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Assassin's Creed Shadows was originally slated for a 15th November release, but last month, Ubisoft announced a hefty delay to 14th February 2025, partially due to the underwhelming reception to Star Wars Outlaws. It seems this was the right call, and the company is already feeling much more confident, assuring investors that Shadows will be "delivered with a great experience by mid-February and with great quality."
That's according to Frédérick Duguet, the firm's chief corporate finance officer, who made the pronouncement during its second-quarter earnings call (thanks, VGC). When asked if there was a chance the game could be delayed again, Duguet reiterated: "We have a good visibility for the game to come on time and with great quality." Ubisoft estimates that delaying the game will add €20 million ($21.7m) to the total development cost.
Duguet admits the public's reception to Outlaw's unpolished state was partially responsible for Shadows' delay: "On the back of what we saw with Star Wars Outlaws, we need to make sure that we come with an impeccable player experience on day one. Of course, there are always some bugs, but we’ve been focusing and continuing to focus on ensuring that the day one experience will be well optimised."
How do you feel about Assassin's Creed Shadows? Do you think it will live up to the hype? Let us know in the comments section below.
[source videogameschronicle.com]
Comments 30
"we're confident that by the time everyone forgets how much our last game sucked, our next game will be much better received!".
(Tbf outlaws actually seems better than it's reputation implies.)
All the delay does is give the haters more time to sharpen their spears. Gamers never forget or forgive. Outlaws is not nearly as bad as people say but it will be better after a few big updates.
Let’s see if Ubisoft even survives that long…I do have high hopes for this game being successful though, don’t get me wrong. I’m not going to play it myself, but I believe it will do rather well or rather poorly, but it all depends on if Ubisoft can stay afloat until then. And lately all the news we hear about the company is less than stellar…
Star Wars Outlaws biggest problem to me is that it felt too much like a generic Ubisoft game. It wasn’t bad, but it didn’t stand out.
I kind of have similar expectations for the new AC game
They are confidently Delusional
@Lavishturtle "Gamers never forget or forgive"
They do when genuine effort is put in to fixing a game. Just take a look at Cyberpunk. That launched in one of the worst states ever and CPR went above and beyond to fix it for a very long time. Its now a really good game loved and praised by millions with an awsome expansion. UBI is a different breed tho as there will still be MT's day 1, fixed game or broken game and it will still be cookie cutter drivel.
Jokes aside, this game is basically a hail mary from Ubisoft. If this one flops just like Outlaws, it could be an unbelievably massive blow to Ubisoft. Which I think would be funny, but it's probably not good for the industry as a whole. I dunno, just gonna be interesting to watch.
I'd say delay it as long as it takes to provide the best experience at launch. I'm still looking forward to this one despite all the hate
Why not January or March? You know the game is going to catch heat all over again beacause February is Black History Month...
Also, is this game's launch still tied to the AC Infinity platform? That might be another controversial topic if it doesn't immediately add value to the customer.
I heard rumours that they were planning to only put the Infinity launcher on the physical disc, not the game data. That you still need to download a digital copy from the game via the Infinity launcher in order to play it, which would make the whole point of buying physical obsolete.
On the back of what we saw with Star Wars Outlaws, we need to make sure that we come with an impeccable player experience on day one
Translation: "it was perfectly known inside Ubisoft that those 2 games will launch in 2024 in an unfinished state, and still we gave Star Wars the green light.
And it's only because of negative player reactions resulting in low sales, and that we really need the money from AC Shadows sales to survive, that we decided to delay and actually finish it. Otherwise we would have launched it now without a second thought."
The effing nerve on some of the devs and publishers these days...
@Shinnok789 Exactly that how I read it too lol
Of courses they will with February being black history month. Coincidence … I think not.
"we need to make sure that we come with an impeccable player experience on day one"
Smirks.
@Shinnok789 You're probably right, but it's not exactly shocking that a company only reacts when they start to feel it financially, is it? Whatever the reason might be, if AC Shadows ends up being a better and more polished day-one experience as a result, that can only be a good thing.
The customer base voted with their wallets and it looks like Ubisoft got the message.
"delivered with a great experience by mid-February and with great quality." Bookmark me, cos I have an ominous feeling that statement is going to come back and bite them on bum when it launches!
Cyberpunk 2077 all patched up is still overrated and Keanu Reeves monotone dialogue is so dull and the NPC are dumb as rocks but to be fair most games A.I. NPC are, definitely artificial and most certainly not intelligent, hence dumb as rocks quote, lol. My opinion of course, ha.
If you had to guess, which option would you choose?
Nah, it will get buried by Yakuza + MonHun combo.
The only way I can see this working is by reworking the entire game, because no amount of polish will save something the public already sees as a turd, can't pull a CP2077/NMS with this one.
Hope that screenshot is not from in-game? makes me laugh at how blind the guards are, unless the brightness has been turned way up? lol
Could be a minority? could be just Ubisoft haters? Did you ask every gamer out there? is it the general consensus among millions of gamers? does any company actually track this sort of data and publish it as accurate data?
I really hope so. But I am working on Odyssey (just got back from Greece too so it hits harder) and Mirage (tried Valhalla and I hate it so I may have to youtube it) to tide me over. Shadows and Ghost of Yotei are my most anticipated AAA games next year. Super excited for Shadows. Making room for my shiny new statue!!
Will probably play this eventually and enjoy it, but February s KIngdom Come 2 month. Got a week off work for it and everything haha. What I'd really like from AC is a PS5 patch for Unity. Love that game.
If it does. Who's excited for it? I see mostly toxicity over it.
Only way to redeem this DOA product is to bring back AC multiplayer or this games a bust. we need multiplayer! Make AC great again!
AC4
Brotherhood
are GOATs for a reason!
I’m not sure but just my gut instinct is that this game is going to underperform. I could be wrong though. It just seems like the audience for it is busy with other games. Feb is probably a good time to throw it out there and see how it does. On the plus side, at least Ubisoft doesn’t have to pay royalties on this game like for Star Wars and Avatar.
I wouldn't shed a tear, if the game never comes out. Same if Ubisoft shut down.
When has Ubisoft (or any dev, for that matter) admitted to launching their game in a horrid state? Do these companies admit they're about to lay an egg? (CDPR didn't warn anyone about Cyberpunk. Sony called Concord the future of Playstation.)
It doesn't matter what Ubisoft SAYS. It matters what they DO. And what they've been doing for years is releasing titles under-cooked and laden with horrible mtx and poorly implemented (and often broken) gameplay systems that got old half a generation ago.
I'll be utterly shocked if Shadows is even CLOSE to as good as Ghost of Tsushima, let alone the sequel coming around the corner. Ubisoft got left in the dust with this one. They desperately need to embolden actual creators to refresh their titles.
Their designs have become rote and stale and their competitors are taking their designs and improving upon them while they just cut and paste different aspects to try and create something "new" and "compelling" when all it really ends up being is a mishmash of well-trodden ideas without a cohesive vision.
I'm not the biggest AC fan, but I keep my eye on the series because they sometimes do manage to knock one out of the park with regard to how it piques my interests (Origins and Odyssey were awesome imo). Shadows couldn't be further off my radar if it tried. I don't even fully hate Ubisoft. Farcry and Division are some of my favorite shooters of all time. I've put loads of hours into them and even Siege. Hell, Ghost Recon Wildlands was a friggin' BLAST to play with my buddies. There's just no spark in Ubisoft games anymore. You buy one and you can bet your ass you've seen every single gameplay mechanic and system before in an older Ubisoft game (or a competitor's title), but with odd changes for no reason. They design by copy and pasting ideas. Just reshuffling what's been done before. They haven't innovated (or recognized their own innovation) in YEARS. And their reputation shows it.
@Kidfunkadelic83 Remember No mans sky? I 'member.... (looks into the sunset on a rocking chair).
@torquex Honestly? With how much attention the game gets, with about an article a week, and the interest for it in Japan, I think it’ll be the best selling Assassin’s Creed game in the series.
They mean, confident it will release with a s**** load of bugs.
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