Lord Shimura

We will face death...and defend our home. Tradition...courage...honor. They are what make us. We are the warriors of Tsushima! We are samurai!
― Lord Shimura in Prologue

Lord Shimura (志村 Shimura) is the tritagonist and an eventual antagonist^[1] of Ghost of Tsushima. He is the jito (地頭; lord) of Tsushima (appointed by the shogun) and Jin Sakai's maternal uncle. After Jin's father died, Shimura continued Jin's training in the way of the samurai. He is voiced by Eric Steinberg (English) / Akio Otsuka (Japanese).^[2]

Biography[]

Born into Clan Shimura, the ruling samurai clan of Tsushima, Lord Shimura had been raised as a strict adherent to the traditional samurai values that dominated Japanese society. He was raised with an untold number of brothers and a sister named Chiyoko.

Tragedy struck Clan Shimura when Clan Yarikawa carried out a rebellion to seize control of the island. Though the rebellion was crushed with the aid of Clan Sakai, Tokiasa Yarikawa already killed Shimura's father and brothers before being executed himself, rendering Shimura the sole immediate successor as leader of his clan and Tsushima.

Chiyoko would eventually be married to Kazumasa Sakai, resulting in the two clans presumably growing closer as well as the birth of Shimura’s nephew, Jin. However, tragedy would befall both of the clans in the early on in Jin’s youth, with Chiyoko passing away from illness and Kazumasa falling in battle during the failed attempt to pacify Iki years later. Shimura attended the ceremonial funeral for Kazumasa and approached a mourning Jin. Feeling for Jin's loss of both his parents, Shimura took Jin under his wing as a ward of his clan, training Jin how to fight and taught him their code of Honor as he grew up.

During the Mongol landing, Lord Shimura led the local samurai forces against the Mongols on Komoda Beach. The defense ended in disaster as the Mongols killed the majority of his forces and conquered most of the island in a matter of hours. During the initial battle, Khotun beheaded one of Shimura's closest friends, Harunobu Adachi, after lighting him on fire, effectively making Shimura the sole survivor out of the two respected clan leaders. After the battle at Komoda beach, Shimura was captured by the Mongols under Khotun Khan and held captive on Castle Kaneda. In Kaneda, he was pressured by Khotun to surrender the island and join forces with him to conquer the Japanese mainland, but Shimura refused to surrender. As time went on, Khotun would taunt Shimura with news that Jin was killing without honor, with Shimura refusing to believe Khotun's words.

Shimura was eventually rescued by his nephew Jin Sakai and other allies, who then recaptured Castle Kaneda from Mongol hands. After they reclaim the Castle from the remaining Mongols, Shimura has Jin contact a smuggler to deliver a message requesting reinforcements to the mainland as the island was surrounded by Mongol ships. After the smuggler successfully escapes the Mongol ships, Shimura reveals to Jin that he also put in a request to officially adopt Jin as his own son, making him heir to Clan Shimura.

Soon after, before the battle to retake Castle Shimura, Shimura breaks the news to Jin that the shogun sent reinforcements to the island as well as their approval of Jin's adoption. During the battle, Shimura is shocked by Jin's dishonorable tactics, such as beheading a Mongol leader to terrify his men. When the Mongols are pushed back into the castle's inner keep, Shimura orders a frontal charge, which results in massive casualties for the samurai. Though Shimura intends to order another frontal charge at dawn, Jin knows the tactic will result in more unnecessary losses for the samurai, and proposes that he poison the Mongols instead, a tactic that Shimura deems as an act of terror. Jin and Shimura both refuse to relent, leading Shimura to slap Jin in the heat of the moment. Regretting slapping his nephew, Shimura tries to apologize but Jin, realizing his uncle is too stubborn to listen, leaves.

Later that night, Shimura enters the Castle to find the Mongol forces poisoned by Jin. Shimura is outraged that Jin disobeyed him and used dishonorable tactics against the enemy, but Jin contests that Shimura's strict adhesion to Samurai honor cannot save their people. Knowing that the Shogun will want someone executed as punishment, Shimura asks Jin to blame Yuna as a scapegoat, even using the form of approval for Jin's adoption, but Jin refused, accepting his new role as the Ghost; with Jin embracing his new identity and abandoning his connections to the Samurai for good, Shimura dejectedly drops Jin's adoption letter into a fire. Shimura has Jin put in a cell to be shipped to mainland Japan and taken to the Shogun for his crimes, although Jin later escaped to continue fighting the Mongols.

Sometime after, Shimura is seen giving a speech to the new recruits sent by the shogun to retake the island and defeat the Mongols. Jin, having discovered Khotun Khan's whereabouts, snuck back inside Castle Shimura and left behind a letter in Shimura's room, requesting his aid in the upcoming battle.

During the final battle, Shimura and the samurai enter the battlefield and indirectly aid Jin, who eventually defeats the Khan, once and for all. After the battle, Shimura sends word to Jin to return home to talk. When Jin turned up, Shimura expresses surprise, confessing his uncertainty that he would show up. Shimura takes Jin for a walk with him, the two discussing their actions in the war, with either sides defending their methods and refusing to apologize for them. The two eventually arrive at Kazumasa's grave, where Shimura reveals to Jin that the shogun have demanded Jin's head for his actions in the war, with Jin realizing that Shimura has been assigned to kill him. The two men separate as Jin composes a death poem for either of their Clans as Shimura waited in tears.

As Jin finished the poem, Shimura and Jin unsheathed their blades and began their final duel, with Jin besting his uncle in single combat. Defeated and wounded, Shimura asks Jin to honor him with a warrior's death, leaving Jin with two options: honor his uncle's wish for death, or spare him.

Fate[]

If Jin chooses to honor his wish, he promises his uncle that he will be remembered as the honorable man he was in life. In response, Shimura thanks him and acknowledges Jin as his son, telling him to find him in the afterlife. Jin promises to do so, before killing him and breaking down in tears, having lost the last of his family. Officially, Clan Shimura will be extinct.

If Jin instead spares his uncle's life, he tells him that while he has no honor, he will never kill his family. Shimura warns his nephew that "the Ghost will be hunted for the rest of his days." Accepting his fate and new identity, Jin puts on his Ghost mask and departs as Shimura watches.

Post-game dialogue will vary depending on Jin's choice. If Jin spares Lord Shimura's life, peasants commend the Ghost as "a true hero.". As well once the game is done there will be these samurai order from Shimura to kill the Ghost which could hint at the sequel.

If Jin chooses to kill Lord Shimura, we find out that Clan Oga has claimed the Mongols have killed the Jito, rather than the Ghost, but the peasants have trouble believing it. It is unclear why Clan Oga would give this explanation to the people, whether it be to stop an uprising or to cover up the fact it was a death wish all along. Like Clan Nagao's skirmish with Hironori Nagao years ago, this would be the second time for the samurai to fabricate another story to protect either Clan Sakai's legacy or fate or Shimura's death in the hands of Jin.

Personality[]

When we fight, we face our enemy head on. When we take their life, we look them in they eye, with courage and respect. This is what makes us samurai. Only cowards strike from the shadows.
― Lord Shimura teaching Jin Sakai how to fight

Lord Shimura is a staunch defender of the traditional samurai code of honor, courage, and loyalty. At first, he appears as a wise, caring and honorable man who strictly adheres to the samurai code, but as the game goes on, more of Lord Shimura's negative qualities are shown.

Shimura developed methods of war and leadership contrary to his immaculate public image, making him a hypocrite. While Shimura outwardly obeyed the rules of the shogun, he often did things his own way in order to maintain power. He insists that samurai must serve as an example of honor and courage for the commoners but maintains a condescending attitude to his people and soldiers who are merely servants of his will. Shimura sees mercy as a means to an end and will use people to get the job done while keeping his hands clean. This is why he feels comfortable maintaining relations with the inferior and indebted smuggler Goro, and yet frowns upon Jin's closer ties to the thief Yuna, who ultimately influences Jin's perspective on warfare. Shimura insists on samurai controlling their emotions, yet he struggles with anger at criticism, shown when he slaps Jin after being called out for sacrificing the Yarikawa soldiers during the siege of Castle Shimura. He was also willing to lie to protect his interests, which was proven when he tried to persuade Jin to frame Yuna for the poisoning at Castle Shimura, albeit he was doing it to save his nephew from execution.

Despite Shimura's underhanded behavior, his knowledge and skill with warfare cannot be understated. When not with Jin or under the surveillance of the Shogun's bannermen, he uses remarkably deceptive tactics to destroy Mongols and bandits alike. According to peasant dialogue, he spread a rumor causing a bandit clan to raid a Mongol camp for supplies, thereby getting rid of both factions in the process without any samurai bloodshed. His expert knowledge of the terrain of Tsushima allowed him to lure a band of Mongols to a cliff in Yarikawa where he ambushed them from behind even though he was outnumbered. While he is skeptical of using new weapons, he accepts Jin's usage of hwachas and doesn't hinder his use of them in battle. When he is being observed by the Shogun's bannermen, he settled into a rigid adherence of the samurai code, with his strategy essentially being the same as Komoda Beach, seemingly oblivious of the odds. Even in the face of heavy casualties, Shimura refuses to consider tactics that would compromise his standing with the Shogun. Ultimately, he comes off as prioritizing his prestige and reputation over the lives of his people, which was one of the biggest factors in his falling out with Jin.

Shimura cared deeply for Jin, serving as a father and mentor figure in the absence of Kazumasa and Chiyoko, later going so far as to offer Jin adoption into the Shimura clan as his son. Shimura's former wife, sons, and the rest of his family had been taken from him one by one, so Jin served as an enormous consolation to his loneliness and isolation. The greatest virtues that Shimura taught Jin were the importance of kindness and respect, even to enemies in a samurai's life, not just bravery and loyalty. One can argue his parental love centered on the dream that Jin could have been his ideal successor. Shimura was willing to look past or ignore Jin's defiance to the Samurai code when it bode no consequence, but as Jin's "crime" became undeniable with the Shogun's force standing witness, and Jin himself unbending in his ways, Shimura imprisons Jin and later even accepts the Shogun's order to execute him personally. The irony is that it would have been better for Shimura to have taught Jin absolute obedience instead of kindness and compassion, or else none of this would have happened. In the end, for Shimura, the cost of breaking his oath to the Shogun and dishonoring his whole ancestry was worse than killing his adopted son with his own hands, but it clearly devastates his conscience. The choice of a duel without witnesses to carry out the shogun's order is unusual, considering the high chance for failure, but Shimura likely saw this as the only way to give Jin an honorable death.

Despite his paradoxical traits, Shimura shows unexpected wisdom that stretches beyond his devotion of the Samurai Code. While brought up in an impractical system, he has a practical mind able to foresee events and what is more important in the long run. When Jin infiltrated Castle Shimura to plant his message, Lord Shimura's conversation with another commander suggests that the Shogun was putting pressure on the jito to get rid of the "Ghost" as soon as possible, which Shimura refuses to heed in favor of fighting off the Mongols first. Shimura is also the only person in the entire story to rightly predict the unwanted and irreversible consequences of embracing the "Ghost" and openly opposing tradition, as evidently, the common folk of Japan had begun to use poison against each other for their own selfish ends after the invasion, and there's even a "Ghost's Army" acting outside of Jin's control which he is not even aware of.

Tales[]

Trivia[]

Lord Shimura is possibly named after Japanese actor Takashi Shimura ( 志村喬) who is noteworthy for his appearances in 21 of 30 films by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa (more than any other actor) including Rashomon (1950), Seven Samurai (1954) and Throne of Blood (1957).
Lord Shimura is possibly inspired by Koremune Shigehisa, a member of the real Tsushima Sō clan who was awarded the title of Jito after ending a rebellion started by the Abiru clan. This is very similar to the in-game Yarikawa rebellion in which Lord Shimura ended a rebellion started by clan Yarikawa and was awarded the title of Jito.
According to the Record, "Conversations with the Khan 3", Lord Shimura apparently had the ambitious desire to be more than the Jito of Tsushima.
Lord Shimura's musical theme is inspired by the samurai biwa ballade based on Honnō-ji (本能寺の変, Honnō-ji no Hen). For observant fans, this melody would have foreshadowed his ultimate demise of being betrayed by his most trusted warrior, Jin Sakai.
Shimura's ultimate fate if Jin spares his life is widely debated by fans, as some believe he was executed by the Shogun or forced to commit seppuku for failing the Shogun's orders to kill his nephew. Whether or not Shimura did commit seppuku or was executed for his failure is unknown.

Gallery[]

Videos[]

Ghost of Tsushima - Story Trailer PS4

References and notes[]

↑ "Honor and Ash"
↑ Ghost of Tsushima credits

[1] "Honor and Ash"

[2] Ghost of Tsushima credits

[1]

[2]