2025 might’ve just hit its gaming low point. Valve’s beloved platform Steam — the digital playground of broke gamers and GPU hoarders — just suffered a massive data breach affecting 89 million accounts. But that’s not even the craziest part.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows, a game no one asked for and even fewer wanted, started auto-installing itself into people’s Steam libraries like it’s some cursed ring from a J-horror flick. Yes, it’s real. No, you’re not dreaming. Yes, it’s probably already chewing through your SSD.
🕶️ The Leak, The Game, The Rage
It all began when some outsourced security contractor at Valve apparently clicked on an email titled “Claim Your Half-Life 3 Beta Key” (sigh…). One click later, and boom — Steam accounts were on the dark web faster than your crypto portfolio in 2022.
But instead of draining your bank account, hackers (or Ubisoft, depending on your conspiracy flavor) decided to force-feed you Assassin’s Creed Shadows, a game that tries to be Japanese and woke at the same time — and fails spectacularly at both.
You know it’s bad when even Reddit’s most dedicated AC stans are like, “Nah bro, I didn’t sign up for this.”
🧨 Shadows Is a Disaster — And Now It’s on Your Hard Drive
Here’s what you get with this “gift” from Ubisoft:
- Historical inaccuracy so aggressive, even Wikipedia flagged it
- Dialogue like it was written by ChatGPT on Ambien
- Samurai with 15 frames per second — on a 4090
- A sidekick named Midori who spends more time in gender discourse than fighting ninjas
- And bugs. Oh, the bugs. Your save file will travel time more than Ezio ever did
Oh, and the install? Silent. Stealthy. Malware-vibes. No EULA, no prompt, just suddenly there — like a TikTok ad for AI girlfriends.
📉 The Internet Reacts: Chaos, Copium, and Conspiracies
Twitter (sorry, X) exploded. Memes started rolling in faster than Bethesda bugs. Top Reddit threads included:
- “Ubisoft just did what every virus dreams of”
- “I have AC Shadows now. Steam, blink twice if you’re in danger”
- “Deleting it didn’t work. It reinstalled itself. Is this a cult?”
Japanese gamers, meanwhile, weren’t laughing. The game’s portrayal of their culture sparked huge backlash. One Tokyo user wrote, “This is not representation. This is fanfiction with microtransactions.”
🧯 What To Do If You’ve Been ‘Ubisofted’
- Check your Steam library. If Shadows is there and you don’t remember buying it, you’re one of the lucky 89 million.
- Change your password. Like, right now.
- Enable Steam Guard (if you haven’t already — why haven’t you?)
- Scan your PC like you just downloaded a .rar file named “fortnite-hack-vbucks.exe”
- Delete Assassin’s Creed Shadows and try not to look back. Unless you’re into self-harm.
📦 TL;DR
Steam got wrecked, Ubisoft dropped a game on your rig without asking, and no one knows if it was a hack or a marketing stunt gone rogue. What we do know is: Assassin’s Creed Shadows is now 2025’s most unwanted house guest.
Pixel P. Snarkbyte, widely regarded as the “Shakespeare of Sh*tposts,” is a video game expert with a unique knack for turning pixels into punchlines.
Born in the small town of Respawn, Pennsylvania, Pixel grew up mashing buttons on an ancient NES controller, firmly believing that “blowing into the cartridge” was a sacred ritual passed down through generations.
Pixel P. Snarkbyte: proving that life, much like a buggy open-world game, is better with a little lag-induced chaos.
