After having misused a flag of the Sekigahara Teppo-tai group in the art-book of Assassin’s Creed Shadows , Ubisoft has once again ended up in the eye of the storm due to another alleged “theft”. According to some fans, it would have used a sword of Zoro from One Piece passing it off as the property of Yasuke .
It all happened at JapanExpo in France, where Ubisoft had a booth dedicated to Assassin’s Creed Shadows, coming out on November 15 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. Representatives from the French company welcomed visitors with a series of props that , according to them, belong to Yasuke, the first African samurai and one of the two protagonists of Shadows .
So far so good, too bad that the sword shown at the stand does not belong to Yasuke, but to Zoro from One Piece ! X.com users noticed this, and also provided evidence of the accusation: as you can see in the tweets below, the sword passed off as belonging to the samurai is nothing more than a 1:1 replica of Zoro’s sword purchased online . Even the stand that holds it is not original, being in fact included in the package of the aforementioned One Piece gadget, which incidentally is sold at a price of 39.99 euros on the French site Féenomen.
In addition to plagiarism, there would also be the problem of historical and cultural inaccuracy . The kanji on Zoro’s sword derive from Buddhist beliefs, while Yasuke arrived in Japan with the Jesuits and then converted to the Islamic faith. It is no coincidence that in addition to the first African samurai, he was also the first Muslim samurai.
We await a comment from Ubisoft representatives, who did not hesitate to apologize in the case of the misappropriation of the Sekigahara Teppo-tai group flag . In the meantime, in Japan, the petition to cancel Assassin’s Creed Shadows for lack of historical accuracy and cultural respect has exceeded 84 thousand signatures.
Katana et masque de Yasuke (par @PureArtsLimited ❤️) ou encore artworks du jeu, notre stand Ubisoft à la @japanexpo vous propose une expérience… immersive 👀🔴
On vous immerge avec nous dans l'esprit du jeu jusqu'au dimanche 14 juillet ! 🥷 pic.twitter.com/tzkE2BnkO6
— Assassin's Creed FR (@AssassinsFR) July 11, 2024