Assassin's Creed has always had a strange relationship with history. The weapons in the original game were tweaked to be more historically accurate, but in the sequel (which still lovingly recreates the time period and architecture), you have a fistfight with the Pope.
Obviously it's not “real” in the sense that we travel through time and talk to gods, but it takes the story it portrays seriously. However, the balance has been getting worse lately, and it all reminds me of the infamous turkey in Assassin's Creed 3.
Note: The story side of the game was diminished because it tried too hard to repeat its outdated open-world formula with bigger and bloated maps, resulting in an often silly adoption of fantasy tropes that didn't fit the narrative, not because the presence of Yasuke, a real person who really existed.
I'm writing this in honor of Turkey Day, also known as Thanksgiving, aka in my country (as the “y” stands for “honor”), Thursday. TheGamer is a website with writers from around the world that presents geography lessons in popular video games and computer code. We are based in Canada (a country that celebrates Thanksgiving on the second Monday in October, so October 14th this year), most of our readers are in the US (who celebrate today), and the country most represented by our staff is the UK (who celebrate nothing , never will be). For someone who likes to start Christmas too early, Thanksgiving is basically a roadblock to the holiday season. But at least it gave us an Assassin's Creed turkey.
Assassin's Creed 3 had such high potential
Assassin's Creed 3 takes place during the American Revolution, allowing us to play as a half-Native American warrior whose tribe is involved in the War of Independence. While I'm at the bottom of my Assassin's Creed rankings, I've always thought the setting was masterful – more interesting than going cowboy, but modern enough to feel different from what came before, and fitting in perfectly with the idea of Templars and Assassins. For the player character Ratonhnhaké:ton (or Connor, as he says when he merges with her), this is a war for his land, and no matter who wins, he still loses.
It's a tumultuous time for Native Americans and American settlers, often for very different reasons, and rife with conspiracy and shadowy societies that control the course of human history. It never lives up to its potential, distracting from Haytham's dreary personal affairs (Ratanhack:ton and Templar parents), failing to fully integrate Native American culture, as AC2 gave off a renaissance Italy feel, and the first Assassin's Creed feels too big – a criticism that would become famous in the next decade.
As a result of this larger scope, less hopeful stakes, and more stoic protagonist, Assassin's Creed 3 has little time for frivolity. While the tone fits the theme, it feels like a bit of a memorial service after three games for Ezio. The brief respite we get from this is in turkey. This hidden easter egg is often overlooked, just like Assassin's Creed 3 itself. But while it's small and completely pointless, I'd like to see more of this spirit in future Assassin's Creed games instead of sometimes desperate attempts to connect people to a new story on an outdated map.
People cheered when Ubisoft Forward's showcase for Shadows stopped to pet the dog, and at times it seems that Ubisoft thinks that fans who queue up all day at theaters and scream at any moving ad represent the typical gamer demographic.
How to unlock Assassin's Creed 3 Turkey
To find the turkey, you need to get into the game well enough to get Davenport Manor. On the back porch, you can whistle to call the turkey. It's pretty cute, but one short burst of Konami code later and the turkey is donning a killer outfit. The use of Konami's code, while not a Konami game, is probably a foreshadowing of the company still relying on “you can pet the dog” in 2024, but otherwise it's a great little moment.
What I love about it is that it's a video game. You enter a cheat code and get a silly prize. It's like the days of Big Head Mode all over again. Assassin's Creed had a hard time deciding when to be an action-adventure game with a serious and historical narrative, and when to be a video game. As the number of games increased, he tried to do both more often, and the ideals began to interfere with each other. Turkey is the answer.
I'd like to suggest you download Assassin's Creed 3 this fun Turkey Day to check it out for yourself, but given the obstacles that can prevent you from playing old games on new hardware, I guess I'm referring to “search it on YouTube on this happy Turkey Day.” It's just a little easter egg, but it's also one of the few things about Assassin's Creed 3 that I'd like to include in the series for future games.

- Released
- October 30, 2012
- Developer(s)
- Ubisoft Montreal