The powers-that-be at Ubisoft, the Executive Committee and the Board of Directors, have announced an internal review and investigation of the company. This follows several setbacks for the firm, including (but not limited to) soft sales of Star Wars Outlaws and a big delay for Assassin's Creed Shadows. Most critical of all, however (and ultimately a product of the rest) is a stock price that has continued to nosedive in recent years, €11.42 per share at the time of writing.
That's down from a five-year high of €85.18, which is catastrophic stuff for a publicly traded publisher/developer of Ubisoft's size (employing a frankly absurd 19,000 staff; for comparison, SIE, across all studios, employs around 13,000). News comes to us by way of the French firm's latest financial statement and update (thanks, Insider Gaming), which reads:
"In the light of recent challenges, we acknowledge the need for greater efficiency while delighting players. As a result, beyond the first important short-term actions undertaken, the Executive Committee, under the supervision of the Board of Directors, is launching a review aimed at further improving our execution, notably in this player-centric approach, and accelerating our strategic path towards a higher performing model to the benefit of our stakeholders and shareholders."
Interestingly, the statement addresses the "polarized comments around Ubisoft", presumably regarding the various controversies surrounding Assassin's Creed Shadows: "I want to reaffirm that we are an entertainment-first company, creating games for the broadest possible audience, and our goal is not to push any specific agenda. We remain committed to creating games for fans and players that everyone can enjoy."
How optimistic are you feeling about Ubisoft these days? What do you think about the Board's investigation? That sounds fairly serious, right? Let us know in the comments section below.
[source staticctf.ubisoft.com, via insider-gaming.com]
Comments 83
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"our goal is not to push any specific agenda."
Yeah, right...
Wild to think you need 19,000 employees to type Ctrl C and Ctrl V a bunch of times to create their games.
@Jayslow yeah I haven't bought a ubisoft game in years. Just fully aware I can play a near identical game for half the price by going through their back catalogue. Nothing new they make is new.
People trying to use the woke label are stupid though. Ubisoft have had plenty of servicable stories. Their stories just don't matter. They are junk food, easy, copy and paste games that'll never crawl up a person's backlog
Star wars seems to have lost the licence to print money, and not because of the 'political' stuff I think. There was just never enough there to make a universe out of it.
My youngest brother and I are honestly craving The Division 3. Haven't even bothered with SW: Outlaws, and as far as AC is concerned, chronologically, I'm only on AC III Remastered
I genuinely wasn’t aware of anything woke about Ubisoft, as in directly through playing their games. If it wasn’t for my daughter explaining last month I wouldn’t even know what the term meant.
However, now I do know, and having given it some thought, I’ve just realised I haven’t played a Ubisoft title since the Original Assassin Creed game.
For a team of 19,000 they sure have made a small dent in my gaming memory. Just a bit shocking, they used to be rather favoured in the Rayman era.
Stop making the same bland games with different coats of paint and a million microtransactions. None of your products matter. I can't remember the last time I thought, 'Oh look! A Ubisoft game! I bet that's interesting!' Deus Ex maybe?
Following the delay and announcement of Ghost 2, I cancelled my Shadows preorder. If the game launched in November, I’d have all winter to tackle it, but now… who knows what else may release early in 2025? And why burn out on the samurai genre before a potential classic? I don’t hate Ubisoft like most people, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see why people feel distant from the brand. Prince of Persia is one of my favorite games this year, but that doesn’t stop it from being a baffling release that happened years too late after the brand recognition for the IP faded (and the marketing for the game was questionable too). 20 years ago though, Ubisoft was considered one of the better large publishers, so they could rebound. They’ve got the resources to restructure.
Leverage your IP, diversify your output, stop rushing your developers, polish games before release, and move away from the Assassin's Creed/Far Cry design model.
All you need to do is make one quality game that goes viral, and everyone will be looking at you. Rayman's Astro Bot. Jade's Breath of the Wild. Sam Fischer's MGS V. Ghost Recon's Helldivers 2. Red Steel's Half-Life Alyx (also remake Red Steel 2). (Also-also, let's start porting Rayman 2 to every console again).
Keep doing the allegedly 'woke' stuff, though. Because it'll be funny to watch all these people stumble when it's reenforced that the problem was never bad politics, but rather bad games.
Same exact games as games of old, very bland and not revolutionary like they were when ubisoft was big. They discount games so quick that people train to not buy right away as well. Add in the character and frankly Star wars is unappealing to many. We saw how expensive licensing can be with spiderman and wolverine leaks. This is gonna hurt them badly
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after farcry 3 everythings been kinda trash and i like the farcry games never got into the AC games those are just too samey imo everything ubisoft makes is mid at best
I can't help but laugh a little bit.
Small groups of AC fans over the years: "omg give us AC in Japan already!!!!!"
Ubisoft: gives AC in Japan
Fans/Investors/Everyone: WHY IS EVERYTHING SH*T. I HATE YOU
I don't know if 1% more from "wider audience" is worth for loosing 50% off from "normal audience" but they have to ask themselves. I think that main issue is Ubi lost focus of it's flag ship Assassin's Creed. Yes, lots will disagree, but when AC had overall story (Desmond, Abstergo) it was fuel for entire franchise. Now it is just random games, almost not connected together. And I completely lost any interrest in future AC games, because there is nothing to discover. And if you ask any player that jumped into series around AC Origins, they are unable to answer simple questions - Who are assassins? What is their purpose? Why is "this" game about exactly this timeline of "this" character? Why is there someone using "solarium" (animus) at the beginning of game?
@Veritas7Ax because they screwed it.
Ubisoft fell off when the AC franchise blew up, I'd say around the end of the Ezio saga. At that point, Ubisoft considered AC the money-maker and just leaned too hard in to it, effectively making them know for Open-World collect-a-thons that mimic their other games in a different setting. Players got bored, Ubisoft didn't listen, sure in their own Open-World formula being what players really wanted.
It has taken way too long for them to realize it isn't what players want.
@Gabrielmpf Ubisoft putting people in games that aren't white dudes.
... nefarious.
It seems like open world fatigue continues to spread amongst large portions of potential video game buyers. For better or worse, Ubisoft has become synonymous with formulaic. A new storyline, setting, and a few new tricks just doesn't entice players the same anymore.
Open world games nowadays need some "hook" to draw in players. Until Ubisoft can come up with one, I predict they will continue to flounder and deliver the equivalent of video game fast food.
At least they said they are committed to updated and improve outlaws for a long time, and make it a great game and success. Cross fingers, id love it to be super good in all accounts after done.
@Balosi Astute observation. The more they tried to explain Star Wars (think midoclorians) the least mystical and special it felt. I do think there is a lot of the universe to explore and the aesthetic is top tier, but much of content post-original trilogy has been either misguided or half-baked.
Maybe finally cancel The Beyond Good and Evil 2 GaaS mess after all this time and bring back single player Tom Clancy games.
@IamJT Mesa nosa know what a yoosa be saying!
@Xbox_Dashboard Deus Ex was Ion Storm published by Eidos, then Squeenix. Nope, not Ubi!
I thought Outlaws was good (and I'm normally not the biggest Ubisoft fan). But I also paid $20 for the month of U+ and was done. Can't imagine U+ is helping them any.
Make every game more woke.
They really do just get what they deserve. Why couldn't Outlaws just be a Han Solo game? Then they take this wishy washy position where AC is "fiction" but we also want to respect the culture... Yet they are bumbling around disrespecting everyone and thinking they can hide behind the fact their main character is black. Its just so transparent and sad. Thank god we got Ghost of Yotei which the developers have a proven track record of actually caring about the culture of the game.
@NEStalgia I’m not sure if Jar Jar was the biggest misstep in that movie or just making aliens based on racial stereotypes… either way there were a lot of questionable decisions. Midichlorians will always be my least favorite personally. “The Jedi are so cool and mystical like ultra powerful space monks.” “Yea but they get their powers through microscopic space bugs in their blood now.” “Oh okay… that’s cool”
@IamJT I'm not sure there were any decisions in that movie that WEREN'T questionable, other than maybe casting Liam Nisson. Which I'm sure he thinks was questionable.
It was so amazingly bad it took me many years and a Bioware fanfic to actually get me to watch anything SW again.
I want a new Rayman, Child of Light, and Splinter Cell. But with modern Ubisoft who lost the magic and creativity, i feel like it best to keep those IP in the coffin.
Oh here we go. Please leave Shadows alone universe. I wanna play my game.
Oddly enough, Ubisoft (Montpellier) delivered one of the best games I’ve played this year in Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown. I’d like to see more games like that!
@ZeroSum that’s a good reference point. I stopped being excited for Ubisoft stuff after Brotherhood.
@Ryu_Niiyama maybe I’m too optimistic but I still feel it’ll probably be a great game, though I’ll wait a bit before getting it on launch, depending on what comes out around the month.
@Jimmer-jammer I actually didn’t know that. It flew under my radar, might give it a go!
@PuppetMaster Child of Light was everything I coulda asked for from the UbiArt engine and its team. The right game at the right time for me. Shame we might not see them return soon.
@nessisonett so true.
Yves Guillemot has to go.
@Balosi ...did you really just say Star Wars doesn't have enough universe in it?
What?
You couldn't get more white than Eivor, lmfao.
I enjoy ubisoft games, mainly the open world collectathons. They're like comfort food, turn your brain off and do repetitive duties. Their games are always 7 or 8's, and I can't remember the last time or ever they actually made a 10/10 masterpiece of a game that set the world on fire. Assassins Creed Odyssey is one of their only titles to be nominated for GOTY at the game awards. They definitely need a management shakeup as it just hasn't worked for them for so long
@torquex but female Eivor is apparently the canon one
There is a remake/remaster in the works of the first game. I'll lalways remember Ubisoft for Splinter Cell, Ghost Recon and Rainbow Six.
I never tried that one but valhalla's Norway and England is great and i would of been ok with just those 2 places but the asgard and the other places were not so great imho. They got some very talented devs but man 19,000 staff? Ghost of Yotei is another tsushima 6/10 same as AC's 6/10, great open worlds though. Each to their own and gamers have different tastes not all like the same thing i suppose. I've never played a game that i could honestly say is a 10/10. I wouldn't even play astro bot if it was gifted to me although i would take a physical copy and trade it in, first thing i uninstalled was that astro rubbish, i hate games like that.
@Vivisapprentice and still white, lmfao.
@Yousef- absolutely worth a try if you like the metroidvania style!
Oh no! The other shoe dropped!
I'm looking forwards to shadows and I'm not bothered about the delay as it obviously needs some polish and I won't purchase it day one anyway...I'll wait for the sale as I've done with every AC game since origins (I'd rather have the ultimate editions at a fraction of the price.) Maybe ubisoft need to trim the fat as they seem to have an awful lot of workers and maybe release fewer games and concentrate on quality over quantity.
@torquex who was white in odyssey? The main protaganists were Greek and hardly the stereotypical "white" person.
@torquex you right, you right. I didn't play Valhalla, I just heard it was super long and boring.
I haven't played a game since the early 2010s, Child of Light, Grow Home, Rayman era of games.
I played Far Cry 3 and AC 4 and all their games now just seem derivative of that with no real evolution. If it's the same gameplay, and let's be real Ubisoft open worlds do not have good stories, then there's nothing for a player like me
I get people going oh it’s Ubisoft it’s woke it’s only shareholder’s blah blah.
But they are the money men. They will just cut back or even look to sell. Potentially putting them into MS hands.
Be careful what you wish for.
All the jokes and complaints about Ubisoft and people tired of them. I guess it’s starting to actually show, huh? I guess the recent comments about getting used to “not owning your games” might have had something to do with it. I don’t own a single one of their games, but I do like their earlier stuff.
Ubisoft games are void of creativity and their unappealing approach to design and monetisation has finally caught up with them. Their games hold no value because players don't hold on to them and you can buy copies at a fraction of the price within a month or two of release. People know they can just wait and get most of their games cheap now.
You what's really, really funny to me? You know who these publishers would hire to screen for things like the one legged gate? Sweet Baby.
So stfu.
Ignore all the 'woke' commentators. No one would give a hoot if the games were delivering on quality. The issue with Ubisoft is that they have gained a reputation for delivering the same experiences at a high price points with forced monetization. No one is excited for Shadows because everyone feels they have already played that game multiple times. No one was excited for Star Wars Outlaws because a), that brand is tarnished, and b) it seemed like just another Ubisoft game. Or they go for insipid attempts at live service models such as Xdefiant or Skull and Bones. I loved Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown but again, one can't expect a Metroidvania platformer to do AC sales.
If you’re really going to blame the downfall of Ubisoft of “wokeness” and not their derivative, uninspiring game design, predatory practices and toxic culture, you are brain-broken and need to log off and spend some time in nature or something.
Ubisoft has become boring and predictable with far too much focus on nickel and dimingl gamers. Ubi+ anyone? 😂
Maybe if they cared more about the games they create and less about the stock price they'd see more profit.
@LikelySatan AC's very first game had Altair as the protagonist, so the franchise always had some type of diversity. The difference is that AC was interesting back then, I absolutely adore every game until Black Flag. After that, it got boring.
Syndicate was cool, though. I really liked Evie.
Shadows does have something off about. I can't put my finger on it on what it is exactly. I do find it weird that pretty much every mainline game had the protagonist be someone native to the region we play in, Altair in the Middle East, Ezio on Italy, Connor on the US, Evie and Jacob on England, Bayek on Egypt. However, after many years of fans wanting to play as a Japanese samurai assassin, they don't deliver on it. It just feels like they wanted to be controversial.
The target is the CEO and his family they have lost touch with the gaming industry and clearly don't care anymore. I can see them up for sale can't see them crashing out but who would buy them if MS did they would be stopped the only ones who could now would be EA, Sony can't afford it unless Tencent buy more shares
Excuse me while I go to climb a tower to unravel my back garden to get to my shed,
You're not missing much if i'm honest but I got it for a tad over £13 in a ps store sale. The ability Dive of the valkyries is such fun though, it has some humour thrown in here and there, the religious monks are bonkers and i wasn't keen on that aspect, i just really enjoy riding around on horseback looking for a scrap. The saving grace is skipping some of the dialogue. For such a cheap price Norway and England are great the rest is not for me.
A report from Games Industry.biz published Sept. 6, 2022 said with regards to Tencent and the Guillemot Brothers Limited
Tencent is investing €300 million ($297 million) into GBL for a 49.9% stake in the company, which owned almost 13% of Ubisoft shares before this deal.
The deal only gives Tencent 5% of voting rights in GBL, but no seat on the board of directors or consent or veto rights in the operation of the business.
Ubisoft's board of directors has given Tencent permission to increase its directly owned stake in Ubisoft from 4.5% to just under 10%. Tencent will not be able to sell its shares for five years, nor will it be able to increase its stake beyond that 10% threshold for eight years.
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/tencent-increases-investment-in-ubisoft
Don't know never played it, i was refering to ac valhalla white male or female protagonist.
One element most of comments don’t point out is how essential Ubisoft is to France’s worldwide reputation. It’s the biggest video game company in the country, owned and led by French CEOs. And as the article stated, they employ a ton of people here. To see them in such a bad state is bad for players but even worse for the economy of France.
With the amount of fantastic IPs Ubisoft has, they should be leading the market right now. In France and elsewhere, gamers have been begging for new entries in the Rayman and Splinter Cell franchises for years. Instead of delivering great AAA solo experiences (which initially made the company famous), the Guillemot family chose to prioritize live-service games such as Riders Republic while still rushing the release of main solo franchises. They’ve been running after too many (crazy) rabbits at the same time and now they’re paying the price for it.
As for the supposed « woke » agenda, it’s kinda absurd. Women being main characters of games is not an heresy. Diversity in games is something that should be encouraged by players. I seriously pity gamers who don’t favors openness and acceptation in entertainment.
@LikelySatan Well, it has proven to be quite nefarious for them, as their current situation shows...
@Xbox_Dashboard deus ex wasn’t Ubisoft though
@AlexPorto they did deliver on that premise, as the female protagonist is a Japanese ninja, exactly what you’d expect from an AC game set in Japan. It was a weird decision to shoehorn Yasuke in, even if it was a Japanese character in his place. A bulldozing bloke who’s terrible at stealth doesn’t fit the lore, and sticks out especially after Mirage returned the series to its roots, and Shadows has a lot of new stealth mechanics. I do think the diversity pick accusation has some merit, they could have picked any number of historical figures over Yasuke, but I’ve still pre ordered. I’ll be using the character that suits the game.
I find Ubisoft a sad case, akin to a dementia-patient. Once every 10 years or so, they wake up and deliver a fun game like Rayman Legends. But then their eyes glaze over, they slump back in their armchair, and push out another Assassin's Creed turd.
My biggest problem with Ubi has been their willingness to just leave the defining elements of thier franchises Behind way to easily. Now I am a huge AC fan. I love all the older games. In my opinion those games offered something that nothing else in the industry did. Their biggest issue was Ubi releasing those games way too close to each other thus there not being many changes from entry to entry but taken as a whole the AC franchise was very unique. If you wanted to play something like AC the only real option was AC. Now it's just another RPG. Why would I bother playing a mediocre version of that when there are countless better ones out there? What exactly does the AC franchise offers now that I can't find elsewhere? They still don't seem to have learned their lesson, talking about how they want to go for the broadest appeal possible, well more of the same is gonna happen in that case.
I don't know what everyone's problem is with Ubisoft sure their games are simple mechanically but then again I don't put in Assassins creed game and hope I'm gonna being playing a Mario game with amazing game mechanics, they are simple and kind of fun games with beautiful worlds to explore. Sometimes after my 60 hour work week I just want to veg out and play a nice looking game with simple mechanics. As for the woke stuff, yeah I think its stupid but I just roll my eyes and continue playing.
@torquex sorry I thought the discussion was about odyssey..apologies.
Most people with any common sense, knows exactly what the issue is. Unfortunately common sense isn't that common in 2024. We'll just dance around and pretend it's something else.
@Yousef- I heard the sequel was cancelled when it still early stages of development 😔
@torquex I don't trust todays Ubisoft can do justice for a Splinter Cell remake...
@tselliot Mountain out of a molehill, storm in a tea cup lol. Can't wait to play as samurai Yasuke and crush some skulls
Don't see how they can go wrong because they have the original to copy from. It would be a travesty if they change the core formula.
@Yousef- I am more concerned about possible cancellation. A game isn’t out until it’s out.
@jberg my bad. Ok sooooo the last Ubisoft game I cared about isss....uhhhh..Beyond Good n Evil on the 360? Wow.
@Yagami no, to me a 7 is still a decent game, usually a few things from stopping being great. Even a 5 or a 6 can still be enjoyable
Sounds like they need to layoff 1000s of people unfortunately.
I still enjoy ubisoft games though and get most of their stuff day one.
"How optimistic are you feeling about Ubisoft these days?"
Ever since Breath of the Wild released, Ubisoft has had this notion that they need to match it, but somehow they're taking notes from everything BotW does wrong, as opposed to what it does right, which is not a lot. TotK is a better standard by a large margin.
Either I'm seemingly losing interest in games, or gaming is just boring and unoriginal
This shows how expensive liveservice is to upkeep. A pity for the workers they will probably get saddled up with the problems.
@Rudy_Manchego The game they produce are not horrible but if I buy one AC game every three years then im happy. Also with their ramming DRM in physical copies of games is not giving me a good feeling. The amount of stupid remarks like telling people accept that you don't own anything isnt the smartest thing to do and made a lot of bad blood.
Reading the comments and seeing how gamers are actually celebrating the down fall of a Major publisher is beyond stupid. I just think Ubisoft is now learning what EA learned after Anthem, it just took them a while longer and hopeful they figure it out.
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