Assassin's Creed Shadows - Switch 2 - Review

Back in March, I had the pleasure of playing through Assassin’s Creed Shadows for review on Xbox Series X and I say pleasure, because I loved it. Now I will freely admit that I had heard whispers of the game coming to Switch 2 for a while before it was announced and I was excited to play the game on the go. Now that the game is here, was I right to be excited for it, or was disappointment lurking in the shadows?

From a content point of view, this game is the most complete release as all the post-launch updates that the game has been given on the other platforms, are here by default. That means the updated game difficulty options, the addition of New Game+, but most importantly the updated parkour. Now due to how I am often completing one review and then moving onto the next, I did not get a chance to experience these updates when they first released, but now I did, well eventually. One of the things I was excited to do was pick up my save from my Xbox and continue the adventure, but when I loaded into the game it was not there, quitting and starting again had it show up. There was an issue connecting to the Ubisoft services at first, which was the issue, but with my save there I jumped in and within a few minutes the game crashed.

I figured it was a random thing, which does happen from time to time, so I jumped back in and it crashed, in fact it ended up crashing six times. Sometimes it crashed almost right away, other times it let me run around for a few minutes and I had no idea what was going on. In the end, I thought maybe there was something in my Xbox save that just was not compatible with the Switch 2 release. So I took my Switch 2 from its dock, started a new save file and got almost 3 hours of play, without a single issue. My theory at that point was that the game could not run docked without some sort of day one patch, so I took a chance and loaded up my Xbox save again and 4 hours of play later, not a single issue. So the next test I wanted to do was to see if maybe it was the running in 4K, so I swapped my Switch 2 to work on a 1080p port and docked the console and surprise, not a single issue. After another good chunk of time, I figured it was time to test to see if it was the 4K port, so I saved the game, kept it running and swapped the cables around and not a single issue. In the end I had no idea why it was crashing all that time, but once it was sorted, it ran amazing.

Now, in my original review, I sunk almost 45 hours into the game and after a few hours playing on the TV with the Switch 2 release, it felt like the Xbox version. I don’t mean that the controls were Xbox like or anything like that, but rather the platform I was playing on faded to the background. When I paused the game, to get a drink and stretch, I sat down and picked the Xbox controller up in error, because I was just so used to playing this game there. After a slight shake of embarrassment, I picked up the right controller and got back into the action and lost almost an entire day to it. Now as I said, I continued my save, though I did spend time as Naoe and Yaskue from the beginning as well and the muscle memory came back fairly quickly. This meant I was able to jump in and sneak around and more importantly, commit to the stabby stabby.

Of course, going from the Xbox Series X version to the Nintendo Switch 2 version, there were going to be some compromises, and if you look for them, you will see them. But here is the strange thing, you have to look for a lot of them, because more often than not, the game looks amazing. Yes, the game does run at 30fps and yes, there are issues with hair, something that Star Wars Outlaws had as well, but the world is as much of a character here and it looks amazing. The weather in the game plays an important part and there were times here where the rain was pouring down and I could not see, or the leaves were blowing in the wind and just looked spectacular. Cutscenes looked great as well, with emotion clearly visible on the faces of those you speak with and the frame rate did not get in the way.

If I had to pick two issues with the games visuals, the first would be shadows, there are two types, the always there but not fully detailed and those that pop-in. Given that Shadows is in the name, I was hoping for a more subtle pop-in effect, as I knew those would not be the best, but when they pop in, you will notice them. What makes it strange is that its only in the more open spaces, when you are running through forests or along city streets, you won’t see shadows pop in anywhere near as often. The second issue I did spot more than a handful of times, were people not being ready. This is an animation thing, the folks are loaded into the world, but don’t move until you get closer to them and then their animations play. Normally that would not be a concern, but there were times when I spotted it with guards and it made following their patterns a bit of a struggle.

Audio wise, I have no complaints, or at least no more than I had with my original review. The music is still inspirational at times, rock at other times and usually suits the action on screen. The voice work comes through nice and clear, both when docked and in handheld.

Assassin’s Creed Shadows started out rough for me, but once whatever was going on sorted itself out, I had no issues. The game looks amazing most of the time and I think is one of the best-looking titles on Switch 2. If you are like me and already have a save from another platform, being able to continue on the go is a delight and while there are some visual concessions, they never get in the way of the fun. If you have a Nintendo Switch 2, then I highly suggest you pick this one up, there is no shadow of a doubt in my mind, that you will enjoy it.

The Score

9.0

Review code provided by Ubisoft

The Pros

The game looks stunning with the dynamic weather, vast plains and people doing their thing

All the fixes and content drops released so far being included, make this one complete package and there is more still to come

The Cons

There are visual issues and when you notice them, they do stand out

A whole lot of random crashes, without any clear reason as to why, was just weird, but once they stopped they stopped for good