Imagine buying a brand new car where the steering wheel falls off during your first drive, the manufacturer tells you they'll mail replacement parts next week, and reviewers praise them for their responsive customer service. Welcome to modern video game launches, where Assassin's Creed Shadows' recent patch for Nintendo's Switch 2 serves as both a band aid on fresh wounds and a stark lesson in normalized dysfunction.

Let me be perfectly clear this isn't about one game or one patch. The recent 1.1.7 update for Ubisoft's feudal Japan adventure exemplifies an industry wide betrayal. Players who purchased Shadows at full price experienced frequent crashes, unstable performance, and progression blocking bugs that made the premium price tag feel like an admission fee for alpha testing. When the developer responded with promises of fixes, gaming sites framed it as some noble act rather than basic accountability.

Here's what really happened Ubisoft sold a product knowing it malfunctioned under common usage conditions. The Switch 2 version apparently struggled with fundamental tasks like maintaining consistent frame rates or handling controller detection when docking the console. These aren't edge case issues. A black screen during account login at startup? An entire expansion pack region becoming inaccessible if you own multiple copies of the game? These scream of inadequate quality assurance, not unfortunate oversights.

Three critical insights emerge from this fiasco that demand attention:

First, the financial calculus behind broken launches now actively exploits player patience. Major publishers know patches can fix problems after release, effectively using their customer base as free testers to meet arbitrary deadlines. Call it the cyberpunk business model release first, apologize later. Why delay when millions will pay full price for an unstable experience? Shareholders see revenues hit projections, journalists praise post launch support, and gamers get conditioned to expect jank as standard operating procedure.

Second, console players face unique disadvantages in this equation. Unlike PC gamers who might adjust settings or modify files, Switch owners have zero recourse for performance issues. When performance falters, you can't overclock your dock or upgrade graphical components. You're completely at developers' mercy. The Switch 2 version's reported fixes for touchscreen controls and controller connectivity shouldn't have been necessary for a first party title from a major publisher. These are basic functionality checks.

Third, regulatory bodies continue failing digital consumers. Physical product recalls exist for good reason. If a car manufacturer sold vehicles with faulty brakes, they'd face lawsuits and federally mandated corrections. Yet digital marketplaces operate in a lawless frontier where selling incomplete software carries minimal repercussions. Nintendo's famously strict certification process clearly didn't prevent a game with multiple progression blocking bugs from launching.

Historical context makes this more alarming. We're two console generations removed from when games shipped on read only media without possibility of updates. Developers had to get it right the first time. Physical limitations forced discipline. Today's always online infrastructure enables sloppiness on an industrial scale. Shadows joins an ignoble lineage including Cyberpunk 2077's infamously broken launch and No Man's Sky's missing features at release. The pattern perpetuates because it remains profitable.

I don't doubt Ubisoft's sincerity in fixing Shadows. Their patch notes detail smart corrections from preventing double engravings on overpowered weapons to ensuring key characters don't vanish during quests. New combat animations and accessibility improvements reflect genuine care. But these adjustments should have preceded launch, not followed it.

Imagine if other industries operated this way. Your new dishwasher leaks, flooding the kitchen. The manufacturer promises a technician will visit next month. Reviewers praise the eventual fix but ignore the water damage to your flooring. Theater audiences accept missing final scenes because the director might add them later via streaming. The cognitive dissonance around games persists because enthusiast media lacks critical distance. When patches become praise worthy events rather than shameful necessities, our standards have eroded completely.

Consumer psychology plays a key role here. Each fan who files bug reports believing they're helping make a better product unconsciously reinforces the system. Your unpaid labor becomes an expected development subsidy. We've been gaslit into believing games can only achieve scale through our forbearance.

Solutions exist but require collective will. Aggregated refund systems for technically deficient products would force accountability. Mandatory performance transparency standardized across platforms would let buyers see actual frame rate data before purchase. Legislation treating substantial post launch patches as evidence of false advertising could reshape publisher priorities. Mostly, we must reject the Stockholm syndrome of celebrating fixes for problems that shouldn't exist.

The Assassin's Creed franchise built its reputation on meticulously recreated historical environments. The irony isn't lost that Shadows' modern technical failings make its in world fiction feel like a facade. When merchant NPCs reset inventories or navigation markers malfunction, the meticulously crafted illusion shatters. True immersion requires stability we can trust.

As cloud gaming grows and games become subscription services rather than purchased products, these quality issues might escalate. Streaming platforms could theoretically adjust performance remotely, but detection and remediation become harder when files don't reside locally. What recourse will players have when lag or compression artifact issues get dismissed as connection problems rather than developer shortcomings?

My frustration stems not from hating games, but loving them too deeply to accept diminished standards. Video games represent the most ambitious fusion of artistic and technical creativity in human history. Each flawed launch chips away at their legitimacy as a mature medium. The real Shadows we must confront are those of corporate impunity looming over artistic potential. Next time you read patch notes, ask yourself why so many fixes were needed at all. The answer might scare you into demanding better.

Ubisoft will likely continue supporting Assassin's Creed Shadows for months, gradually transforming it into the product they initially promised. The players who endured its launch phase deserve comprehensive restitution, not just functional software. Maybe store credit for wasted troubleshooting hours, or free expansions acknowledging their unintended beta testing. Barring that, anything less than perfect stability suggests this technological regression remains unfinished business.