Assassin’s Creed Scores Are in Freefall: Here Is Where the Next One Lands

By Lionel Gen Bernard Allkeyshop Gaming News
1 May 2026 no comments

Assassin’s Creed II scored 89 in 2010. Valhalla scored 69 in 2022. Shadows landed at 76 in 2025. Plot those 14 points on a timeline and the trend is unmistakable: Ubisoft’s flagship franchise is losing roughly one point per year, and the math points to a sub-70 average by 2027.

I have watched this franchise evolve (and devolve) from the beginning: pro Unreal Tournament arenas first, then founding AllKeyShop and tracking every Assassin’s Creed launch since Altair first donned the hood in 2007. The data speaks for itself. Across 14 mainline Assassin’s Creed games ranked by AKS user score, the regression line points down. Not a cliff, not a crash — just a steady, merciless erosion of about one AKS point per year since the Ezio trilogy peaked in 2010-2011.

The RPG era tells the story in miniature. Origins (2017) revived the formula and earned an 85. Odyssey (2018) went bigger and dropped to 78. Valhalla (2022) went even bigger — 100+ hours of Viking saga — and cratered to 69, the lowest score of any mainline entry. Mirage (2023) course-corrected back to 76 by stripping away the bloat. Shadows (2025) matched it at 76. The takeaway: even when Ubisoft does everything right, the best they can manage now is a score their 2011 games beat by 12 points.

Every Assassin’s Creed Ranked by AKS Score

Data from our complete franchise ranking. Click column headers to sort.

If the trend holds, the next mainline Assassin’s Creed — whether that is Black Flag Resynced in July 2026 or the next RPG entry — projects to land somewhere between 68 and 74 on the AKS scale. That is not a prediction anyone wants to make about a franchise that once defined open-world gaming. But the data is the data.

This is the same pattern we flagged earlier this year in our Indies Outclass AAA analysis: big-budget franchises are bleeding user satisfaction while smaller, focused titles climb the charts. Assassin’s Creed is not broken. It is running out of room to impress.

The silver lining is price. Older, higher-scored entries like Black Flag (88) and Brotherhood (88) are available at deep discounts through verified CD key storefronts. You can grab the two best-rated games in the series for less than the cost of Shadows at full Steam price. And right now, the best way into the franchise might be through its back catalogue.

Coming Soon: Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced (July 9, 2026)

A ground-up remake of the fan-favorite pirate adventure. Ubisoft Montreal is rebuilding Edward Kenway’s Caribbean in a modern engine with overhauled visuals, ship combat and world detail. Pre-order keys are already tracked on AllKeyShop. This is the release that prompted this retrospective: if you want to revisit Black Flag before the remake lands, the original CD keys are available at a fraction of the launch-day ask. Browse Black Flag Resynced pre-order prices

• Released: July 9, 2026 (upcoming) · Developer: Ubisoft Montreal · Publisher: Ubisoft
• Platforms: Steam, PS5, Xbox Series
• ▶ Watch trailer

Lionel Gen Bernard

Competitive gaming veteran and Infographics Creator at AllKeyShop, Lionel 'Gen' Bernard made his name in the early days of esports as a professional Unreal Tournament player, competing at the highest level when competitive FPS was still in its infancy. Founder of AllKeyShop, he now brings his competitive DNA to data-driven visual storytelling, producing original infographics and editorial content. His work maps the global gaming landscape through the lens of someone who's lived it from both sides: the arena and the industry.