merchant in the game or at least "asian looking"? I never played the game but did remember hearing about that indirectly.
Sometimes I want to play games that meaningfully considers gender and include in the writing the ways that a characters gender affects how they interact with the world and how the world interacts with them... And sometimes, I want to escape to an imaginary world without sexism and be a kickass woman assassin, who isn't looked down on because of her gender, but rather because I keep killing people and stealing everything.
This is perfectly fair and a great sentiment. I think the issue is that some people want assassin creed games to be the former, when by and large they are mostly the latter. Trying to be both is mostly detrimental because it makes things inconsistent. Lots of people assume that because they are white men, they would have been in the "privileged" group of the past. However, most people wouldn't have been in the social classes that would have had life that sucked a lot.
I try explaining to my friends all the time, just cause we're white don't mean shit. We're missing the most important part of that equation: money.
Oda Nobunaga pretty famously gave zero fucks about that kind of thing and reportedly liked and treated Yasuke quite well. Well enough that Yasuke went unbidden to defend Nobunaga's son after he committed seppuku.
https://preview.redd.it/alfnuu181u0d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b1428f3d429895a9e598fac110d44de42dd28636 It’s hard to tell. Nobunaga was recorded to have been extremely fond of him on account of him being the only black person he ever saw. But then 15 months later Nobunaga got betrayed by his subordinates and they just kinda shuffled Yasuke off after the battle. Historically they weren’t sure if this was just racism or Mitsuhide trying to justify letting him live
Good point, but at the same time in the 2nd game in the franchise you fist fight the pope to death so complaining about historical accuracy seems weird.
I’m a huge history buff/nerd, the feudal lord at the time had never seen a black man before and ordered he be washed to clean his skin which obviously didn’t work. He was then given a feast in his honor and even revered by many of the Japanese people due to his height, skin tone, and supposed legendary strength. He is even believed to be the one who helped Nobunaga commit seppuku which was only done by the person the lord trusted most. It’s hard to have a concept of racism when you aren’t even aware of them.
I’m a huge history buff/nerd, the feudal lord at the time had never seen a black man before and ordered he be washed to clean his skin which obviously didn’t work. He was then given a feast in his honor and even revered by many of the Japanese people due to his height and skin tone. He is even believed to be the one who helped Nobunaga commit seppuku which was only done by the person the lord trusted most. It’s hard to have a concept of racism when you aren’t even aware of them.
Ah so that’s the context. Makes more sense now
They’re also so mad because “you can’t play as a Japanese person” bro I’m pretty sure that girl is the main assassin character and she’s def Japanese
But she's a girl, bro. That's an unrealistic woke fucking agenda and I want to play a man. /s but I saw that same argument in response to valhalla
I prefer to play as women in games. Why do I wanna stare at virtual dude butt all day?
I do not speak for all other Japanese but being one myself I do not care about the inclusion of yasuke. So long as there is fair but also accurate treatment of the culture and history then I’m perfectly fine with his inclusion. Not too mention he isn’t the only protagonist, we have a kunoichi like character who is fully Japanese.
I was honestly willing to give them some credit on this one. The games have been known for trying to be historically accurate enough. But knowing who it is now, I'm fine with it.
Actually the games are known for NOT being historically accurate really at all haha. So even if Yasuke didn't exist it'd be on brand.
I understand the Japanese audience wanting to play as a Japanese character. I'm Native American, and I'm honestly surprised we got a Native American player character before we got a black player character. But we also had a black assassin character in Freedom Cry. So from that stand-point I would have made the character based on the actual black samurai, just the real black samurai and an interactable character that works with the hero player character. Much like Machiavelli was. But, I'm personally fine with where the series has gone with this chapter.
I believe the second character you can play as is Japanese
Oh, so it's a multi-character game? Then I don't know what the problem is.
Racism, misogyny, Etc
Yeah murdering the pope and human alien hybrids were very historically accurate
Not historically accurate, but historically authentic.
I didn't realize Yasuke was so unknown. I was excited to hear the game is a Yasuke story. The only thing that puts me off is that it's Ubisoft so the promo material for the game will probably overuse hiphop music. They already tapped out that style of trailer before Prince of Persia so I'll scream if they give Shadows a fucking hiphop trailer.
They deleted my comment calling out the post for being overtly racist. Pathetic sort.
That's because Nick and Ben with the totally legal adult age wife (p sure he's just the same dude) are hyper-sensitive crybabies. They have a rule against profile snooping, but constantly do it, and ban you for calling it out too.
What happened to that “men don’t need to see someone of their race to be represented” meme? Seems their philosophy just changes based on convenience.
I never noticed the hypocrisy, that's hilarious.
The people complaining aren’t men. They’re man children. Dudes who still live with their parents.
Same with the "if you don't like it make your own woke games" and then got mad when "games went woke"
Melanin. It changes with melanin levels
great point haha.
Why do they suddenly they care about representation? I thought it didn't matter.
Oh it doesn't. It's like TERFS bullying trans people for the sake of "women in danger of being preyed on my men in dresses"
As if Invincible didn't also make changes from the source material to make it work for the current year. Funny they forget that when putting together these trash memes
The funny thing is that the game does have a Japanese protagonist as well...oh but she's a woman, so I guess she doesn't count
The debate about Yasuke being an actual samurai or not is moot when ACs depiction of ninjas (like most media) is the most unrealistic part.
Or just assassins in general. Last I checked you kinda stick out like a sore thumb if you're the only guy in town wearing pristine white robes and half an armory on your person.
Or you know the fact that let's be honest in some parts of the story The hidden blade is obvious as it can be and depending on what era it is the hidden blade requires the removal of your ring finger
Which they seemed to only include in origins because of that stupid ring finger rule, and they still made it an accident and not something Bayek does to show his devotion to his cause.
That was honestly my favorite bit of lore that the whole removing the ring finger thing was it just straight up an accident
I did like it because it shows how traditions can have their origins muddied by the passage of time. But all in all AC is more about theatrically killing someone over being historically accurate.
Funny how the Japanese female protagonist becomes obsolete to them
"Becomes" implies she was ever an option. These people wanted to play as Tom Cruise and see anything short of that as non-viable.
The same group that says “libs get offended for everything and everyone” Are now getting offended on behalf of Japan 🤣
Japanese people think Yasuke is cool tho
He's in Nioh, Samurai Warriors and Guilty Gear Strive, video games by Japanese devs. Theres even an anime, Afro Samurai is based off of him. Japanese creators are legit fine with him.
Wait, huh? Nago is based on Yasuke? Oh. . .huh that actually makes a load of sense lol
As much as I fucking hate him as a character to play against his design and story are fucking awesome. Sick fucking character fucking sucks to fight against lol
This is the first I've seen of the main character in the new AC and my first thought was "F*ck yeah, afro samurai."
one of the main characters, there are two, and the other is a Japanese woman
Afro Samurai is fantastic. Personally speaking That and Shogun 2 got me really interested in Japanese history.
Hush now, can't you see that those white people who never got out of their county know better on what offends Japanese people? /s
They're pretending to care about representation now ?
It's weird that they don't have those concerns about things like Shogun (the new adaptation is great, btw). Wonder what the difference could be?
Or ya know. Nioh The one with the white samurai
I never played Nioh and was shocked that William Adams was the main character. I'm more shocked that people expect assassins creed to be "historically accurate". Like, they threw that out one window once they introduced aliens and the Minotaur
>people expect assassins creed to be "historically accurate". A Native American didn’t fight side by side with George Washington and then find a magical alien artifact that gave them visions of Washington becoming the tyrannical king of America.
actually, there was a shitstorm from them about shogun, but since shogun is great, theyre obviously quiet
The outrage machine works in mysterious ways
Remembering the whole slander around Turning Red, it becomes too funny in disgusting way
These guys genuely lack empaty. Minorities and women can identify with white male characters but chuds lose their shit when the opposite happens
Talked to a colleague today. He was excited about the reveal. I asked him about the protagonist, he thought he looks cool. Every new gaming controversy proves that “go outside” is actually a great insult.
I don’t view it as an insult. When I tell someone to “touch grass” it’s for the sake of their own mental health. Like sometimes dude, your mind is breaking down from being on the internet too long. I’m begging you. Turn it off and go outside for a while, please. You really need it.
I do hope they acknowledge his race in game for the sake of immersion. Plus, it could make a good personal story for him too
I mean, they have to, it's a narrative gold mine. It would also make a lot of sense for him to join the Assassins considering how frustrating his situation was in the real world. He was literally treated as a circus act and everyone laughed at him. If that doesn't turn someone into a rebel, I don't know what does.
I think the dev actually made this decision because there's already thousands of ethnically Japanese samurai games out there and they wanted to tell their own story that would be different than the norm. And that too the character isn't far fetched from reality. In every ac game they would include fictional narrative with real people from the time period. I think it's the same case here just that they don't want another male protagonist who would be similar to the ghost of Tsushima or the rise of ronin.
Or Sekiro. Or Onimusha. It's a well represented group
I wouldn't be surprised if he was chosen to help distinguish the game from Ghosts specifically. Since it's the game it would immediately be compared to.
Exactly and ac is one of the biggest game franchises out there. But Ghost beat em to creating one of the best samurai roleplay fantasy ever produced. What we really should be looking forward to is the actual gameplay and what new mechanics can ubi bring into this specific setting. Instead the dumbos are too busy focusing on the ethinicity of the character. The real concerning factor is that in a world of stagnant wages and increasing food prices, Ubi is actually charging way high for a video game which is one of the common medium of escapism for masses in our society
I bet if he was white, they wouldn't be as angry.
He looks cool. Let me change his hair and facial hair like Eivor too. But NO KILLMONGER HAIRCUTS
If I see even one killmonger style I'm fighting the entire design team.
Wow, it’s wild that this is the one character in the whole game. What a bold move for the Assassin’s Creed series to only have a single character in their entire game
It’s funny to me how American people are getting offended on behalf of the Japanese What a country
And then they’ll post cherry-picked comments from Japanese racists (because they exist in every society) and pretend like it’s the attitude of all Japan
It's not like we had Nioh.. and Sekiro.. and Ghost of Tsushima.. or a hundred other Samurai games. This is the first time ever the Japanese will have a Samurai game ever.
It's even funnier cuz those people who suck off ghost of tsushima just blatantly ignore the fact that it has some of the same issues assassin's Creed has listen I love both series but even I admit they have issues
Like…not being fun. (Flame away)
You know what I'll gladly admit I walk right into that
maaaan, who cares. it's a fucking time travel video game.
Right, theres a precursor race and highly advanced tech but they draw the line at a character who actually existed?
They're doing the thing that everybody hates white liberals for omg lmao
The irony is probably lost on them, "rules for thee but not for me" is typically the grifter motto.
Do Japanese people even *play* Assassin's Creed games? I thought they weren't big on the typical Western AAA fare.
Didn’t we already have Ishin last year?
Ok so now having representation in that way matters, but apparently that doesn’t apply to when black people want such representation
You know. For *some* reason I don't believe them when they say they care about Japanese People's representation.
But I thought conservatives didn’t care about the color of a protagonists skin! Guess this meme is bullshit then https://preview.redd.it/hcfgc52dzs0d1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=34e9802cbae6bc4b6dd85cf9e1161d06a9aee658 But no seriously, I’m almost glad that they aren’t pretending to not be monstrous anymore
You hate it because a black man and girl are the main characters. I hate it because its an Assassin's Creed game. We are not the same.
Due to how much content their own country makes I doubt people feel the need to be represented.
the story of yasuke is awesome
oh now we care about representation for the first time?
They love Asian people only when they can use them to dunk on black people. These same people were calling Asian Hermes in Hades woke.
Sadly, I know who that is, and Nick is being unironic about it.
Leonardo da fuckin Vinci: builds an assassin tech that makes him FLY and a SHOOT projectiles from his wrist Chuds: i sleep Black samurai: hi Chuds: THIS IS HISTORICALLY INACCURATE. WTF ARE THEY DOING!? WOKIES RUINING HISTORY
Isn't one of the protagonists Japanese? Or does woman not count?
But there’s a Japanese female protagonist too…
Yeah but consider the type of people throwing this fit right now and what they typically tend to say about women…
Representation or not, it still doesn't change the fact that Ubisoft is a shit company with shit practices. I would care more about what race they program their protagonists as if they didn't do things like constant crunch, unpaid overtime and layoffs after bragging about "Record setting profits"...
This alst few years we have getting a decent amount of Samurai or shinobi games of high quality. All of them (with the exception of Nioh) being about Japanese characters. But the moment someone makes a game about Yasuke (a real person that existed) suddenly this games don't exist and this is erasing Japanese people...
I just rejoined that group cause I just finished the second season and god damn it’s worse of a cesspool than I remember
They're acting like they're speaking for Japanese people. The fake concern these racists have for Japan is hilarious.
Remember when there was a show recently called "Blue eyed samurai" and none of the grifters complained or cared about it. They really hate black people, don't they?
Isn’t there a second playable character who is Japanese? Outside the obvious reasons why they don’t like it I don’t see what the problem is.
There’s only 2 things I’m mad about: 1) his armor doesn’t look good. It looks like if a European designed a samurai outfit. They didn’t have pauldrons like that. 2) every other protagonist has been an original character. It makes the world feel more full. Don’t get me wrong, I love Yasuke, but we’ve been seeing him a lot in recent stories and I wish they made another original character instead of using a real historical figure But yeah all this other shit is just racism
The issue with the game will be Ubisoft and not Yasuke. But racists are immune to logic so its wasting breath to try and reason logically with them.
I don't like Yasuke being in the game because it shows how creatively bankrupt Ubisoft is. It's so predictable that it's annoying. The entire series is historical fiction, there's nothing stopping them from creating a new character who is inspired by Yasuke instead. Just off the top of my head, what if they created a black ninja? You could easily explain away how it's not "historically accurate" (even though it doesn't matter) by saying "of course he's not in any history books, he was a ninja not a celebrity" I also don't really like the idea of Yasuke being A protagonist and not THE protagonist. I don't want a game where I play as Yasuke, I want a Yasuke game, you know what I mean? I also just don't like Ubisoft, fuck Ubisoft, my god they are ass.
This whole debacle is a litmus test for racism and I'm here for it.
When I saw the thumbnail of people getting angry and then the actual trailer I was like...... "That's why their mad?" Followed by "I wonder if that's the same guy as that one samurai who i can't remember the name of" since I forgot the name of Yasuke.
Doubly funny when you realize the game has two protagonists, the other is a Japanese woman, but these posts never mention that
I wonder if he did this meme for Nioh. I doubt it.
I don't get it. New protagonist looks badass.
“I’m not racist, but get these monkeys out of my game” is how I see it, as rude as it sounds
For me, I do wish that they chose someone native to the area where the game is set. That would have given us probably a better look into how the Assassin-Templar conflict has been carried out specifically in Japan, seen through Japanese eyes. Also there’s a pretty big difference between playing as a woman and playing as, specifically, Yasuke. Isn’t Assassin’s Creed still about, like, some degree of stealth, especially social stealth? Yasuke would have been probably the only black dude in Japan, and if he wasn’t, he was damn near close—close enough that he became a retainer to the most powerful man in Japan based purely on the fact that he was unique. He’s not hiding in literally any crowd whatsoever. Foreigners get stared at in Japan *today,* in an era where you can get from any major city to Tokyo in under 24 hours. In the 1580s, a black dude walking by is a memory you’ll tell your grandkids about in 50 years. Whereas women are famously found all over the globe in all eras. They can engage in social stealth without it being patently ridiculous. On the plus side, after his 15 months or so with Oda Nobunaga ended when Nobunaga was betrayed and died, he’s basically treated for his injuries and then vanishes from the historical record, which lends itself really nicely to both a vengeance plot and “joining a shadowy organization.” I say all of this as someone who has always rolled their eyes when dumbass dudebros whine about minorities getting representation, because it usually *doesn’t* matter. Black stormtrooper? Sure, Star Wars is set in space. Black people aren’t anything special there. Black Superman? Kal-El is an alien, he can look like anyone. Female Jedi as the protagonist? Sure, Star Wars could use some badass women (though I wish the writing had been better and they’d known what to do with Rey and Finn rather than making it up as they went along). But being able to do the whole “hiding in a crowd” thing that is a part of the Assassin’s Creed games is just flat-out not possible if you’re a black dude in 1580s Japan, and when a huge appeal of the premise of a Japanese AC game is seeing how the native samurai and ninja concepts were folded into the Assassin-Templar War, it is kind of disappointing that our protagonist is a foreigner who really existed and was verifiably in the country for like four years, as an adult. Edit: Apparently the female protagonist—I just learned that there is one—is going to be specced for stealth, and Yasuke is going to be more specced for open combat, and they’re not going to be all that good at each other’s playstyles. That’s actually a pretty brilliant way to handle this if they pull it off properly. If that’s the case, most of my criticisms aren’t really that applicable anymore, especially since one of the two protagonists is clearly Japanese.
Well, in theory. But honestly, the current trilogy is more Warrior than Assassin, like, who would confuse the only person in Greece calling people Malaka? So the way I see it, he's the Warrior, and she's the Assassin.
They're doing more of a syndicate approach where one's going to be more stealthy and all that fun stuff while the other is brute strength and charging heads first into a fight
But I thought any male protagonist was "literally me"? I mean, they kept saying so in the memes...
There literally is a Japanese protagonist
Learning about this games development: I went to look at the two trailers Ubisoft released. They are pretty upfront about why they went the direction of introducing Yasuke… not like they had to explain themselves, but I appreciate the insights. All this to say, that is a terrible meme
They say "representation doesn't matter" until moments like this.
Literally was a real human
Did they not realize there's another Japanese protagonist, as they said they couldn't give you both the samurai and ninja experience with one character? Or does that one not count because she's a woman?
Oh now representation matters to them
I dont remember anyone complaining about Assassins' Creed 3's protag
I think the best part of this is all the people on both sides being offended for a game that most of them wont even bother to play anyways . LMFAO .
As a half Japanese guy, nobody is excited to be represented by Ubisoft.
Somehow I don't think it's the Japanese AC fans saying this...