Robin Bhuyan
If you’ve spent countless hours sneaking and parkouring through history as an Assassin or eliminating high-profile targets as a bald, barcoded killer, you might think Assassin’s Creed and Hitman are completely different beasts. After all, one is an open-world, parkour-heavy historical epic, while the other is a modern-day stealth sandbox with disguises and precision kills.
But what if we told you these two franchises share way more in common than anyone realizes? Not just a couple of coincidences—full-on structural similarities that make it seem like Ubisoft either took a lot of inspiration or were secretly exchanging ideas behind the scenes with IO Interactive.
Most gamers have never noticed these hidden Hitman and Assassin’s Creed similarities—but we did. And once you see them, you won’t be able to unsee them.
So let’s break it all down—game by game, story beat by story beat—and uncover the crazy Hitman and Assassin’s Creed similarities might just make you wonder: Was Assassin’s Creed inspired by Hitman?
Leave aside the game design comparisons! We are comparing mostly the story here!
Hitman: Codename 47 & Assassin’s Creed: Mentor’s Betrayal
First things first, both series kicked off their debut games with protagonists—Agent 47 and Altair Ibn-La’Ahad—who are the top assassins in their respective orders. Both men work for their mentor figures, Professor Ort-Meyer (through the ICA) and Al Mualim, only to realize far too late that they’ve been deceived into systematically eliminating their master’s rivals. Talk about terrible bosses!
And it doesn’t end there. When the assassins finally confront their betrayers, what do their mentors do? Send in mind-controlled assassins, of course! Ort-Meyer unleashes his army of brainwashed clones against Agent 47, while Al Mualim uses the Apple of Eden to force Altair’s fellow assassins to fight against him. You know, standard evil mentor stuff.
The backstory is completely similar- While Altair is not Al Mualim’s biological son, he is raised by Al Mualim like a son, not just a student, training in the ways of the Assassin’s. Ort Meyer, meanwhile, created 47 in the lab, using his own DNA, and the DNA of 4 other hardened criminals, and raised him till he was released out into the world, as seen at the starting at Hitman Codename 47. And what does both Ort Meyer and Al Mualim want: World domination!
Holy Battles: Assassin’s Creed II and Hitman 2 (Silent Assassin)
Flash forward to Assassin’s Creed II and Hitman 2: Silent Assassin. Agent 47 and Ezio Auditore: While these two have completely different personalities and backstories, (though Altair shares some similarities with 47), their stories do have a lot of similarities.
While Ezio is forced to accept his father’s legacy and become an Assassin after his father and brothers are killed, 47 is also forced to return to his Assassin past, after Father Vittorio is kidnapped. What’s more shocking is that both games revolve around Italy- Hitman 2 Silent Assassin starts and ends in the Church in Sicily, Italy, and it also serves as 47’s hideout throughout the game. Meanwhile, Assassin’s Creed II is entirely based in Italy, following Ezio’s journey through Florence, Venice, and Rome.
Still not convinced? Here is another “coincidence”—the ending and climax of both games take place in sacred religious locations. Ezio Auditore squares off against Rodrigo Borgia inside the Vatican, while Agent 47 faces his final battle against Sergei Zavarotko in a Sicilian Catholic church. Is the gaming industry subtly trying to tell us something? Maybe Catholic Churches do make great dramatic backdrops for assassins to settle scores.
It’s almost as if someone at Ubisoft whispered, “You know that epic Hitman showdown in the church? Let’s make ours in the Vatican—way bigger and fancier!”
The music Ezio’s family, which eventually became the theme for Assassin’s Creed, has a lot of similarity with Hitman Blood Money’s Ava Maria as well. It is obvious to see similarities in music though, as Jesper Kyd composed most the music for both franchises.
Revisiting the Past: AC Revelations and Hitman Contracts
Then came Hitman: Contracts and Assassin’s Creed: Revelations—the next installments revisited their franchise’s original game. Contracts revisits missions from Hitman: Codename 47, exploring memories through a darker lens. Revelations sends an older, wiser Ezio back to uncover Altair’s hidden memories. Both games explore the past to enrich their stories and may even use nostalgia to deepen the emotional engagement.
Coincidence? At this point, even Ubisoft probably isn’t sure.
An American Tale: Blood Money and AC III
Here’s where it gets oddly specific again: Hitman: Blood Money and Assassin’s Creed III were both critical turning points for their franchises—and both took place 90 percent in America. Both featured two major antagonists: one directly comparable to the protagonist, and the other a manipulative mastermind. Blood Money had Mark Parchezzi III (a fellow cloned assassin) and Alexander Cayne, while AC III gave us Haytham Kenway (Connor’s father) and Charles Lee.
Both games forced players to face someone deeply similar to themselves first (Parchezzi and Haytham), before finally confronting the true manipulative villain (Cayne and Charles Lee). Now, if that’s not narrative plagiarism disguised as inspiration, I don’t know what is. If we talk about Assassination mission strategies, both games totally differ. But the story and the setting have eerily similarities.
Here is another “coincidence”- By the end of the game, Agent 47 and his handler Diana Burnwood are the only ones left after the ICA is wiped out by The Franchise. In Assassin’s Creed III, Connor and his mentor Achilles Davenport are the only remaining Assassins after the Brotherhood is nearly destroyed in America.
The Rogue Assassin: Hitman Absolution vs. Assassin’s Creed Rogue
Another strong parallel that can be seen is between Hitman: Absolution and Assassin’s Creed: Rogue. Both games follow assassins who turn against their own organization and become targets of the very people they once worked for.
✔ In Absolution, Agent 47 goes rogue from the ICA to protect Victoria, an enhanced young female clone like him, hunted by the agency. He is pursued by ICA operatives and must dismantle the corruption within his own organization.
✔ In Rogue, Shay Cormac betrays the Assassin Brotherhood after realizing their reckless actions are causing destruction. He is then hunted by his former allies and ultimately joins the Templars.
Both protagonists start as elite assassins, both betray their faction due to a personal moral decision, and both find themselves being hunted by those they once trusted.
However, a key difference emerges at the end:
- 47 eventually returns to the ICA, having eliminated the corrupt elements within.
- Shay fully embraces the Templars and never returns to the Brotherhood.
In a way, Absolution mirrors Black Flag as well. Just like Edward Kenway joins the Assassins at the end, 47 goes through the game acting independently but eventually returns to his faction, while Shay permanently defects to the Templars. This makes Absolution a mix of Rogue and Black Flag—a rogue agent hunted by his former allies, who ultimately returns home.
Soft Reboots: The New Trilogies
The funniest thing is that both franchises underwent significant soft reboots, introducing fresh gameplay and expansive worlds, at the same time! While Hitman came out in 2016, Assassin’s Creed Origins came out a year later in 2017. (Again, Ubisoft?) While Hitman takes us back to the days when 47 joined the ICA, Origins similarly takes us back to the origins of the Assassins.
In the next game in the trilogy, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, we go even further back in time and learn about the origin of the Hidden Blade. Same applies to Hitman 2 (2018), where we go back even further in time and learn about Ort Meyer being funded by the Providence.
Hitman’s World of Assassination trilogy (2016–2021) and Assassin’s Creed’s RPG trilogy (Origins, Odyssey, Valhalla) both evolved dramatically, offering more freedom, advanced graphics, and narrative depth.
While the gameplay styles diverged—Hitman focusing on mission-based sandbox stealth, and Assassin’s Creed leaning toward open-world RPG elements—both reboots represented a massive overhaul of their respective franchises. It’s almost as if Ubisoft waited for Hitman’s reboot to launch, took detailed notes, before they went ahead with their trilogy. Well, as for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, it came out a year before Hitman 3 (2021), so we don’t get to see any similarities.
The Final Similarity: Templars vs. Assassins, Providence vs. ICA
This is where things get even crazier. While early Hitman and Assassin’s Creed games were already showing suspicious similarities, Hitman (2016) took it to another level. IO Interactive introduced Providence, a powerful secret organization pulling the strings behind world events—exactly like how the Templars control the world in Assassin’s Creed.
✔ Assassin’s Creed: The Templars are a shadowy organization controlling governments, corporations, and historical events, opposing the Assassins, who fight for humanity and free will.
✔ Hitman: Providence is a shadowy organization controlling governments, corporations, and world affairs, opposed by the ICA, a nonpolitical organization that carries out contract killings in the background.
Both games now had a powerful elite organization vs. a secretive assassin order at the heart of their storylines. However, unlike the earlier similarities, Hitman only introduced Providence in 2016, years after Assassin’s Creed had already established the Templar-Assassin conflict.
This means that in this part at least, Ubisoft did not copy IO Interactive, and IO Interactive did not copy Ubisoft—it is possible that both franchises evolved naturally toward the same premise, independent of each other. It’s as if both were unknowingly telling two sides of the same story, set in different time periods.
Final Thoughts (Ubisoft, We See You)
Was Assassin’s Creed inspired by Hitman? Despite these Hitman and Assassin’s Creed similarities, we are not saying Ubisoft definitely sat down, played through Hitman repeatedly, and meticulously adapted IO Interactive’s playbook, but the evidence certainly stacks up. Whether intentional or subconscious, the Assassin’s Creed stories walk a suspiciously similar path to Agent 47’s adventures.
But hey, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, right? And in the gaming world, everybody steals from everybody—but rarely with this much precision.
Ubisoft, maybe send IO Interactive a thank-you card next time. Just saying.
