Today’s Twitter controversy: a press release of questionable origin has surfaced, ostensibly from Ubisoft, claiming that Assassin’s Creed Syndicate’s Evie Frye is “one of the first female leading roles for any videogame.” But before we all drop everything to assemble a social media mob and exact our revenge for such a ludicrously inaccurate claim, know this: it’s B.S.
Assassin’s Creed Syndicate makes the cut in our best PC games of 2015.
Here’s the original tweet, from Twitter user @Toadsanime:
Ubisoft are praising themselves for including 'one of the first female leading roles for any video game'. pic.twitter.com/Hj9k6ccnjs
— Ryan Brown (@Toadsanime) October 28, 2015
Now, that’s obviously a ridiculous claim. Evie Frye isn’t even one of the first female lead protagoniststhis year, let alone in videogame history. Even within the Assassin’s Creed franchise there’s Aveline from ACIII: Liberation. Wrong statement is wrong.
However, if you’re in the habit of receiving Ubisoft press releases, the lack of excited capitalised intro text in that uncited, conveniently cropped, presser, immediately rings alarm bells. Likewise the pronounced focus on Victoria Atkins herself rather than the game, suggests this isn’t of Ubi origin.
Having initially claimed the presser came from Ubisoft, @Toadsanime eventually conceded that it may have come from a third-party PR Agency.
We reached out to Ubisoft for clarification on the situation. Shortly after, confirmation came from Ubisoft creative director Palle Hoffstein that the statement was in fact nothing to do with the publisher, but instead came from Atkins’ representation:
Hey folks. It's from Victoria's PR firm. Nothing to do with us. pic.twitter.com/JnMEtErFOM
— Groovy Ghoulie (@Palle_Hoffstein) October 28, 2015
Now, what have we all learned, everyone? That’s right: it isn’t always Ubisoft’s fault, and Victoria Atkins needs new representation.