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Assassin's Creed Shadows has already reached one million players

Ubisoft's latest entry in the Assassin's Creed franchise, which hit the market March 20, reached the milestone a staggering 24 hours into its release weekend

News by Grant DeArmitt, Staff Writer

Published on Fri Mar 21 2025

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Forgive the pun, but Assassin's Creed Shadows is already making a killing. Unlike the ninjas at the center of its story, however, that's no entirely unexpected. The video game franchise is one of the sharpest blades in designer Ubisoft's arsenal. And yet, even they might've been surprised at just how deep this one would cut. According to reports, Assassin's Creed Shadows has reached 1 million players just 24 hours after its launch.

Assassin's Creed Shadows, the 14th major installment of the franchise that began in 2007, had a bit of a slow time getting to release. Originally slated for a release date of November 15, 2024, the game was pushed back until February 1, 2025, and then pushed back again to its final release date of March 20. The situation got even more interesting when, partially because of comments form the Prime Minister of Japan himself, a Day One patch was pushed on the game's release date, in order to correct a matter of cultural sensitivity. Read more about that here.

In spite of that somewhat rocky launch, Assassin's Creed Shadows has proven to be worth all the time it took to get out. Taking to social media, game studio Ubisoft was thrilled to make several posts about the game's rapid growth in playership, some of which were reported by gaming outlet IGN.

"It's not even 4pm here in Canada," Ubisoft wrote, "and Assassin's Creed Shadows has already passed 1 million players! [...] Thank YOU from the bottom of our hearts for joining this adventure in Feudal Japan. We are beyond excited to start this journey with you!"

Well there you go, gamers: it's an important lesson in both being patient as a fan and in taking your time as a creator. We're also taking this story as a portent of Assassin's Creed Shadows continued success in this year's gaming market and a pseudo-explanation as to what's taking Assassin's Creed so long to tackle 15th century Transylvania.

We get it now, Ubisoft. You're just biding your time.

Assassin's Creed Shadows is on sale now.

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Grant DeArmitt: Grant DeArmitt (he/him) likes horror, comics, and the unholy union of the two. In the past, and despite their better judgment, he has written for Nightmare on Film Street and Newsarama. He lives in Brooklyn with his partner, Kingsley, and corgi, Legs.