Assassin's Creed's parkour has been an integral part of the series from the jump (ha!), with protagonist after hooded protagonist able to gracefully treat their open worlds like personal jungle gyms. And when Assassin's Creed Shadows launches on November 15, players will get all-new ways to artfully explore, with one of the two playable protagonists - the shinobi Naoe - adding her own interpretations to parkour. In addition to performing acrobatic flips while free-running and climbing or swinging with the help of her physics-based grappling hook, Naoe can use dodge moves during parkour to drop silently and unseen from ledges, or execute dodge rolls at full sprint and then transition into leaps through windows or over railings.
Even before Naoe's elaborate interpretation of parkour, however, the art form's representation within the series has evolved considerably from game to game, changing to meet the needs of each new era and environment while adding unique flourishes along the way. You can discover all its variations as you traverse the landscapes of the Assassin's Creed games included in a Ubisoft+ Classics or Premium subscription, and keep reading to find out more about each game's distinct approach.
The Original (2007)
The fact that 2007's Assassin's Creed made parkour and free-running central to exploring its open world was pretty impressive at the time - but what made it even more so was that players could consistently pull off impressive-looking moves with minimal input. Holding a couple of buttons and moving the analog stick launched the Assassin Altaïr through the urban landscapes of Acre, Damascus, and Jerusalem at high speed, sprinting gracefully across rooftops, leaping effortlessly over gaps (while still being able to jump manually), and setting the template for how characters could move in later games.
Key to making this work (and minimizing frustration) was that Altaïr was innately "sticky," able to automatically make precise jumps, swing from horizontal bars, and grab ledges, so long as players kept the buttons held and pointed him in the right direction. The most efficient way to begin a free run was to look for "parkour starters" at street level - usually scaffolds or stairlike stacks of crates - and sprint straight at them, which would lead Altaïr into sequences of other free-run-friendly architectural features, like metal poles and wooden beams that jutted out from the medieval edifices. These may have looked random at first, but in fact they were deliberately placed to create "highways" through the cities. As players got better at spotting and traversing them, these highways became a thrilling way to get around quickly and gracefully while staying a few steps ahead of the guards - and, more often than not, far above them. In addition to just being a lot more fun than skulking around at street level, the climbing and parkour created a feeling of acrobatic mastery and redefined what an "assassin" could and should be in the minds of fans.
Altaïr was also an adept climber, able to run up nearly any wall and spider through its maze of loose bricks, windowsills, and other handholds to reach the rooftops, where more free-running opportunities (and guards) awaited. He could also launch himself away from or along walls he was climbing (in a move known as a back-eject or side-eject), and doing so straight from a wall-run was an especially cool-looking way to start a free-run, with the added momentum giving him a little boost (crucial if pursuers were on his tail). Altaïr also had a couple of semi-secret moves even some fans don't know about: by holding an extra button after two consecutive jumps, for example, he could end free-runs with a "vault" that let him slide off high narrow beams for a smooth transition to a lower level. And if he was being pursued, free-running into market stalls would make him vault through them, creating momentary bursts of chaos and confused guards to leave in his wake.
Finally, there was the Leap of Faith, a move all future Assassin's Creed protagonists would emulate. If he could jump from a high place into a haystack, Altaïr would leap dramatically and land safely (and be hidden until he emerged). In the spirit of giving players environments they could quickly "read," ledges from which Altaïr could execute a Leap of Faith were marked by pigeons and their droppings, ensuring players could always spot a place to quickly descend without ever needing to scout around first.
The Ezio Trilogy (2009-2011)
While Ezio Auditore shared a lot of Altaïr's moves, he also expanded the series' parkour repertoire considerably. In Assassin's Creed II, he came out swinging - literally, with big grasping arm swings that let him climb faster than Altaïr, and eventually with a "climb leap" move that let him jump straight up and grab otherwise out-of-reach handholds. And while Ezio didn't have Altaïr's vault, he could break falls from high places by tackling a civilian or air-assassinating an enemy (neither of which was looked on favorably by the guards) - and he could one-up Altaïr by executing the Leap of Faith backwards (with slightly panicked arm-windmilling).
Renaissance Italy also added a lot of era-appropriate free-running elements to the open world. These included hanging pots that let Ezio swing 90 degrees around corners, trellises he could scramble up to gain height, clotheslines he could easily sprint across, and - in the Bonfire of the Vanities DLC - flagpole-like springboards he could use to execute long jumps (and yelp in surprise whenever he did so). Not only did these inject more variety into the free-running pathways, they also expanded where they could lead and created more options for players to get around fast.
While visiting Rome in Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, the older, injured Ezio lost the ability to climb leap (later restored with a special climbing glove invented by his best friend, Leonardo da Vinci), but gained parachutes and a cool flip he could execute while jumping from horseback onto horizontal bars. But Brotherhood's biggest parkour innovation - the one that would stick around throughout the series - was to add rope-and-pulley lifts, which Ezio could hit at full speed and use to zip up to rooftops by grabbing the rope, cutting it, and getting yanked skyward by falling cargo. (This had the added benefit/drawback of crushing any pursuers/unfortunate civilians who got too close.)
When an older Ezio - now Mentor of the Assassins in Italy - visited Constantinople in Assassin's Creed Revelations, the big addition was the Hookblade - and for a retractable wrist-mounted hook, it sure had a huge impact on Ezio's ability to get around. The most obvious use for it was sliding down the ziplines that crisscrossed above the streets of the Ottoman capital, but it also added new dimensions to familiar moves. Hanging pots still let Ezio bank quickly around corners while free-running, for example, but now he could also hook them to execute a long jump. The Hookblade also improved the climb leap by letting Ezio launch himself up from handholds, instead of just grabbing them, which - along with the parachutes returning from Brotherhood - made scaling Constantinople's taller structures a breeze.
Ezio's era represented a big expansion for the series, growing everything from its scope and its storytelling chops to its audience - and of course, its parkour, which pushed far beyond the limits of what Altaïr could do, turned its cities into elaborate free-running playgrounds, and opened the door for a whole new era.
Revolutionaries, Pirates, and Turncoats (2012-2014)
Assassin's Creed III and Liberation were crafted using a new engine, and came with a lot of big adjustments to parkour. Controls were streamlined - players just needed to hold one button to free-run and climb, which cut down on accidental leaps and back-ejects from high places - and Connor (but not Aveline) could now free-run on autopilot through the interiors of some buildings, spooking the residents and deterring pursuers. But the biggest and most impactful addition was wilderness free-running. Since Connor and Aveline operated mostly outside of urban areas (which, in Colonial America, weren't all that "urban" to begin with), trees became an efficient way to move quickly through the wilderness, as the heroes effortlessly sprinted along limbs, swung across branches like monkey bars, sidled around trunks, and used fallen logs, boulders, and old stumps as starters.
Most of these systems - including wilderness free-running, which was here to stay - were carried over into Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, Freedom Cry and Rogue, although the latter added a few unique environmental features for the Templar turncoat Shay Cormac to use. This being a game about the opposite side, it seems appropriate that these additions would include reverse lifts - rope-and-pulley devices with hooks that Shay could grab to descend quickly to street level. Vertical shafts let him automatically wall-jump his way up to the rooftops, horizontal cargo lines let him grab a hook and zip between buildings, hanging ropes could be used to long-jump across gaps, and grabbing a vertical flag or banner would safely lower him back to the ground.
This era of Assassin's Creed was defined by a greater sense of open-world freedom, with big wilderness environments and the open sea calling players to discover new ways to explore - and heralding where the franchise would go in a few years. And while Shay was broadening urban exploration with machine-assisted ways to quickly rise and descend, another Assassin with tenuous loyalties was discovering more organic ways to do the same in Paris.
Full-Scale Cities (2014-2015)
Assassin's Creed Unity, considered by some fans to be the absolute apex of simulated parkour, featured lavish visuals and lots of new, highly varied free-running and climbing animations that let players perform impressive-looking moves. French Revolution-era Assassin Arno Dorian would routinely execute elaborate sideways wall-runs and spinning dismounts instead of just jumping or side-ejecting, and free-running around Paris was a chance to pull off acrobatic moves that organically and beautifully flowed from one to the next.
A bigger change was the ability to "parkour up" and "parkour down" to climb or descend quickly by holding different buttons, as well as horizontal free-running without automatic climbing. This was implemented in part because many of Paris' buildings were 1:1 recreations of their real-world counterparts, which also meant they were huge (previous games' landmarks had been closer to 4/5 scale to save resources on then-current hardware). Players needed a way to get down quickly, and since it seemed out of place to fill urban Paris with haycarts, parkouring down offered a more elegant, controlled way to get back to the ground (or just explore lower levels of the gigantic structures).
While retaining a lot of similarities with Unity's parkour, Assassin's Creed Syndicate's signature innovation was the rope launcher, which - if you wanted to move around in a hurry - was second only to the game's trains and carriages for sheer speed, and easily outpaced all other means of getting up to the rooftops. An addition to Jacob and Evie Frye's Assassin gauntlet, the rope launcher was a grappling winch that let the twins zip rapidly up to high ledges and bridge the gaps between buildings by creating ziplines.
In Victorian London - an Industrial Age city with massive buildings and broad avenues that dwarfed even those of 18th-century Paris - the rope launcher let players keep up their momentum and blast past extra-long climbs, and avoided creating a situation where agile Assassins would repeatedly descend, cross the street, and climb again. It was also great for making a quick escape, as even the more athletic enemies couldn't keep up with a rope-launcher ascent or zipline. Syndicate added a new safety feature as well: To minimize the frustration of falling deaths, Jacob and Evie simply wouldn't jump from ledges or eject from walls if the fall would be deadly (and they'd actually shake their heads if there wasn't a handhold or landing spot in range).
These journeys through Paris and London represented Assassin's Creed's parkour at its flashiest and most urban, defined by expressive animations, high-speed traversal, and new options that gave players a sense of fine-tuned control over how their Assassins moved above the crowded streets and ornate buildings. But a new era was about to dawn, and with it came a new kind of freedom.
Wide-Open Worlds (2017-2020)
While Ancient Egypt featured soaring temples and dense (for 49 BCE) settlements, the open world of Assassin's Creed Origins was largely wilderness and desert, and so its approach to parkour emphasized climbing over free-running, with players able to use the high walls and rocky environments to quickly find vantage points for firing arrows and sneaking into enemy encampments undetected. And boy, could Bayek climb. Sheer cliff faces, fortress walls, and Sphinxes were no match for his ability to rapidly clamber up nearly any surface, usually without having to find obvious handholds. One notable exception to this was the pyramids, which pushed players to discover climbing paths, and which Bayek could slide back down at high speed once he'd reached the top.
Bayek was still a highly capable free-runner, although his approach was less flashy and more straightforward than the games that preceded Origins. He didn't sprint, and holding a single "parkour" button would let him climb obstacles and free-run (he'd also grab available handholds automatically while dropping, so there was no need to parkour down). This continued in Assassin's Creed Odyssey, although the Spartan mercenary known as Kassandra or Alexios did Bayek one better by being utterly immune to death by falling (a perk of their family heirloom/First Civilization artifact, the broken Spear of Leonidas) and, as they leveled up, immune to fall damage entirely. Kassandra/Alexios also brought back the ability to leap from horseback - either to start a climb or to air-assassinate enemies - and their Leap of Faith was actually a skill that could be leveled up to turn any long fall into a ground-smashing stun attack.
Building on the formula set by Origins and Odyssey, Assassin's Creed Valhalla added the abilities to sprint and slide, and - with no artifact to protect them - made the Viking hero Eivor susceptible to fall damage and death (although Eivor could shake off some truly stomach-churning drops once properly leveled and armored). Eivor cut a more sizable, heavy figure than Bayek or Kassandra/Alexios, and so their free-running appropriately felt slower - although they were no less capable when it came to parkour, and the somewhat denser construction around ninth-century England's towns, villages, and castles (along with more free-running-friendly trees) ensured that Eivor had more opportunities to flex those skills.
These three games further pushed the boundaries of what Assassin's Creed could be, building on possibilities introduced in Assassin's Creed III and IV to broaden the series' horizons and give players greater mastery over environments that - given the eras they were set in - didn't feature a lot of urban construction. Well, actually, one of those eras did - just not in Viking-occupied England.
The Return to Roots (2023)
Assassin's Creed Mirage, set 12 years before the events of Assassin's Creed Valhalla, was a return to a dense urban environment filled with free-running highways of narrow beams, horizontal poles, tightropes, ziplines, and other familiar features - plus some new ones, like vertical poles for vaulting across wide chasms. The resulting parkour playground re-emphasized the importance of acrobatic skills not just as a way to climb to high vantage points, but as a way to follow the lines of the city's architecture to get around skillfully and elegantly. Post-launch updates have underlined this by making Basim even faster and nimbler, making Mirage feel even more in line with classic Assassin's Creed experiences.
Players could also get a more classic parkour experience in virtual reality with the Meta Quest-exclusive Assassin's Creed Nexus VR. Since the experience needed to be as fluid as previous games, players could free-run the same way: push an analog stick while holding a button, and Ezio, Connor, and Kassandra would expertly sprint and leap over gaps and across railings, poles, rafters, and other environmental features, taking players along for the ride. Climbing was more hands-on - literally, because you'd actually grab onto handholds with the controllers to pull or launch your virtual body up or across walls. Imagine rock-climbing with a fraction of the effort, and you'll get the idea.
A new era of parkour is coming on November 15, when players will be able to use Naoe and Yasuke's distinct skill sets to climb and free-run their way through Sengoku-era Japan in Assassin's Creed Shadows, available for preorder now on PS5, Xbox Series X, Amazon Luna, Macs with Apple Silicon via the Mac App Store, and PC via the Ubisoft Store and Epic Games Store. The game will also arrive on iPad at a later date. Players who purchase the Gold Edition, Ultimate Edition, Collector's Edition, or have a Ubisoft+ Premium subscription can play the game three days early on November 12. Additionally, all other Assassin's Creed games listed above (except Assassin's Creed Nexus VR, available from the Meta Store), including their DLC, are included with a Ubisoft+ Premium subscription, and (with the exception of the first Assassin's Creed) are included without DLC with a Ubisoft+ Classics subscription.
For more Assassin's Creed, check out The Evolution of Assassin's Creed's Hidden Blades and How to Play the Assassin's Creed Games in Order.
