According to a new report, Ubisoft canceled an Assassin's Creed game in 2024 that would've been set during and after the American Civil War. The game would've had you play as a Black man and former slave who joins the assassin's order and fights enemies, including the Ku Klux Klan, and was reportedly canceled because Ubisoft leadership believed the game dealt with topics that would be too politically sensitive.
The game was canceled in 2024, shortly before the July 13 assassination attempt on then-candidate for US presidency Donald Trump, according to a report from Game File (paid article link), which cites interviews with five current and former Ubisoft employees.
This title was deemed "too political in a country too unstable, to make it short," according to one developer.
Another source says, "I was terribly disappointed but not surprised by leadership. They are making more and more decisions to maintain the political 'status quo' and take no stand, no risk, even creative."
According to the report, the game was in the "concept phase," after initial approval from leaders at Ubisoft, and would have been years away from release.
While racist backlash against Assassin's Creed Shadows over its depiction of Yasuke, a Black samurai, had already begun by the point this Civil War game was canceled, the report suggests that this was only a small part of Ubisoft's decision to end development. The publisher was evidently more worried about the US political climate as a whole.
"Leadership decisions impact developers’ creative ambitions and motivations," according to another developer cited in the report.
Meanwhile, Ubisoft is making new DLC for Assassin's Creed Mirage in collaboration with Saudi Arabia.
Assassin's Creed 3 director says Ubisoft put "a lot of pressure" on devs to "add play time" and "bulk" out games with RPG elements, "to delay resale as GameStop was the only one making any money on that transaction."
