Business is obviously going badly at Ubisoft, being forced to cancel several titles in production and postpone a well-known one.
The French giant has indeed split a letter addressed mainly to investors about the past year and the one to come, but which may also be of interest to players. And the news is more bad than good.
Still far from sinking, but the ship is taking on water
Set aside Rainbow Six: Extractionthe expansion Dawn of Ragnarok to Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Mario and the Rabbids or Just Dance 2023, the year 2022 was generally mixed for Ubisoft. During this time, games such as Roller Champions and its Battle Royale Hyperscape had to close their doors, the fault of an almost non-existent player account.
The French giant has also canceled four games in production (whose Splinter Cell VR and Ghost Recon Frontline). In the letter that interests us here, Ubisoft announces the cancellation of three additional projects, as yet unannounced. Research and development within the group would thus have suffered, losing 500 million euros in value.
The reason behind these numerous cancellations would be on the side of a changing video game market, in which these new titles would not have had their place. Ubisoft indeed evokes a focus of the industry around very strong brands, carried by games and their sequels that last for a long time, various platforms and with different economic models.
Instead of developing new licenses, the firm therefore believes that the most viable strategy is to develop its major licenses such asAssassin’s Creed, Ghost Recon or far cry. A stronger emphasis on games live-service would also be on the menu.
Bones gathering dust
In this letter, Ubisoft also quoted a certain Skull & Bones. You know, the eternally postponed open-world pirate ship battle game scheduled for March 9? Know that this is no longer relevant, the title being once again postponed. Instead of a full game, we will have a beta on the same date.
But that would be almost the least of the brand’s worries, while flagship games such as Mario and the Rabbids Where Just Dance 2023 would not have had the expected success. The group’s revenues would thus have recorded a 10% drop in 2022, instead of the 10% increase expected. It still weighs the pretty weight of 1.5 billion euros.
In fact, a major restructuring operation is to be planned internally, in order to refocus expenditure on key areas. Layoffs could therefore well take place in the months to come.
In this very dark picture, there are still some colors. Assassin’s Creed Mirage, returning to the roots of the iconic franchise, will be released this year. The famous Avatar: Frontiers of Pandorashould be released in 2024. Ubisoft tells us that several other premium titles will be released in this (large) period of time (including perhaps the famous game Star Wars ?).
Source : Ubisoft
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