Fashion in Assassin's Creed Bits and Pieces

Assassin's Creed I

The Templars wear your standard crusader garb. The chain mail under the surcoat and cloak with the red cross. His concept art had him wearing black, which was worn by sergeants (one step above knights, who wore white), and was also worn by some characters in the game,  but I am unsure of which would be more historically accurate. To be fair, though, the white robes are more recognizable.

Interestingly enough, I was unable to find any contemporary portraits of Robert de Sable, though I'm pretty sure the actual man wasn't bad-guy bald.

I wasn't able to find any quality or contemporary images/descriptions of 12th century Syrian/Persian clothing, but from what I did see (mainly from the 1300's), it seems like Altair's clothing is completely wrong.
Also, because I'm a jerk like that, I have to comment on the Assassin Bureau Chief's/Malik's coat.

It's basically a super simple modern coat, which has no place in the 12th century.

Assassin's Creed Liberation

Aveline De Grandpre

Guys, Aveline just really wants to be in the Edwardian period. She's dressing for the era she wants.

This dress doesn't fit well into any time period, but that hat is certainly Edwardian. The V shape at the bottom of the bodice is slightly reminiscent of 16th century English wear, The skirt silhouette looks a bit like the something from the 1790s (after the game ends), sort of reminiscent of the bumroll. Those sleeves look like a failed attempt at period sleeves.

And her step mother, Madeliene de L'Isle,

Kill it with fire.

I don't even know where to start. Bias cut things again, natural bust curvature, which is wrong. The sleeves are just weird and don't fit into any time period that I know of. The hair is kind of alright, but it's just not close enough, and the flower thing looks like a rosette from the French revoluation. Also, what is with this game and low necklines/low boob placement? Honestly, both of these female characters have the bust silhouette that happens without a bra. I'm not a fool, they wouldn't be wearing modern brassieres, but both of them would be wearing stays, which lift the bust, and actually create a straight silhouette from the bust point to the waist.

Assassin's Creed Unity

First things first. The character model for Napoleon was amazing.

A portrait painted in 1792, and a screenshot from the game.
The uniform is wrong, but the face is perfect.

But enough of the niceties, let's move on to Elisa de Laserre.
I'm not even going to discuss her main outfit, because it's just as random and unrealistic as Aveline's assassin's outfit.
But her ball gown is something I will harp on.

Here it is in all it's gory (pun intended).

This is the point where I start making dismayed noises, fanning myself, and over dramatically falling out of my chair. First off, it's plain ugly, and from a historical perspective it's wrong from head to toe. It looks like they took most of their inspiration from the rococo period rather than the early 1790's. She's supposed to be a French noblewoman in the early 1790's her hair should be up. The style had the majority of the hair situated above the neck, with a relatively small amount of it draped over the shoulders.

The necklace is awful. I don't know what the artists were thinking with the top. I would expect to see the off the shoulder neckline, and small puffed sleeves on a gown from the 1850's/60's. The bottom part of the sleeves looks like leather, which is just wrong. Moving on to the bodice itself, there is some very modern color blocking there. I haven't seen a bodice like that EVER, in any era of history. The stomacher-ish thing is a really weird shape. Stomachers were always triangle shaped. Also, if we look at a side view (below) it's obvious that the gold part is actually layered on top of the black. Stomachers would always be layered below the two sides of the bodice.

At least they got rid of that hideous floating ruff/whisk.

The triangle portion below the bodice also makes no sense. True, stomachers could be quite long, but it is obvious that in this costume, the lower part is not a part of the bodice, and the little charms have no historical precedent that I've seen. The two gold portions on either side of it wouldn't bother me if they reached all the way to the bottom of the skirt, as many dresses did have panels or sections of embroidery in that position, but in their cropped state they bother me. I'm not certain about the flaps at the hips. They mostly look like Cinderella's  dress, which was discussed by Kendra at Frock Flicks here. The ribbons look like some sort of reference to the ribbon detailing on french gowns in the mid 18th century, though these did not have free hanging ribbons, rather they were sewn onto the skirt.

If we look at the bottom of the dress we see gathering similar to the robe a la polonaise, popular in the 1780's. I found a couple of examples of layered gathering, I just wish that the over-skirt was gathered higher, closer to the waist, with longer hanging sections, like this. Oh, and one last thing that I know would horrify the ladies at Frock Flicks:

AHH! BACKLACING!

(Did anyone else notice that it took 4 images for me to explain how bad this outfit was?)

Shao Jun

This Chinese Assassin turned up in the animated short Embers, and is the playable character in AC: Chronicles China. But onto her outfit.
Bah ha ha ha ha, ah ha ha ha ha. Ah ah ah ah ah ah ah. Ok, ok, calm down, deep breaths... (snort) Bwah ha ha ha ha, oh my god, ha ha ha ha ha.

GET THE F*** OUT!!!!!

There's so much that is wrong, I'm just going to show you what's right.

Standard women's dress in the Ming dynasty was actually comparable to the Korean Hanbok, with pleated, less voluminous skirts, and longer bodices.

Honestly, the last  two outfits would be quite easy to move around in. and it would be relatively to hide weapons in the sleeves.

I think they would have done better to create a simplified version of Ming dynasty armour. Perhaps by removing many of the ceremonial symbols, and slimming down the arm wear. From what I can tell, armour from the Ming, Song, and Qing dynasties was quite similar.

WARNING: OFF TOPIC RAMBLINGS CONTINUE FROM HERE TO THE END OF THIS POST, IT IS ABOUT AC, BUT IS NOT ABOUT A CURRENT GAME.

I would love to see an Assassin's creed game with a female protagonist set in the early part of the Qing Dynasty (images are from The Legend of Zhen Huan, because I love that series. If there's one thing that Chinese costume dramas do right, it's the costumes.).
Qipao in the Qing dynasty covered the body in a loose A line shape with wide sleeves and a side slit that began at the hips. Under this was worn a blouse, the sleeves of which were visible inside the larger sleeves, along with a pair of trousers-the result of the Manchu culture valuing horsemanship.

The clothes were fairly easy to move around in. Noble women wore flower pot shoes which had a tall platform located at the center of the sole, and were richly embroidered. The Manchu did not practice foot-binding, and made several attempts to ban the practice, beginning in 1634. These made women look taller and more elegant, as the proper walk required slow, small steps.

As much as I love them, I will admit that these shoes restricted movement, so a main character would either have to not wear them or kick them off.
But I think the most interesting gameplay would come from the accessories/ornaments.

Before the iconic mandarin collar came into fashion women wore embroidered scarves called longhua. Literally a million uses.
The other part that made me thing was the hairstyles.
The long, flat ornament at the top of the hair, called a bianfang, could easily be a blade.

Also, the majority of the ornaments were hairpins. With the amount used in some of the more elaborate hairstyles, it would be easy to stab someone to death.
Last but not least: the Nail Guards.

These elaborate metal coverings were worn on the ring and pinky fingers, and served as a status symbol. It would (obviously) be almost impossible to work in such ornaments, and they served to show that a woman didn't have to. With the right upgrades, these could basically function as hidden blades.

RAMBLING OVER

Thanks for reading. I'll probably continue with other bit's and pieces posts as I keep looking at the rest of Assassin's creed.