Skip to main content

Ancient Egypt, Greece tours based on Assassin’s Creed games are now free

Assassin’s Creed Origins, released in 2017, and 2018’s Assassin’s Creed Odyssey created worlds based on ancient Egypt and ancient Greece, educational tours of which are now available as free downloads.

Recommended Videos

The free guided tours are part of Ubisoft’s “Play Your Part, Play at Home” campaign, which is offering free games to help people while away the time as they stay at home under quarantine.

Take a historic journey from home with Discovery Tour: Ancient Greece & Discovery Tour: Ancient Egypt FREE to download and keep 🏛🚶‍♀️ #PlayApartTogether

👉 https://t.co/UVftq2CaBr

— Ubisoft (@Ubisoft) May 14, 2020

Discovery Tour: Ancient Egypt offers 75 historical tours curated by historians and Egyptologists, while Discovery Tour: Ancient Greece features tours on the five themes of philosophy, famous cities, daily life, war, and myths. They are both free to download until May 21, and signing up for a Uplay account is the only requirement for visitors to gain access to the living museums.

In addition to the tours of ancient Egypt and Greece, Ubisoft is also offering free downloads for Might & Magic: Chess Royale, a real-time 100-player autobattler set in the Might & Magic universe, and Rabbids Coding, an educational game that combines the craziness of Rabbids with simple lessons on coding. The campaign also includes free trials for several games, including Tom Clancy’s The Division 2, Trials Rising, and The Crew 2.

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla

The next entry in the Assassin’s Creed series, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, will take the franchise into the Viking era. The game will be set during the Viking invasions of England near the end of the 8th century, with players taking control of a Viking raider named Eivor who will lead excursions to fight, conquer, and build Norse settlements in the British Isles.

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla immediately drew comparisons with 2018’s God of War, which placed an older Kratos in the unfamiliar territory of Norse mythology. However, the game’s narrative director Darby McDevitt said in an interview that he was not concerned over the similarities with the PlayStation 4 exclusive, as God of War leans into the mythology while Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will focus more on the historical aspect of the era.

It remains to be seen if Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will also get a Discovery Tour of its own, but the feature is expected to also roll out for the world that the game will create.

Aaron Mamiit
Aaron received an NES and a copy of Super Mario Bros. for Christmas when he was four years old, and he has been fascinated…
Assassin’s Creed Shadows’ blend of old and new is a recipe for success
Yasuke in Assassin's Creed Shadows fighting an enemy. He's dressed in his samurai armor.

Assassin's Creed Shadows was officially revealed a couple of weeks ago in a beefy cinematic trailer showing off its dual protagonists, Yasuke and Naoe. It's a big moment for fans of the series, as Shadows is finally the Feudal Japan Assassin's Creed game fans have been asking for since it was teased back in the very first entry in the franchise in 2007.

Does it live up to that long wait? Ahead of today's Ubisoft Forward stream, I saw an extended gameplay presentation for Assassin's Creed Shadows that gave me a much better sense of what to expect this fall. The team behind it is looking to blend newer series entries like Valhalla, Odyssey, and Origins into the more traditional Assassin's Creed titles from over a decade ago. And that seems like it could be a winning formula.
Out of the shadows
During the presentation, I saw both of Shadows' playable characters in action -- and they're quite different from one another. Yasuke's Samurai stature and hulking physique command respect from villagers when he walks by. They bow to him, move out of his way, and clearly show signs of admiration. His combat skills also match this, giving him access to actions like a shoulder charge to break down doors or knock enemies off balance.

Read more
Can’t wait for Assassin’s Creed Shadows? Play these games instead
Yasuke in Assassin's Creed Shadows fighting an enemy. He's dressed in his samurai armor.

Ubisoft unveiled Assassin's Creed Shadows last week, giving us our first real glimpse at the first Assassin's Creed game to be set in Japan. Its Feudal Japan setting is something that fans of Assassin's Creed have craved for a long time, and while it's awesome that Ubisoft is finally delivering that concept, some other games did beat it to the punch. Many other developers have noticed how fruitful a historical Japan setting can be, from its feudal era all the way until the West started to intervene in the Edo period. As a result, there are quite a few games that I can recommend you check out while you're waiting for Assassin's Creed Shadows' November 15 launch.

The five games I'm recommending all range in size. Three of them are AAA action games, all set in different eras of Japanese history that immerse players in different ways. Meanwhile, the other two games I'm spotlighting are more experimental titles that, while not directly comparable to Assassin's Creed Shadows from a gameplay perspective, are still well worth your time if Japanese history and culture intrigue you.
Ghost of Tsushima

Read more
No, Assassin’s Creed Shadows won’t be online only
Yasuke in Assassin's Creed Shadows fighting an enemy. He's dressed in his samurai armor.

Despite fan concerns that the recently announced Assassin's Creed Shadows would be online-only, Ubisoft has confirmed that this won't be the case.

The Assassin's Creed team posted a statement on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday to clarify that the game would only need an online connection to install, and then can be played completely offline after.

Read more