Assassin's Creed Red Protagonist Seemingly Revealed in Another Odd Ubisoft Leak

Ubisoft's long-awaited Japanese Assassin's Creed game, codenamed Assassin's Creed Red, has seemingly had its protagonist leaked by a developer.

As reported by Eurogamer, Ubisoft senior writer Pierre Boudreau (who's working on the new game) changed his LinkedIn cover photo to what is likely Assassin's Creed Red's protagonist before quickly changing it back to Assassin Creed's Valhalla's protagonist Eivor.

The image, below, shows what appears to be a female assassin wielding a katana against a red background, which features the Japanese Assassin's Creed logo and a pagoda. It appears part of a larger image that's cut off, but obviously we only got this brief glimpse from the leak.

Set in feudal Japan, Assassin's Creed Red was revealed in September 2022 as the "next premium flagship title and the future of our open-world RPG games", suggesting it will be closer in style to Assassin's Creed Valhalla and Odyssey than 2023's Mirage. A brief concept trailer showed an assassin jumping onto a roof during the sunset.

Nothing else is known officially, though another Ubisoft employee's LinkedIn post from July 2023 claimed it was launching in 2024.

Assassin's Creed has a history of leaks, many of which come from Ubisoft itself. Odyssey leaked, Origins leaked, and Mirage leaked, alongside almost every other game in the franchise.

The most famous one is Assassin's Creed Unity, which initially leaked after a Ubisoft employee spilled all the details of the Paris-set entry to a fan they sat next to on a plane. No-one believed the story, of course, until screenshots of Unity leaked a few months later and was eventually revealed to be genuine.

Assassin's Creed Red therefore joins a long line of leaks. If the 2024 release date is correct, Ubisoft would perhaps be releasing the game in time for the holiday period like it did with Mirage in October 2023. That game was (fully leaked and) officially revealed in September, so it could be a while yet before we get any proper details on the next game.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.