Dive into the shadowy world of Assassin’s Creed Shadows, where mastering stealth and swordplay across feudal Japan can take you anywhere from 35 to over 80 hours depending on your playstyle. Whether you’re racing through the main story in about 40 hours or exploring every corner for a full 100% completion that can stretch beyond 80 hours, this latest installment offers a rich blend of ninja and samurai gameplay, customizable bases, and a sprawling open world ripe for discovery.
While the individual experience of discovering all the game’s secrets might take a long time, finishing the main campaign isn’t exactly quick either. Below, we explain how long it takes to beat Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
How long to beat Assassin’s Creed Shadows main story
The main story of Assassin’s Creed Shadows takes approximately 30 to 40 hours to complete, according to statements from the game’s creative director and various player reports. This duration reflects a focused playthrough of the core narrative without extensive side activities. Players who engage more deeply with side quests and exploration can expect to spend upwards of 60 to 80 hours or more to fully experience the game’s content.
If you’re focused on finishing the main story quests and only spend your time doing the bare minimum amount of side activities to meet main story level thresholds, it takes around 40 hours to finish the main story for Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
However, if you want to see the credits roll, then you should add a few hours to that total. The credits only appear if you finish all of Naoe’s missions.
With the above in mind, for context, our playthrough took exactly 41 hours and 43 minutes. In addition to completing all the missions involving the primary group of assassination targets, that figure also factors in time spent exploring a considerable number of castles, temples, and other optional objectives in order to meet level requirements.
How long to beat Assassin’s Creed Shadows optional objectives
The optional objectives in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, such as side quests, contracts, exploration of temples, castles, and collecting items, significantly extend the gameplay beyond the main storyline. While the main story takes about 30 to 40 hours to complete, engaging with these optional activities typically increases the total playtime to around 50 to 70 hours. For players aiming for 100% completion, which includes synchronizing all map points, capturing forts, collecting all items, upgrading characters, and completing all side missions, the game can take between 80 to 90+ hours. These optional objectives enrich the experience and provide valuable rewards, making the game much longer and more immersive for completionists.
If you have higher aspirations beyond the main story, finishing Assassin’s Creed Shadows will take, by our estimates, at least twice the time it takes you to beat the main story.
In Assassin’s Creed Shadows, quests are organized by boards on your Objectives menu. There are a total of 22 boards, with most of them focused on a certain set of characters to help or enemies to eliminate. (The Animus board is a bit different: It offers Anomaly missions that change after a set time schedule. These are weekly missions that offer an in-game currency used to earn bonus items.)
Besides the regular missions offered on boards, Assassin’s Creed Shadows offers other kinds of activities. One such activity is Contracts, run-of-the-mill missions that aren’t tied to any narrative but only serve as a means to earn materials (for your Hideout base) and experience.
Beyond that, Shadows is full of optional activities. Exploration activities like Temples (home to Lost Pages), Kuji-kiri, and Hidden Trails can reward you with knowledge points necessary for making new skills available to unlock. Castles, meanwhile, are a bit more intense in terms of side content. They are guarded by strong samurai who you must defeat to unlock a special chest that gives you strong weapons or armor. There are also dedicated activities for parkour, archery, weapon training, tomb raiding, and more.
And that’s to say nothing of the most classic Assassin’s Creed activity of them all: unlocking every single synchronization point on the map.
How many hours will I need to beat Assassin’s Creed Shadows on my first playthrough
For your first playthrough of Assassin’s Creed Shadows, you can expect to spend roughly 35 to 40 hours if you focus mainly on the main story and some side content to keep up with level requirements. This duration allows you to experience the core narrative and a moderate amount of exploration without aiming for full completion. If you play more thoroughly or on higher difficulties, this can extend to around 50 hours or more, but a straightforward first run will typically fall within that 35-40 hour range.
What’s the fastest way to finish Assassin’s Creed Shadows for a first playthrough
The fastest way to finish Assassin’s Creed Shadows on your first playthrough is to focus on key strategies that maximize efficiency and combat power early on. Start by quickly acquiring powerful gear such as the legendary trinket “Amaterasu’s Blessing,” which boosts damage significantly, and the “Egan Sunset” Tanto that grants slow-motion abilities to control fights better. Prioritize unlocking the double assassination skill and its upgrades to swiftly eliminate multiple enemies, especially when equipped with a Tanto. Synchronize viewpoints early to unlock fast travel, saving time moving across the large map. Additionally, tackle side missions that boost XP and mastery points, like eliminating bandits and samurai in castles, but avoid opening legendary chests until you are near max level to get the best upgrades. This approach allows you to breeze through difficult enemies and main story targets efficiently, cutting down overall playtime while still progressing smoothly through the game.
