The Assassin’s Creed series of video games is adored for painstaking historic accuracy, but also sparks controversy with heavy use of artistic license — most recently with a black samurai in the latest instalment, Shadows.
Released on Thursday, Shadows takes place in 16th-century feudal Japan, replete with imposing fortified cities and tranquil temples crafted by developers.
“They’ve done a really fantastic job with very accurate recreations,” said Pierre-Francois Souyri, a historian among a dozen French and Japanese experts consulted for the game in a bid to weed out cliches and anachronisms.
Photo: AFP
Since being tapped in late 2021, Souyri says he has answered “a hundred or more questions” from the development team, ranging from how salt was produced to how puppet shows were staged.
Souyri adds that within the carefully crafted setting, “it’s not too hard to come up with characters who find themselves having adventures” in “a very eventful period” marked by intense conflicts.
BLACK SAMURAI
But one foundational choice by the creative team has provoked fierce debate online and beyond: casting a black samurai, Yasuke, as one of the two playable protagonists. The other is a young female ninja, Fujibayashi Naoe.
Irritation that an African character was depicted with the rank of samurai prompted a Japanese petition against the move, receiving more than 100,000 signatures.
The text blasted “lack of historical accuracy and cultural respect” by game developers.
Souyri was unimpressed by the criticism.
“It’s the game’s conceit to call him a samurai, it’s not a doctoral thesis,” he said.
Like other historians who have weighed in, he pointed out that Yasuke “is a person who really existed” — although the historic evidence on his status “can be difficult to interpret.”
Yuichi Goza, assistant professor at the International Research Center for Japanese Studies in Kyoto, disagreed.
“Nothing proves that Yasuke had such qualifications” making him a samurai, medieval history specialist Goza said.
In surviving documents, “Yasuke stood out above all for the color of his skin and his physical strength.”
His patron, warlord Oda Nobunaga, likely “kept Yasuke by his side to show him off,” Goza believes.
Erupting even before Shadows had been released, the controversy over the black character’s inclusion has been the fiercest surrounding any Assassin’s Creed game.
The series has been attacked in the past, including by hard-left French politician Jean-Luc Melenchon for how firebrand Robespierre was depicted in Assassin’s Creed Unity, set during the French Revolution.
CULTURE WAR BATTLEGROUND
In a report last month, the European Video Game Observatory noted that Ubisoft’s announcement of Yasuke immediately “sparked a heated controversy amplified by social media.”
The outfit blamed most of the uproar on “an American conservative moral crusade” waged by a hard core of “at least 728 interconnected accounts.”
That group made up “only 0.8 percent of speakers on the topic of Assassin’s Creed Shadows in the US (but) account for 22.1 percent of all related coverage,” the Observatory added.
The researchers said the behavior “suggests an astroturfing campaign” that piggybacked on the broader culture-war battles going on during the US presidential election campaign.
“Our use of Yasuke has been instrumentalized by certain people to get their own message across... but that’s not the message of the game,” said Marc-Alexis Cote, executive producer of the Assassin’s Creed franchise.
Nevertheless, within Japan depictions of the country’s history remain a sensitive issue — as shown by reactions to images showing a Shadows player damaging the interior of a temple.
“I understand France’s secularist principles, but it’s important to acknowledge that ill-considered insults about religion can spark strong reactions,” Goza said. “This risk should have been foreseen.”
Ubisoft itself had resisted for some time fans’ demands to see an Assassin’s Creed game set in Japan.
But recent successful games set in the feudal period, such as 2019’s Sekiro or 2020’s Ghost of Tsushima, may have helped overcome the publisher’s reticence.
“There’s a combined effect of exoticism and familiarity which fascinates Westerners,” historian Souyri said.
Many young people, especially in Western countries such as France and the US, devour Japanese mangas and anime series.
But Goza argues that “these depictions become counterproductive if they reinforce discrimination and prejudice towards Japan.”
He calls Shadows a “clear example of these concerns being realized.”
Jason Han says that the e-arrival card spat between South Korea and Taiwan shows that Seoul is signaling adherence to its “one-China” policy, while Taiwan’s response reflects a reciprocal approach. “Attempts to alter the diplomatic status quo often lead to tit-for-tat responses,” the analyst on international affairs tells the Taipei Times, adding that Taiwan may become more cautious in its dealings with South Korea going forward. Taipei has called on Seoul to correct its electronic entry system, which currently lists Taiwan as “China (Taiwan),” warning that reciprocal measures may follow if the wording is not changed before March 31. As of yesterday,
The Portuguese never established a presence on Taiwan, but they must have traded with the indigenous people because later traders reported that the locals referred to parts of deer using Portuguese words. What goods might the Portuguese have offered their indigenous trade partners? Among them must have been slaves, for the Portuguese dealt slaves across Asia. Though we often speak of “Portuguese” ships, imagining them as picturesque vessels manned by pointy-bearded Iberians, in Asia Portuguese shipping between local destinations was crewed by Asian seamen, with a handful of white or Eurasian officers. “Even the great carracks of 1,000-2,000 tons which plied
It’s only half the size of its more famous counterpart in Taipei, but the Botanical Garden of the National Museum of Nature Science (NMNS, 國立自然科學博物館植物園) is surely one of urban Taiwan’s most inviting green spaces. Covering 4.5 hectares immediately northeast of the government-run museum in Taichung’s North District (北區), the garden features more than 700 plant species, many of which are labeled in Chinese but not in English. Since its establishment in 1999, the site’s managers have done their best to replicate a number of native ecosystems, dividing the site into eight areas. The name of the Coral Atoll Zone might
Nuclear power is getting a second look in Southeast Asia as countries prepare to meet surging energy demand as they vie for artificial intelligence-focused data centers. Several Southeast Asian nations are reviving mothballed nuclear plans and setting ambitious targets and nearly half of the region could, if they pursue those goals, have nuclear energy in the 2030s. Even countries without current plans have signaled their interest. Southeast Asia has never produced a single watt of nuclear energy, despite long-held atomic ambitions. But that may soon change as pressure mounts to reduce emissions that contribute to climate change, while meeting growing power needs. The
RSS