Assassin’s Creed Shadows Unveils Secret Technique for Breathtakingly Realistic Wind Simulation

In Assassin's Creed Shadows, the world comes to life as the wind blows. The grass is dancing, the leaves are whipping up into the air, and Naoe's hair is swaying back and forth. The game's changing weather and periodic systems are enhanced by this breathtaking effect. Several of the game's graphical engineers said in an exclusive conversation with Digital Foundry that what appears to be wind turns out to be invisible fluid rather than wind.

Introducing Atmos: The Dynamic Weather System

Atmos, the dynamic weather system in Assassin's Creed Shadows, was developed by Ubisoft to complement the game's seasonal theme. The seasons change as Naoe's revenge tale alternates between two eras of her life. One minute you can be trekking through heavy layers of winter snow that cover the Japanese countryside, and the next you'll be running over lush fields as the snow melts. You will eventually be able to commandably switch between seasons.

Optimized For Next-Gen Consoles and High-End PCs

A game like Assassin's Creed Shadows argues persuasively for the purchase of a PlayStation 5 Pro or a gaming PC equipped with a 50-series Nvidia graphics card. With ray tracing turned on, the Pro can run at a fluid 60 frames per second, and a future update will fully utilize Sony's PSSR upscaling technology. With an RTX 4070 or later, DLSS and Frame Generation can effortlessly get you up to 60 frames per second on a PC.

A Living, Breathing World Beyond Hyper-Realism

And since it's not only the illumination, you'll gain from all that horsepower. Similar to completing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, it's how dynamic elements like the wind or the ability to cut bamboo apart increase the degree of involvement or tactile sensation of the environment. Assassin's Creed Shadows has raised the standard by utilizing all of the capabilities of contemporary computing to create a living, breathing environment rather than just hyper-realism.