Assassin’s Creed Shadows debuted as the top-selling video game in the United States for March 2025, according to the latest data from industry-tracking firm Circana. Despite discussions and mixed reactions leading up to its release, the title achieved significant commercial success in its first month, becoming the second-best-selling game of the year to date. The strong launch comes at a crucial time for Ubisoft, which is in the midst of company-wide restructuring and facing increased pressure to deliver stable performance across its major franchises.

Assassin’s Creed Shadows Top Charts in USA

Assassin's Creed Shadows

Assassin's Creed Shadows, developed and published by Ubisoft, is an action role-playing game marking the fourteenth major entry in the Assassin's Creed series. Following 2023's Assassin's Creed Mirage, Shadows unfolds in 16th-century Japan during the waning Sengoku period. The game dives into the enduring conflict between the Assassin Brotherhood, champions of freedom and peace, and the Templar Order, proponents of peace through control.

Players experience this struggle through two distinct protagonists: Fujibayashi Naoe, a kunoichi (female ninja), and Yasuke, an African samurai inspired by the historical figure of the same name. Each character offers unique gameplay styles, fostering diverse approaches to quests and challenges. Shadows launched on March 20th, 2025, for PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox Series X/S, and macOS, with an iPadOS version slated for future release. Critically, the game garnered positive reviews upon its debut.

Ubisoft’s Performance and Industry Context

Ubisoft’s release of Assassin’s Creed Shadows follows several months of internal changes, including staff reductions and the acknowledgment that last year’s Star Wars: Outlaws underperformed in sales. The company recently established a new core business division focused on its most recognizable properties, such as Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six. A $1.25 billion investment from Tencent into this division underscores its strategic importance. The commercial success of Shadows may help stabilize the company’s financial outlook and demonstrate the continuing viability of the Assassin’s Creed brand in a highly competitive market.

Overall Market Trends in March 2025

Although the release of multiple new titles added momentum to the software side of the business, the overall U.S. video game market contracted in March 2025. Total spending fell to $4.69 billion, marking a 6 percent decline compared to March 2024. Spending on video game content, which includes full games, downloadable content, subscriptions, and mobile purchases, dropped by 4 percent to $4.16 billion. The hardware segment experienced the sharpest decline, falling 25 percent year-over-year to $286 million. This marks the lowest level of March hardware spending since 2019. Spending on accessories also decreased by 11 percent.

Circana’s executive producer for games reports, Mat Piscatella, noted in an interview with GamesBeat that digital-only versions of consoles now make up a significant share of sales. For the year so far, 75 percent of Xbox Series consoles and 50 percent of PlayStation 5 units sold have been digital-only SKUs. These trends are consistent with a broader industry shift toward digital distribution and may reflect both evolving consumer habits and hardware saturation nearing the end of the current console generation.

Assassin’s Creed Shadows Top Charts in USA

Performance Reflects Ongoing Challenges

Cumulative spending for 2025 through the end of March totaled $13.7 billion, representing a 9 percent decline compared to the same period in 2024. Hardware sales year-to-date fell by 32 percent to $747 million, with content spending down 7 percent and accessories down 16 percent. While most segments of the industry are showing negative growth, there are a few areas of resilience. Non-mobile subscriptions increased by 11 percent compared to last year, and digital premium downloads on consoles rose by 12 percent. However, mobile content spending fell by 6 percent, according to Sensor Tower.

New Titles and Franchises Drive Sales

March 2025 saw the highest number of new releases entering the monthly top 20 chart so far this year, with seven debut titles making the list. Alongside Assassin’s Creed Shadows, new entries included MLB: The Show 25, WWE 2K25, Split Fiction, Bleach: Rebirth of Souls, Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition, and Suikoden I & II HD Remaster. The diversity of these titles reflects a wide range of genres, from sports and fighting to action-adventure and role-playing.

Among the most notable performers was Xenoblade Chronicles X, a remaster of a title originally released on the Wii U. Despite the absence of digital sales data from Nintendo, the game achieved a place on the chart based solely on physical sales. This suggests significant interest in the title, particularly as it reaches a broader audience than its original release platform allowed.

Assassin’s Creed Shadows Top Charts in USA

Assassin’s Creed Shadows Rankings

Assassin’s Creed Shadows is not only the best-selling game of March 2025 but also the second-best-selling title of the year so far, trailing only Capcom’s Monster Hunter Wilds. Other new releases from March also made strong showings on the year-to-date list, including MLB: The Show 25, WWE 2K25, and Split Fiction. Each of these games benefits from either established franchise recognition or, in the case of Hazelight’s Split Fiction, strong anticipation built on the studio’s earlier critically acclaimed titles.

Industry Outlook Moving Forward

While individual games are still able to achieve standout performances, the broader market trends continue to point toward contraction. Declining hardware sales indicate that the current console cycle may be reaching maturity, and overall consumer spending in the video game market is down across nearly all segments. The data suggests that publishers may increasingly depend on digital content models and recurring franchises to sustain performance during this transitional period.

Ubisoft’s experience with Assassin’s Creed Shadows may serve as a case study in how legacy franchises can continue to drive results, even amid wider industry uncertainty. However, it remains to be seen whether such successes will be enough to counterbalance ongoing structural and economic challenges facing the sector.