Assassin's Creed Shadows doesn't totally tie up every loose end it introduces, but don't worry too much about lacking closure. One of the open-world game's lead developers has explained that the RPG's new Animus Hub will serve as a connective tissue between Shadows and whatever the future of the series holds.
To quickly catch you up, the Animus Hub basically functioned as a menu in Assassin's Creed Shadows that gave players a short synopsis of some previous AC games and let players launch them directly from the Hub. It also contained sections dedicated to Projects (basically battle passes), the Exchange (an in-game shop), and most interestingly, the Vault (a catch-up of the ongoing modern day storyline.)
We know that the Animus Hub isn't a feature exclusively tied to AC Shadows - it'll carry over into presumably all upcoming Assassin's Creed games - so what does it mean for the series' overarching storyline?
AC Shadows associate game director Simon Lemay-Comtois reiterated it was "the one thing that will keep going in time" in an interview with GamesRadar+, but was otherwise vague as to how, only hinting that "things that are set up in Shadows should keep happening in other projects and evolve and move forward. I cannot say much beyond that, but if you think of Shadows as one thing and Animus Hub as another, the Animus Hub is overlooking future games as well. It's not just a Shadows thing."
Is the Animus Hub a replacement for modern day action? Will we ever see another protagonist like Layla or Desmond move the story along outside the animus? Or, and forgive my cynicism, is it publisher Ubisoft's attempt at making a single-player live-service? We'll see how it progresses in Assassin's Creed Hexe and beyond.
