Assassin’s Creed titles are cozy games for me. There’s no more relaxing place to go after a difficult day: historical outdoor museum tours, plus dopamine dispensers, plus slow-paced assassination simulators. The developers of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows seem to understand this need to escape better than ever before.
I’m “only” 40 hours into Shadows (I reckon I’m only about 30 percent through the game), but I already consider it one of the best entries in the franchise’s long history.
I’ve appreciated some past titles’ willingness to experiment and get jazzy with it, but Shadows takes a different tack. It has cherry-picked the best elements from the past decade or so of the franchise and refined them.
Assassin’s Creed: Shadows has debuted in the top ten most-played games in its first week amid runaway sales and resounding success. According to the most up-to-date numbers, Shadows was the best-selling game of the week in the United States, falling just behind Monster Hunter Wilds in week-one revenue. Though Ubisoft has been more eager to share player counts than sales data, it’s clear the game is a big win from just about any metric.
Ubisoft touting player numbers caused some players to conclude the game was performing poorly on the sales front, but the latest data shows that this is clearly not the case. The game generated the highest-ever day-one revenue for a Ubisoft game on the PlayStation Store and the second-highest day one sales in Assassin’s Creed franchise history. The total number of players shot past one million within 24 hours and left Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla’s record in the dust.
Assassin’s Creed: Shadows was the best-selling game of the week in the US and already ranks among the top 5 best-selling games YTD (dollars, w/e Mar 22, 2025).Only Monster Hunter: Wilds reached higher week 1 dollar sales in 2025 so far.Source: Circana Retail Tracking Service
Assassin’s Creed: Shadows features two protagonists: the powerful-but-slow Yasuke and the lightning-quick Naoe, offering varied play styles and approaches to encounters that keeps gameplay feeling fresh. It’s also easily one of the most beautiful games in the series, with many players praising the quality of its graphics (particularly when maxed out in 4K.) It provides players with a solid 25 hours of gameplay for the main story, but like the other games in the franchise, you can play for dozens of hours more exploring the world and finding all its secrets.
Although the game has been subject to an unnecessary amount of controversy, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows is off to a rousing start. Ubisoft has already announced (and released) additional content for the game, providing even more varied experiences and more gameplay for diehard fans to enjoy.
After a fairly lengthy intro in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, you will have access to both Naoe and Yasuke and can swap between the two as you please for the rest of the game. Your XP is shared between the two characters, but each one has their own skills to master and gear to equip. Naoe is more suited to sneaking and assassinating enemies without being detected, while Yasuke takes a more direct approach and is built for open combat. This means each one should be using the appropriate gear to support that playstyle. Weapons, armor, and trinkets are dumped on you for doing almost everything, which makes sorting through it all and finding the best gear a bit annoying. For Yasuke, these are the pieces of armor and weapons you should focus on getting.
Best Yasuke gear
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Just like Naoe, Yasuke can hold two weapons, wear armor and headgear, plus equip a trinket.
Weapons
Yasuke’s long katana is his old reliable primary weapon, with the best of the best being Venom Pillar. This weapon allows you to instantly charge a posture attack without holding the button by swapping between light and heavy attacks. You should be doing this naturally for better combos, buit this makes his basic attacks even more lethal. If you add the engraving that prevents your attacks from being interrupted, you become unstoppable.
We like to give Yasuke a ranged weapon as a secondary, so we went with the Dragon’s Wrath bow. Thanks to the perk of instantly charging your arrow shots, you don’t have to slow down to whip this out in a fight.
Armor
If you are as aggressive with Yasuke as we like to be, the Defense Master Clothing is a must to keep yourself alive. This armor has the perk of restoring 10% of your HP when you land a hit after a parry. Yasuke already has a lot of HP restoring skills, so stacking this one on top is just one step closer to being unkillable. Just make sure you master the art of parrying.
Headgear
Sadly, even with all your skills and armor, sometimes you will get overwhelmed and taken down. The Samurai Daimyo Helmet of Legend is your get-out-of-jail-free card in that scenario since it gives you the Samurai Stand ability on death. This essentially gives you one free revival per battle.
Trinket
Yasuke’s trinkets aren’t especially powerful, so we just went with our most powerful one that buffed our stats for the Long Katana or increased our adrenaline gain so we could use our skills more frequently.
Assassin’s Creed Shadowsintroduces a few interesting twists on the series’ established formula. There are new features like Scouts and a fully upgradable hideout, but the big change is the addition of two distinct protagonists Naoe and Yasuke. Unlike Syndicate, these two characters serve vastly different roles, with Naoe being suited more towards stealth and Yasuke a better fighter. Each one has their own skills to unlock, but just as important is equipping them with the best gear. You will be drowning in loot over your playtime so knowing which is worth keeping and upgrading can be tricky. If Naoe is your preferred character, these are the items you should be using to maximize her potential.
Best Naoe gear
Ubisoft
Naoe can hold two weapons, plus armor, headgear, and a trinket. These are the ones we found to be the most powerful for her.
Weapons
For Naoe’s katana, the Bloodshade legendary katana has the most powerful bleed abilities in the game. It obviously inflicts bleed, but its special perk is that bleed buildup doesn’t drain over time so you don’t have to be overly aggressive to get it to proc. You can find this katana on a ship to the west of Osaka on the coast of Amagasaki in Izumi Settsu.
For a secondary weapon, the legendary Tanto Call of the Void is a solid alternative. It is strong on its own, but comes with the perk of dealing 30% more damage to enemies you have tagged. If you’re playing Naoe as intended, every enemy should be tagged so this is an easy way to get a massive damage buff.
Armor
Since you will want to stay out of open combat as much as possible, go for the Tools Master Gear. This will increase tool damage, but also adds in the perk where you will automatically throw a kunai at the nearest enemy after performing an assassination, allowing you to remain undetected while clearing tricky groups.
Headgear
Grab the Swift Shinobi Hood as soon as possible. Its perk slows down time when you get detected so you can either take out the guard who spotted you or make a quick escape to hide as a last resort.
Trinket
Finally, our favorite trinket is the Tatsu’s Triumph trinket. It will increase all vulnerable damage you deal, which pairs great with your weapon options, plus adds 2% tool damage for each point you’ve invested in the Tools skill tree. This stacks with your armor buff, making tools incredibly deadly.
There have been various forms of upgradable bases in Assassin’s Creed games before, but none as deep as in Assassin’s Creed Shadows. Besides being a relaxing location where Naoe and Yasuke can hang out with their various allies, you will also be building entire structures that add new functions to the game. You’re tutorialized on them only to get access to Scouts, but the rest of the buildings and upgrades are up to you. Since resources are so precious, investing in the wrong structures can set you back hours. Instead, we best hideout upgrades you should get in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
Best hideout upgrades
Ubisoft
The most obvious tip to start with should go without saying, but don’t bother purchasing any of the decorative buildings until you have built and upgraded all the ones that provide benefits. Unless you’re mainly interested in playing Assassin’s Creed Shadows as a mini Animal Crossing game, leave that until the end.
Stables
Your first order of business should be to upgrade your stables. This building is a little misleading since it has nothing to do with your mount but actually relates to those stockpiles you will come across in various camps and castles. These are packed with resources, but you are required to mark them for Scouts to collect and bring back to your hideout. The Stables first allow you to even use this feature, and upgrading it increases how many supplies you get from each pile. This will help fund all future upgrades so should be done as early as possible.
Study
Speaking of Scouts, you will need them quite often throughout the game for revealing quest locations and gathering supplies. Unless you pay, you can only use a scout once per season, and you only start with three. Building and upgrading your Study not only gives you more scouts to work with but also increases their scouting range on the map.
Tera
Don’t overlook this smaller building in the lower sections if you’re trying to earn XP. This building can’t be upgraded so all you need to do is get it once and you’re done, but it increases all your XP gain, no matter what source it comes from, by 10%. That is massive if you’re trying to power level your characters.
Forge
Finally, the Forge can be left for last in our opinion. You will have a quest to build one, but that’s all you should do with it until late into the game, if at all. Each upgrade increases the maximum level you can upgrade your gear in, which is great, but completely unnecessary for most of the game. You are always finding new gear at your current level while completing quests and looting chests so spending your resources to buff a weapon or piece of armor tends to be a waste when you find something better right away. The later upgrades do allow for better engraving, but again, this is best saved for the end game when you know what gear you want to stick with.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows is still an open-world RPG at heart. It has some new features like Scouts and two protagonists, but you will still be leveling up, investing points into skill trees, and getting better gear over the course of this adventure. There are a few wrinkles here, such as Naoe and Yasuke each having their own unique skill trees and Knowledge Points acting as a progression gate, but your main concern will still be gettin XP as fast as possible to boost your stats. There are a ton of things to do in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, but not all give XP equally. If you want to power level your characters fast, here are the best ways to earn XP.
Best ways to earn XP
Ubisoft
Assassin’s Creed Shadows makes it somewhat easy to know what is in it for you to do each specific task. When you highlight any objective on the map, you will see the XP rewarded alongside any other items or gear. That’s a good place to start, but it doesn’t tell the entire story since some tasks can be done very quickly and others might take the better part of an hour.
The best way to earn XP is to target the high-value castles. These can have 3,000XP or more up for grabs, alongside some top-tier loot. You want to find the bigger ones, which do take longer but are still worth the effort. For one, that huge XP gain at the end is hard to beat for the amount of time, but you will also typically be taking out several high-level enemies as part of the objective. Each of these can be worth 250 XP on their own, not to mention the trickle of XP you get taking out the normal grunts. Plus, these castles are packed with treasures for extra gear, Mon, and supplies. One good castle can take 30 minutes to an hour depending on if you’re going for stealth or not, but you can easily walk away with 5,000 XP or more.
Main missions are not the best source of raw XP compared to some other games, but they tend to be worth at least 1,000 to 2,000 XP and can be quite brief. We don’t suggest skipping the cutscenes, but if you don’t count them, then the time investment is pretty good for the value. You will have to do them regardless, so don’t avoid them unless you find yourself underleveled for the next one.
Shrines don’t seem like a great XP source, but because you can knock them out in 5 minutes or so, making them a great value for your time. Besides also being the way to get Knowledge Points, they all have non-combat objectives like collecting scrolls or praying at shrines. Once you spot the places you need to go, you can complete them in no time for some easy XP.
The more characters you meet along the journey, the more side objectives will open up related to them. These are the main side quests of the game and range in XP and length, so you may want to be a bit selective in which you take. Without spoiling much, there is one related to taking out a group of ronin that is essentially a list of targets to assassinate for easy XP that is worth completing.
Finally, there are always contracts. Once you unlock and set up some Kakurega, you can find a box with optional contracts to take. There’s no reason not to accept them all just to have, but they tend to stick to the low 1,000s in terms of XP and mainly are a way to get a ton of resources. Still, they’re usually quick and far more XP than you can get just mindlessly exploring and fighting.
Naoe is your more traditional assassin-type character in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, while Yasuke plays quite differently. As a samurai, he is not so good at stealth and subterfuge, but instead heads into battle headfirst with powerful attacks and strong armor. This makes his skill tree far different than Naoe’s, even after you’ve gotten all the Knowledge Points. Since both characters share XP, you have no excuse not to invest points into Yasuke’s tree, even if you don’t plan on making him your primary character. That said, he has some great skills here that might change your mind.
Regeneration
Ubisoft
Yasuke doesn’t have the luxury of killing an entire base without taking a few hits. Well, unless you’re just that good. For the rest of us, Regeneration is a basic but powerful passive skill that restores a percentage of Yasuke’s total HP on each kill. Since rations are so limited, this can keep you perpetually healthy in drawn out battles.
Steady Hand
Ubisoft
The Teppo tree is an interesting one since it represents Yasuke’s main ranged option. Guns have appeared in the series before but were never given as much focus as this. Because of Yasuke’s speed and trouble with parkour, having a gun at your side for distant enemies is worth investing in. Steady Hand starts out by granting a small zoom and damage buff, but can be upgraded to even slow time to line up a perfect shot.
Payback
Ubisoft
The Long Katana is the most balanced weapon in Yasuke’s kit and is considered his default. The Payback skill is not only cool but will make short work of almost any foe in a one-on-one scenario. It unleashes three strikes that all do 35% ability damage, plus it restores 10% HP. Since you can scale up your ability damage, this ability only gets stronger and stronger.
Combat Expert
Ubisoft
Naoe has a similar skill, but it is even more essential for Yasuke. Combat Expert is a simple percentage increase to melee weapon damage. Besides Yasuke’s teppo, essentially all his tools are focused on melee combat, so this skill applies to nearly everything you do with him. Nothing too complicated or exciting but necessary as you get further into the game and start to hit some difficulty spikes.
Brutal Assassination
Ubisoft
Just because Yasuke doesn’t have a hidden blade doesn’t mean he can’t do his own version of a stealth kill. Brutal Assassination isn’t quiet or subtle, but it is a great way to open up a fight. It starts out way stronger than Naoe’s assassination and can be buffed, so you are very likely to kill your initial target if you can approach them unnoticed. You might find a few scenarios where you can use it on a solo enemy and keep stealth, but it is mainly just a way to start a fight by removing one target.
Now that there are double the protagonists in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, there are twice as many skills to learn. Earning XP, as well as the new Knowledge Points, will let you access six skill trees for both characters, with around a dozen or more skills in each to unlock. The game is long enough that you could unlock them all, but that would require a lot of time or grinding. Plus, not all the skills are as useful as the others. Building up both characters is important, but we will be focusing on the most powerful skills you should be getting with the shinobi Naoe.
Double Assasinate
Ubisoft
First introduced in Assassin’s Creed 2, the ability to stealth assassinate two targets is a mechanic you won’t feel complete without. You need to have a Tantop equipped to make it work, but it is worth taking up a slot even if you dislike its moveset. After all, this skill is all about avoiding open combat. Guards move and stand in pairs more often than not, and there is no good way to peel one away without alerting the other. This skill streamlines your stealth approach by letting you take down a pair with ease and not risk raising an alarm.
Melee Expert
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This is one of the least exciting skills, even for a passive, but a powerful one. Melee Expert adds a damage increase to all your melee weapons by a set percentage. You should be trying to avoid open combat as Naoe as much as possible, but things don’t always go according to plan in Assassin’s Creed Shadows. Since it is a percentage buff, this skill will scale with you all the way through the game.
Larger Tool Bag
Ubisoft
As a shinobi, Naoe has a ton of fun tools to play with. The limiting factor for them all is how many you can hold, but you can buff that a few times through the Larger Tool Bag skill. Each level lets you hold one more of each item, and you will need them all when trying to infiltrate the larger castles and bases.
Heighten Senses
Ubisoft
One of Naoe’s most powerful and fun abilities is hidden in her Shinobi tree. Heighten Senses lets you temporarily slow time to a crawl, only breaking early if you touch an enemy. This can let you rush by a group of guards before they have time to full detect you, or close a gap to pull off an assassination. Later upgrades buff its power and let you reset its cooldown.
Assassination Damage
Ubisoft
Sadly, Assassin’s Creed Shadows is still an RPG that won’t let you instantly kill an enemy too high a level or with too much health. You will always be able to tell if your assassination won’t finish the job, but grabbing as many levels as Assassination Damage will make that icon appear less often. The later levels are story locked, but if you are trying to play the assassin, grab them as fast as you can to keep your hidden blade sharp.
By the time we get to Assassin’s Creed Shadows, most of us will be familiar with how the games work. Since transitioning more towards RPGs than stealth games, the titles have not only gotten longer but also embraced skill trees. Naoe and Yasuke each have unique progression paths to work through, but right away you will notice that most of the best abilities are gated off. Like Scouts, Knowledge Points are a new feature that you will need to master if you want to be the best assassin possible. We’ll share all our knowledge about Knowledge Points with you.
How Knowledge Points work and how to get them
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Knowledge Points are a separate system to XP that allows both Naoe and Yasuke to unlock the better and more powerful skills in all their skill trees. Unlike XP, you can’t earn them by performing normal tasks or taking out enemies. Instead, Knowledge Points are rewarded for doing specific non-violent activities in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
As you explore the map, you will uncover various shrines and temples that have various orange icons on your map. Each one will have an objective to complete within its area, such as finding a few lost pages or praying at a number of shrines. You will need to find each of these items or locations, made much easier by holding the left trigger to observe the area and highlighting the glowing white orbs, and interacting with them. Some of these can only be completed by one of the protagonists, such as Naoe doing Kuji-kiri meditation and Yasuke learning new Katas.
Knowledge Points add to your total, with each ranking requiring a specific amount to unlock the next tier of skills. There are six ranks needed to unlock all the skills you see, but maxing it out will also unlock brand new Knowledge trees that require even more Knowledge Points to access the final skills.
There are plenty of familiar mechanics returning in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, such as fast travel and earning XP to level up both Naoe and Yasuke. One of the many new features you will be introduced to early in the game is the Scouts. Once you unlock the Hideout and are given your initial Scouts, they will become an essential tool for finding your next objective and gathering vital resources needed to upgrade your Hideout. However, how to use them or get more isn’t very clearly explained for how essential they are. Let us fill you in on all the details about how Scouts work in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
How to get and use Scouts
Ubisoft
Scouts have several primary functions, the first and most important being to scout areas on the world map. Very often, your next objective will not be placed on the map, but instead, you will have directions on the rough location of where it will be. This is where Scouts are necessary. By following the game’s directions on the map, you need to put your cursor over the area it is describing and assign one or more Scouts to reveal the area. You do this by pressing Square or X to bring up the dispatch menu and then deploying them at that area. You can see how many Scouts are available on the bottom left of your screen and can assign multiple to an area by pressing the right trigger. The more Scouts you use to scout an area, the larger the area they will reveal.
Scouts can also be used to clear your wanted level within a specific region faster than waiting for it to reset with a season change.
Finally, you will sometimes find large stockpiles of resources in the world that you cannot collect yourself but need to assign one or more Scouts to retrieve for you. If you have the necessary number of Scouts available, you can hold the interact button to have them smuggle the resources back to your Hideout at the end of the season.
To get more Scouts in your stable, you will need to recruit more people to your cause by building and upgrading the Study building at your Hideout. Normally, Scouts can only be used once per season so you will need to pick and choose how you want to utilize them carefully. However, you can pay some Mon to shorten their cooldowns by paying Mon at any of your unlocked Kakurega.
