I have so conflicting thoughts on ubisofts. I really like a lot of their games and they do support them for a long time after launch but their management keeps doing really weird & terrible decisions all the time.
I loved them from the time of Rayman on DOS until about Syndicate. Ever since Syndicate I've not enjoyed their games nearly as much as I have most of my life.
AC and Far Cry's gameplay is mostly solid but they never iterate on anything. This is the same problem with call of duty. Eventually people are going to get sick of it.
The problem with big AAA companies are that they’ve grown “too big”. They have to profit a considerably huge margin every game to satisfy the execs and investors and that lead to predatory-trend chasing-cash grab of games decisions we see today
Their sells comes from assassin's Creed mostly and maybe farcry. Or maybe watchdog. Other best games they just killed cause of out ideas and they afraid they are gonna waste their money.
And one problem with big AAA-studious is that when things start to go bad, they always want to cut anything small and concentrate everything on few big franchices. "Go big or go home" and when that fails, huge layoffs, canceled games and CEO's change into some other company with huge bonuses as a 'reward of years of service'. When the other strategy would be to go with several cheaper and more personal games that go birth new and more valuable IP's to build new sequals on. But no, bigger and more boring 100h games with insane grind and artificial length to hype the "expansive world".
It's no secret Ubi became another EA a long time ago. As a person with passion for good video games I always wonder how do such companies still manage to exist.
Exactly. Ubisofts problem is that financially they don’t have giant cash cows like FIFA or Madden that earn hundreds of millions every year while being the exact same game year over year.
Folks that aren’t tired of it yet are still buying the games. That’s part of it anyway, hard to help too. I don’t expect younger generations to notice the dips in quality that older gamers might be seeing. If enough people perceive these practices as a problem, something _may_ be done about it then
I worked for Ubisoft from 2015-2019 straight out of SGD. I am surprised they have not announced massive layoffs after so many cancelled games. During my time with them, there would me a lot of layoffs after a game shipped, literally all the contractors would be fired and also at least half of the QC employees no matter if the game made a lot of money. The crazy thing is that in a few months when a new game would start development some of the laid off people would be rehired. Volt also would take some of their money so basically it was a dead end job for them and there was no way to better themselves. Ubisoft would take advantage of all of the new devs that just finished school because the studio I worked for had a ton of 4 years universities and community colleges around. Ubisoft would hire people and keep maybe 1/3 and fire the rest right before 3 years so they would not get bonuses or more pay. It was pretty disgusting. For anyone that wants to make games and really wants job security your number 1 bet is to be a competent programmer. Do not under any circumstance do QC because that is bottom of the barrel and they are always exploited and the first ones to be fired. Artist are almost always contracted from China/SK so if you are an artist in America or Europe you are also in trouble because the competition always works for no money.
By QC, I'm guessing you mean QA. QA is obviously "safe" because no one tests games forever. But let's not cry for those poor programmers, they probably found a job after like a week or two, there is endless demand for programmers these days, especially does with degrees. As for the QA that don't have programming skills, yeah, it sucks and it will be a lot harder to find another job, it's a well known fact that QA is unsafe, not just in the video game industry, but for the entire software industry. Ubisoft should QA as a contract lasting the duration of game development, it wouldn't give people false hopes.
@@MichaelDavis-mk4me I agree but you would be surprised how many people in school thing they will get into the industry by QA (at my studio we called it QC, quality control even though in school it was QA). Even my instructors would push for people to get into the industry as QA which looking back is insane since you have no future. The best thing is that after years of doing work if you are lucky you might get QA lead but that is only one person at least at my Ubisoft studio.
@@tHeWasTeDYouTh Here in Quebec, when I studied computer science, I was told Ubisoft Montreal is a fantastic place to work... if you are already experienced. Essentially, you have to have many years of experience before considering working there, otherwise you'll just end up in QA or programming easy, repetitive things all day for a bad salary. I decided not to go in the video game industry after all, programming is the same everywhere anyway, just pick the best job available.
@@MichaelDavis-mk4mealso QA for video games salary is the same as working at a retail store now a days($15-17 an hour or so) I’m a software QA for a different industry and my salary is immensely higher than that
They're finally hitting the ramifications of their paint by number game design. The fact is most of their games feel the samw: big open world with tons of markers to do the thing at. The ones that aren't like Siege and For Honor have their own issues that ubisoft hasn't addressed and seem content with keeping their head in the sand.
Their one breakout no brainier hit (splinter cell VR on quest) being cancelled is such a terrible idea. Millions of quests out there and a very small (probably could count them on my fingers) REAL games worth your time and money. Blade and sorcery, contractors, onward, bonelab, into the radius, and sairento are honest to God the only games that come near reaching that AAA level of being worth sinking time into. People are begging for a big studio to make a purpose built vr game with a comfortable budget. It would sell. I can't stress enough that there really is no competition besides res 4 which is a shoddy port of a game never built with VR in mind. So sad. Apparently there is a assassin's Creed vr game in the works but melee has only been done to a decent level by blade and sorcery which has a full purpose built system just for physical interactions. They wanna roll the dice on making satisfying melee over the much easier to get right stealth shooter? What are they thinking?
This is probably why there is almost no chance of a new Rayman or Splinter cell game releasing. Ubi can't corrupt them with it's generic open world formula.
Ubisoft made some of my most favorite games back in the early 00's. I hope they turn around but they also are completely responsible for the situation they're in.
Yeah that's the problem, arguably they haven't made a good game in over a decade. All their top tier titles these days are copy/paste trash. No innovation, no passion for the games they make and the focus is solely on profit. They like EA and some others have failed to realise that without the love and passion to make the best game possible you are never going to have the best game and therefore profits will tank.
Sad to hear Sparks of Hope isn’t selling. Many Ubisoft IPs started out as tightly designed single player experiences and have since been bloated into games as service formats. Over time many of the games have become far removed from what players actually like and it’s been so long that players are voting with their wallets.
To be honest, I would love to play Mario + Rabbids series but I am not going to buy a Switch just for that. Would greatly love to see it on other platforms, though (at least on PC as well) - not sure if Nintendo would agree on this.
Sparks of Hope just have a really unfortunate timing, releasing at the same time as Bayonetta 3 and Persona 5. Also add to the fact that tactical RPG is a niche market.
Im calling it, it is the era for indie games. Triple A companies are getting too greedy just trying to grab money and releasing broken crappy games. With the amazing tools now available to everyone through things like Unreal Engine, very soon we will see great games from actual players who want to play great games.
For every bad triple A game there are ten terrible indie games. They are indie for a reason, don't delude yourself into thinking just because the big boys are struggling that somehow means indies are gonna have this massive fuck off Renaissance where they create god tier games left and right.
There is still a reason for choosing indie though It is getting to a point where AAA games is nearly garrenteed to be a cash grab copy of one of their existing games, while he’s there is probably more bad indie games, but they are naturally weeded out though nature selection, allowing the good ones to shine though, while AAA could rely on the “too big to fail” and milking IPs for some time
I'd say that Triple A companies like UbiSoft & EA are the ones getting greedy and release half assed games like FIFA, Madden and the more recent Assassins Creed games (Odyssey & Valhalla). There's still a ton of other Triple A companies that produce so many hits like Insomniac, Santa Monica Studios, NaughtyDog, FromSoftware exc. Though I do agree many new and upcoming Indie games are getting really good and I find myself playing some that I otherwise would've never in a million years thought I'd play
The biggest problem with any company is that if the company is doing shit it’s usually due to a lack of right direction and leadership from the person running the company
My guess is that the guys on top dont play/know jack shit about gaming culture and they just want to see high sell numbers and that reflects the quality of your product/service, they have games like division that can be a very good way too get money but they dont do much there, like no new expansion and the season pass is not enough i stoped playing that, and switched to destiny2.
@@Airflow80 completely agree. I do think The Division 1 and 2 are pretty fun and the WONY expansion is actually very good. I just wish Ubisoft would stop with this live-service online-only bullcrap and give us good single-player experiences again cause lemme tell ya, those were THE DAYS.
1 YEAR LATER .... 613 people playing Skull and Bones in real time. Cost 200 millions + 20 to 40 millions in publicity. Dev 10 years, Ubisoft Studio's involved = 6
I think they had no option but to delay skull and bones after the push back they got after the gameplay reveal. I don't think the reason is "polish and balance" but more on the line of reworking the systems in there entirety because nobody wants to be gathering resources with their ships canons and have cutscenes on land rather than explore on foot.
About time we acknowledged the fact that the developers of many of the industry's leading franchises who used to be really special have been taking Ls for years now
yeah, it feels like there's no creativity anymore. Everything is very corporate and is just another investment stocks and pleasing the investors instead of caring about their own player base and making sure the game is test played, finished, and can be completely played vanilla or launch.
@@naplzt4k it's more like management was taken over by marketing which is only concerned with selling more with the minimum time and ressources ... They just release the same games over and over with a new coat of paint and call it a day
Its really not too surprising to see the publishers with 1 huge franchise propping them up and a complete unwillingness to try new things rather than just put out a bunch of the same thing over and over run into issues. This has kinda been a long time coming.
This is the fun part, they have like 10 big ass franchises, but they are doing poorly, they own Rayman, Tom Clancy's things, PoP, AC, Just dance, Far cry, Might and magic, Driver. Just yikes
11:08 For me it's also about not being scummy and rooting out the abusers in the company. The main reason why I haven't been interested in buying Ubisoft products lately is because of the mobile game-like monetisation schemes and the lacklustre reaction to abuse allegations.
So you want them to expose and fire employees based on “allegations”? I think it’s a good thing they don’t throw their employees under the bus to appease twitter children.
@@halfcutonion6342 That's not what it's about. It's about lack of transparency, not receiving updates and inaction. And it seems to be a serious problem. 25% of employees claim to have seen or experienced workplace misconduct. So it's not just some twitter children in this case. Personally I think a problem seems to be that those who are accused of the the misconduct are working at Ubisoft for a long time and are hard to replace, which might be why they overlook stuff and try to sweep it under the rug. However they _do_ take measures. At the end of the day it's hard to say wether said measures lead to an improvement or not.
@@ThePandafriend This lack of transparency you talk about is a good thing, not a flaw. The last thing we need is for a company to be able to publicize employee information without repercussions, if there is a legal problem with an employee they should be dealt with privately.
@@halfcutonion6342 I'm talking about lack of transparency of the investigation. With that I don't mean transparency to the outside world, I mean transparency to the employee(s) who asked for that investigation.
Clearing up some info, Mario and Rabbids did not do poorly. All they said was that it underperformed over Christmas and the week after Christmas. It most likely sold extremely well. Gotta keep in mind that their expectations for the game might have been in line with a Square enix outlandish sales number.
The problem with Mario and Rabbids is that the vast majority of the people that bought the game, did so for the novelty of the experience given their admiration for the characters. The idea of a sequel would have no appeal to such a person; Unless they bought into the entire turn based tactics genre at that stage, there was no way there were going to invest in a sequel.
Perhaps if it only had the novely factor going for it, but for all accounts (I haven't played it) the first game was good in and of itself. The sequel also seems to have improved upon the first a lot.
Also, the original came out during the Switch's launch year, and many early adopters of the game bought it because it was one of the few Mario game on the latest Nintendo console (at the time, the only other Mario game was Mario Kart 8, which released about 3 months prior).
With the CEO's comments, it is no surprise things are a mess. Sucks for the workers there, but it is not really a surprise after the bloated games, NFT decisions and general dumb actions
*In Ubisoft term and conditions:* We don't take responsibility if our software or game infect your pc with malware also we have full of your games You don't own any Ubisoft game
@@royalkumar795 you don't own any game actually. Be it ubi, from software or sony, you only own game licences, not the games themselves. even if u own the cd.
Thanks for the insight, but I think there's more to the story that we don't know. I feel like there's a bigger thing happening that gonna affect the future of the entire Ubisoft - creative people or important employees that move to other companies. I hope it's not true, but I'm guessing they lack these key people at the moment. I believe that behind the scenes, huge studios like Microsoft tend to "buy" (steal) everyone, or at least these key people from other studios, or something like that. What is happening now in France, huge protests (for changing the retirement age from 62 to 64 and high cost of living) also adds a lot of tension through employees, and it does add a level of uncertainty to the whole industry.
Accountants are running those big companies, instead of game passionates like they used to. They are making the same repeatable lazy crap, with a focus on microtransactions and people are getting tired of it. There's no hidden depth or meaning to all that.
I love that this video reminded me of the types of editorial articles I'd read in gaming magazines back in the 90s. Not sure who wrote it but kudos to both you and Falcon on that.
I swear Falcon's narrations sounds like a cool uncle that is passionate about video games and the way he expresses his love for video games is very informative.
I really loved far cry 6, spent a month on it and once you've collected everything, upgraded everything and blah blah blah. There's just nothing to do. Like, half of that month I spent was just running around.
It’s honestly insane and sad seeing this company as shell of it’s former self ..like at this point what games do they actually have planned to release this year and where is beyond good and evil 2
Honestly I think they were deep into the development of Beyond Good and Evil 2 and decided to strip the paint off of it and turn it into this Star Wars game. They were really putting A LOT of work into BG&E and they probably figured if they translated that game structure into a brand as big as Star Wars it would be a much bigger return on there investment. So I think they're going all in on that and they'll probably rush and throw together some BG&E online multiplayer game that looks good but doesn't have much substance. 🤷🏽♂️just my theory
I have conflicting feelings about the remark on the 7 canceled games having no investment. The public knows little to nothing about them, so there's no external hype, but it could be heartbreaking internally. Besides that I used to be a big fan of Ubisoft games, just not really the last decade. Thanks for this breakdown Falcon!
For real, everyone who worked on them must be devastated. I have a friend in comics who has had a few projects they were involved with shelved recently, and it has not only hurt them financially, but really broken their heart.
You’re telling me Ubisoft shifted to generic empty open world games years ago, stripping all their franchises of uniqueness, and now they’re having trouble??
How did one of Ubisofts biggest releases coming out not get mentioned, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora? Its planned for this year or early next. My guess would be next winter(2023-2024). It's done by the studio behind division and now following the Huge Success of Way of Water this could be the big cash flow boost Ubisoft needs.
They need to polish and balance the in-game cash shop… I stopped playing Ubisoft games when they started their live service model for single player games.
There's always going to be studios taking on Star Wars games because of how big a franchise it is and how many Star Wars fans there are, so I wouldn't worry too much about the future of Star Wars games.
Im kinda sceptical about Ubisofts Star Wars game, because apperantly they are looking for a microstransaction expert for the Star wars game.I hope thats not true, but it might sadly be.
Sparks of Hope didn’t sell as well because people saw how cheap the original went on sale for after barely a year and decided it was worth it to wait for a steep discount
I want an Assassin’s Creed/Prince of Persia crossover dammit! The dagger, the hourglass, and the medallion could easily turn out to be Pieces of Eden and maybe The Prince had previously unknown training from the Order of Assassins but was forced to go separate ways because time displacement. It’s too perfect not to make it a reality.
Have to deal with the rights issue first. Ubi doesn't own PoP as an IP and that's proven to be problematic in the past. In fact, that's what spurred the creation of Assassins Creed in the 1st place.
The reason why AC was made is because of PoP. There was some issue with the ownership of PoP so ubi just went fuck it we will make our own PoP with hoods and parkour and it seemingly became a huge hit
When Falcon couldn't think of any other AAA-game that has been in development this long I was subtly reminded and saddened by the memory of Beyond Good and Evil 2 supposedly still getting released some day
@@wrydstepbr0_0 A single game can't hold an entire company unless it's GTA or FIFA. Haven't you seen the news? They've spent the past few months begging around for someone to buy them, and everyone refused.
When a game company has significant delays (Like Skull & Bones) if gives players like me pause. Although I am absolutely excited to see something come of this game, at this point I am VERY skeptical about buying it on release. Most likely I will wait 5 or 6 months to buy it so I can see how it's received and how it performs. In fact, at this point I never actually buy ANY game on release - nor do I per-purchase them... I wait 30days minimum post-release to see how the company handles all the inevitable bugs & crashes that come with a new release.
“they’re not in any danger of folding…” I wouldn’t be so sure about that. They tried to be acquired by other companies and got rejected 😂 that says a lot about their situation. I do hope they make a comeback because competition is good but they really have to make an effort.
@@ItzBirdMan1337 yess! Honestly I need battlefield and ghost reacon to be given the love they deserve, the last ghost reacon game I enjoyed was future solider... Holy crap that was so long ago
I’m still mad at this company for not making a remastered or anniversary edition of the original Rayman games. They keep ignoring that classic character. Rayman 3 is my favorite game and they keep pretending it doesn’t exist. Making a remastered edition of the game would be a massive gold mine but they keep on wanting to make more AC games that get a bit repetitive & confusing at times lol 😂
Yup, every ray fan is still waiting on a Rayman game, heck I want voice acting to come back like in the original trilogy, Rayman speaking wasn't all bad and it can still work, rather than being the silent protagonist, which isn't bad either.
Now I might be wrong but the last two Rayman games didn't sell very well platformers are pretty niche these days and Rayman was never one of the top I.P in that space so yeah not the best time sorry
While I would definitely love this personally, having grown up with them as a kid, I do realize this is mostly just nostalgia talking. Most people who've played them way back when probably wouldn't have the time or/nor the money to play them now in a shiny refurbished expensive form. Nor the time due to difficulty. When I talk games with my friends, they oft tell me how games are too hard nowadays (citing Sekiro, Elden Ring, Souls etc). Hard _nowadays_ ? Rayman was downright _sadistic_ with its difficulty. I was never able to beat it as kid, nevermind reach the later levels. I think, even, a part of the appeal of it was wondering about and imagining what those later levels could even be, seeing as I realized I probably would never reach them! (I played it at a friend's house's PC for the most part) I doubt this would much appeal to the younger generation, either, who are used to Fortnite-like dopamine drip feed.
@@samuraicupcake289 Hold on here Rayman 2 and 3 are not that difficult. The first one makes you want to pull your hair out(like crash bandicoot). That’s a fact. There is some challenge in two and three but it doesn’t waste your time.
It almost as if "time savers" and gameplay designed to push you to buy them was a disgusting idea, and now they are reaping the rewards of people avoiding their trash.
I’m really sad about Sparks of Hope not selling well. I loved it, really didn’t see any major performance issues that ruined the game for me (still looks amazing Imo), and ultimately it’s sad to see it most likely not getting any future support.
The problem isn't the game, it's the console. The switch is mostly dead. Only games like BOTW2 and pokemon games have any chance of performing there, imo.
I was actually shocked that that did not sell well considering how popular Mario is the only reason I haven't bought it yet is because I still haven't beaten the first game and honestly I have like 330 something games on switch and almost 300 on my Xbox series S.
maybe if Nintendo would of released an actual console that can legitimately compete with the new generations of consoles instead of a tablet slower than an iphone sales would have probably be different. and also all of the games they make are the same reused games from 40 years ago.
Love them or hate them, Ubisoft have mastered the act of making bad games for a decade but still getting gullible customers to believe the next game will be different.
Mario+Rabbids Spark of hope is actually really fun to play. A great iteration of the Xcom games that has some really good stuff in it. I'm surprised it didn't get more popular, it's a great game for the switch.
Lille info : a strike is annonced in Ubisoft French studios to obtain salaries raises as it was the case in the Montreal studios on the one hand. On the other hand Guillemot's last public speech created a fear that management is going to get worse and that teams are going to be silently let go.
Thumb down every time someone say "cuz it's not marketed." It didn't sell well because guess what other tactical games are on the platform and DID sell VERY well with little marketing? It's really really disappointing that people just keep circle jerking the WRONG concept.
Id honestly be down to see a full blown reimagined splinter cell series as activision did with the modern warfare franchise but thats just me personally! 😊
I’m right here with you dude, don’t get me wrong I think splinter cell vr would have been awesome but I would absolutely love to see a new line of games or even just an updated version of the old games. I know it’s the more controversial one but conviction actually ignited my love for the series I played the originals too young and sucked so wasn’t fond but I played conviction fell in love and went back to the originals which I also love.
Or with rainbow.... They have a legit franchise right there that's just begging to be totally remade as a proper challenge to cod. Imagine a 8 hour single player rainbow game, with modernised RSV2 multiplayer and its got seige added on as an alternative to war zone. Take my money ubi.
At this point it feels like most "AAA" studios have become the fast food of gaming. McActivision and Ubisoft in the box have gotten good at pumping out their menu items, but lack the ability to really make anything unique. As a customer, the game that mom and pop shops have been offering, is a lot more complete, fulfilling, and new.
Ubisoft just been making half baked and pretty much unfun games Watch dogs series, Far Cry 6, the division, ghost recon, Valhalla. They’re all beautiful open world games but they just don’t click
They've been doing weird stuff for a while, but I do think it's admirable that they've supported Valhalla with so much free content. I'm also glad they're listening to the fans in terms of Mirage being much more like the previous assassins games
They're still supporting and providing free updates for The Crew 2 after 5 years as well. There's not many positive things to say about Ubisoft these days but that is one of them. I didn't like or get these games but for fans it's great.
I’m shocked that AC Valhalla got so much support years later, it’s very impressive to see a game get that type of support. I’d love to see Mirage take things back and give us a classic AC game with a concentrated story.
Valhalla might had free content but don't forget that it was mostly all of it time consuming boring and buggy garbage (festivals, mastery challenges etc) and also don't forget that their microtransaction system in the game is a disgrace and probably that's what makes them most of the money from it's "success" not the game's actual sales
The issue with Ubisoft is that it separated it's game pipeline from reality, they got attached to a formula and went with it to produce easy money, but as per usual the more time it goes on the more reasons are forgotten and ultimately they forgot what it is that made that formula successful but continue to use it because it used to produce results. It reminds me of the experiment with the 5 monkeys in a cage with a ladder and a banana. They just keep doing what used to work, it doesn't work anymore but they don't know why because they forgot why it worked in the first place. They create these giant open worlds that are nothing but a "playground" with copy-paste activities that don't differentiate from one another, where the graphics is the only interesting thing but after a while they are ignored, then the characters are bland and generic, the story is generic and they just throw systems into the game because "RPGs sell" but they don't even are necessary or simply add a way for them to monetize the game. Ubisoft went soulless, they don't remember how to make good games anymore and that's what has brought about this fall.
You would think that as technology evolves it would become easier and easier to make great games, but somehow it’s only gotten harder for most developers.
There's a vicious circle there though: as technology evolves, customer expectations evolve too. So while it would be insanely easy to make Super Mario 64 again with today's technology, the expectation is for something newer, bigger, grander, with better lighting, higher fidelity, more in game systems, etc. At least this is my thought/theory.
Funny story is that I used to have bad PC and I could only play games after 5-6 years of their releases. Now I have good PC but I still wait a couple of years and buy games for 10$ or 20$ on sale because preordering or spending 50$ is just not worth for me.
The same thing that happens to all big legacy gaming companies that forgot how to make the very games or products that made them successful in the first place. If creating fun and engaging games and appealing to their costumers isn't their first priority then the end result will always be the same.
it's starting to happen with Bethesda...they used to be great and knocked it out the park with Skyrim then they decided to make Fallout 76 and now Starfield is on the way but feels like it will fail.
They didn't forget, the talent just left and all that's left from the companies that used to make great games is the name. That talent was replaced with whoever came knocking to the publisher's door, and the publisher only cared about sales.
Hey, falcon I think you forgot to mention about big developers left Ubisoft because of bad working environment also employees are protesting against Ubisoft in Paris 🇫🇷.
I think skull & bones was going to be the pirate game folk wanted from black flag but then ubi changed direction to follow trends towards a BR or live service style focus. They've made a lot of cash from games but they've also burned money on other things, such as the quartz\NFT fustercluck and BR stuff.
@@wrydstepbr0_0 At one point the info available was that they'd decided to make it a very pvp focus and then reigned that back after they realised that multiplayer reliant games tend to bomb after the two week twitch hype window slams shut. I only used BR as an example not that S&B was going to be one.
"Let's take the boat stuff from AC4 and make it a game." "Cool." (1 month later) "Okay. Boat combat. What else?" "..............." (3 years later) "So... boat combat. What else?" "................" (7 years later) "........... flag DLC?"
I'm really skeptical when it comes to Skull and Bones. It reminds me of when they showed off the first Watch Dogs. It looked really good with all the wind and weather effects and even the trench coat was flowing nicely in the wind and what we got was such a bad downgrade where none of that looked like they showed off. I mean I hope they take the time and really deliver and make it playable with the graphics like those videos of it. But it's Ubisoft, I wouldn't be surprised if they cut those corners again even after all those delays. I'm just cautious of that, since they did that with multiple games before, Watch Dogs, Rainbow Six Siege and I think there was some others but those two I remember had those downgrades.
From my perspective skull and bones was dead on arrival (announcement in this case) a multiplayer ship battle could be fun but it just looks boring as hell and bland. It worked in AC but singleplayer seems more suited for that
yeah, i've got zero expectations because Ubisoft is good at bait & switch. they still haven't made a Watch Dogs game that looks as good as that first-ever trailer.
@@acomingextinction I agree. Always keep the expectation bar low, so the disappointment doesn't kick as hard when they do let one down. I live by that 😄
Dude, this video is a year old and we were asking this question back then, and now it's even worse, their stock hit an all time low after Star Wars Outlaws and they are in trouble with AC Shadows...
Keep up the great work, Falcon. Although I personally think that ubisoft has waay too much that is reliant on skull and bones, assassins creed and open world star wars game, because of that I think if those three (in a perfect world) all do great than they will be fine just like you were saying, but if it doesn't do you or anyone else think that could be the end of them?
Ubisoft got more flak than it deserved. Their biggest sin was making their trailers look a bit too good back in the day. Nowadays, they actually stick true to the gameplay that they showcase and their games are far less buggy on release than their competitors. They truly pushed the boundaries of gaming.
It never existed and it never will 🙏 All we'll ever see out of that game is "it's still in development!" messages and little concept demos that get scrapped.
The biggest concern I have for this is for the employees. If they are cutting 200m out of their budget, I've worked in enough large corporations over the last 15 years to know that that means downsizing while still expecting the same overall team output. I just hope crunch doesn't get worse for these people, but it likely will.
Random fact: Ubisoft Singapore started developing Skulls and Bones back in 2013, it was originally gonna be a Black Flag spin-off/expansion and an MMO named "Black Flag Infinite", but that idea was later scrapped
Let’s be real, splinter cell in vr, if done well, would be absolutely amazing. I don’t really understand this divide between regular gaming and vr gaming. Vr is early and it’s truly amazing and we need to support it while developers are still trying to use the technology😊
I don't want them to make a new Splinter Cell game. They'll ruin it by making it an RPG. Imagine having to shoot an enemy in the head for 50 times as the enemy's big colorful healthbar is slowly dropping off.
Great work, I would hope they capitalize on the Tom Clancy work. The Division series is fun and it’s “constant” fun. Not a roller coaster, but a place to go to play or play with others.
I am personally disappointed to learn that a VR Splinter Cell may have been in the works and then got cancelled. With the PSVR2 coming out, that would have been a game to look forward to.
I know you said in another video that you just don't want them announcing release dates if they aren't sure, but I feel like we shouldn't be harping on them as a community. Ubisoft happily rushed out AC after AC leading to Unity(?). I rarely even look into what's being made anymore before it's almost out. I just don't wanna pressure the companies even more to push out unfinished products. And I think it wise for just about every game to have a Beta now to work out (hopefully) final kinks. Certainly online multiplayer games.
ubisoft needs a new leader who can make better decisions for the company and give projects to the team who are excited about the project and can deliver on time if any project takes longer than usual then let other teams help them to make it on the deadline for any big projects like skull and bones and Beyond Good & Evil
I love how you present your content. From weekly news, game updates, and top (x) counts, every video is informative and enjoyable. Keep up the great work!
@@dallesamllhals9161 They were good before they implemented a storefront and started to focus on microtransactions. The last 3 AC games are nothing more than shallow husks of the past. Nothing more than storefront first, game second and yeah don't bother with a propper written narative.
I will never forget reading an article over 10 years ago about ubisoft only wanting to focus on games that can become franchises. I always remember that quote anytime I see ubisoft in the news regarding their games.
Those games thrived on good stories in the beginning, now they are just bloated with complete nothingness. Stories are awful and the content is shallow. Origins was not bad and oddesy had nothing going for it other then having a massive mapand decent combat mechanics. Valhalla is so bad neither a large map or good mechanics could save it.
They need to massively scale down their live service stuff and just focus on good narratives. Even ditch the open world stuff. Massive open levels with a hub world seems to be something they can pull off well.
I'm tired of both tbh AAA developers put out fake trailers indie developers put out fake kick starters rip to this gaming industry. Thank God for the few who still have morals
I'm tired of games taking ten minutes to load on brand new machines because they have to authenticate with a DRM server somewhere. Make your games actually good and I will buy them. Force me into shitty DRM and I will not.
10:25 That is the Idea for Games. Take as Long as Possible to beat the game. I Rather Have VERY Long games that Take a Month+ to actually beat the game. WHY would You NOT want a game Like that?
In my view, even though that might not generate as much profit (at least as easily) or make sense to the business-people that work there, they should just scale down their productions indeed and make MORE "compact" or "streamlined" and focused games. - I mean, "Mirage" is a good example of that, which... I'm not sure if it will be that good or just kinda watered down because it's by a different studio, but nobody but probably the biggest fans of just the last three is complaining about a more streamlined and "back to the roots" "AC"-entry at this point. They can also do this with most of their other games, such as go back to a more focused and methodical "Rainbow Six" and "Ghost Recon". The "Siege" CoD-like and e-sports type game can still remain alongside of that. But they should really just make their products more efficient, like campaign-based, but also multiplayer-stuff that gives them extra value, like it used to be. - And then they can also go back to single-player games such as for "Splinter Cell", for which they're already doing are remake, but then they could continue with new ones as well. - Then there's also other stuff like Rayman, which they could really exploit with multiple types of games, not only the main ones like the last two ("Origins" and "Revolution", which are artful gems, why not more of that), but perhaps also spin-off type games, maybe even back to the 3D world. - And "Prince of Persia"?... Just get ON it!... Get the remake done and then see what more, it doesn't have to be complex. - Oh, and when it comes to "Rainbow Six", they should just revive that "Patriot"-project they canceled in favor of "Siege". They have a lot of options and they can just generate money more sporadically with more solid releases that aren't overly... just everything. It all has become too overblown, especially for Ubisoft. But they need to reel it in and kinda go "back to basics", but with all the awesome technology and money they have now. Ubisoft should be a darling of ours, as it was in the past, but it became a monstrosity we can't deal with anymore, and seemingly they themselves can't deal with anymore.
The problem with Ubisoft is that they aren't able to make good games, they just make games to make money, it's not like they are incapable to create enjoyable videogames, they just don't want to create them for players but for cash.
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
I have so conflicting thoughts on ubisofts. I really like a lot of their games and they do support them for a long time after launch but their management keeps doing really weird & terrible decisions all the time.
I really enjoy their games, but they release some that no one cares for. Bull I'll be suing all their AC
exactly this
I loved them from the time of Rayman on DOS until about Syndicate. Ever since Syndicate I've not enjoyed their games nearly as much as I have most of my life.
Ferrari Moment
AC and Far Cry's gameplay is mostly solid but they never iterate on anything. This is the same problem with call of duty. Eventually people are going to get sick of it.
The problem with big AAA companies are that they’ve grown “too big”.
They have to profit a considerably huge margin every game to satisfy the execs and investors and that lead to predatory-trend chasing-cash grab of games decisions we see today
Ubisoft games have been repetitive and boring for a long time. I stopped buying the games they put out a long time ago
Their sells comes from assassin's Creed mostly and maybe farcry. Or maybe watchdog. Other best games they just killed cause of out ideas and they afraid they are gonna waste their money.
@@MaRgEd.ZamaSU the missions are the same thing over and over and they are not fun to do.
And one problem with big AAA-studious is that when things start to go bad, they always want to cut anything small and concentrate everything on few big franchices. "Go big or go home" and when that fails, huge layoffs, canceled games and CEO's change into some other company with huge bonuses as a 'reward of years of service'.
When the other strategy would be to go with several cheaper and more personal games that go birth new and more valuable IP's to build new sequals on. But no, bigger and more boring 100h games with insane grind and artificial length to hype the "expansive world".
It's no secret Ubi became another EA a long time ago. As a person with passion for good video games I always wonder how do such companies still manage to exist.
Exactly. Ubisofts problem is that financially they don’t have giant cash cows like FIFA or Madden that earn hundreds of millions every year while being the exact same game year over year.
They have terrible customer service which proves this theory.
Asslicking reviewers - just like gamerax - failing to acknowledge this problem, are as much to blame.
Folks that aren’t tired of it yet are still buying the games. That’s part of it anyway, hard to help too. I don’t expect younger generations to notice the dips in quality that older gamers might be seeing.
If enough people perceive these practices as a problem, something _may_ be done about it then
@@TheWefikusoh boy, you don't know how much money siege makes and how much valhalla and its shit dlc sold
Saddest part is you could make a video like this on just about every AAA publisher out there right now.
I think they had it coming for a long time.
Except from software, team ninja and Santa Monica
@@RollingSkyPlayer from software, I think
@@RollingSkyPlayer I forgot software lol
From software are the only one left with 100% trust others dont even have 20% trust anymore lol
I worked for Ubisoft from 2015-2019 straight out of SGD. I am surprised they have not announced massive layoffs after so many cancelled games. During my time with them, there would me a lot of layoffs after a game shipped, literally all the contractors would be fired and also at least half of the QC employees no matter if the game made a lot of money. The crazy thing is that in a few months when a new game would start development some of the laid off people would be rehired. Volt also would take some of their money so basically it was a dead end job for them and there was no way to better themselves. Ubisoft would take advantage of all of the new devs that just finished school because the studio I worked for had a ton of 4 years universities and community colleges around. Ubisoft would hire people and keep maybe 1/3 and fire the rest right before 3 years so they would not get bonuses or more pay. It was pretty disgusting. For anyone that wants to make games and really wants job security your number 1 bet is to be a competent programmer. Do not under any circumstance do QC because that is bottom of the barrel and they are always exploited and the first ones to be fired. Artist are almost always contracted from China/SK so if you are an artist in America or Europe you are also in trouble because the competition always works for no money.
By QC, I'm guessing you mean QA. QA is obviously "safe" because no one tests games forever. But let's not cry for those poor programmers, they probably found a job after like a week or two, there is endless demand for programmers these days, especially does with degrees. As for the QA that don't have programming skills, yeah, it sucks and it will be a lot harder to find another job, it's a well known fact that QA is unsafe, not just in the video game industry, but for the entire software industry.
Ubisoft should QA as a contract lasting the duration of game development, it wouldn't give people false hopes.
Hey do you have an instagram, I would love to discuss this further
@@MichaelDavis-mk4me I agree but you would be surprised how many people in school thing they will get into the industry by QA (at my studio we called it QC, quality control even though in school it was QA). Even my instructors would push for people to get into the industry as QA which looking back is insane since you have no future. The best thing is that after years of doing work if you are lucky you might get QA lead but that is only one person at least at my Ubisoft studio.
@@tHeWasTeDYouTh Here in Quebec, when I studied computer science, I was told Ubisoft Montreal is a fantastic place to work... if you are already experienced. Essentially, you have to have many years of experience before considering working there, otherwise you'll just end up in QA or programming easy, repetitive things all day for a bad salary. I decided not to go in the video game industry after all, programming is the same everywhere anyway, just pick the best job available.
@@MichaelDavis-mk4mealso QA for video games salary is the same as working at a retail store now a days($15-17 an hour or so) I’m a software QA for a different industry and my salary is immensely higher than that
They're finally hitting the ramifications of their paint by number game design. The fact is most of their games feel the samw: big open world with tons of markers to do the thing at.
The ones that aren't like Siege and For Honor have their own issues that ubisoft hasn't addressed and seem content with keeping their head in the sand.
You just summarized assassins creed perfectly
Their one breakout no brainier hit (splinter cell VR on quest) being cancelled is such a terrible idea. Millions of quests out there and a very small (probably could count them on my fingers) REAL games worth your time and money. Blade and sorcery, contractors, onward, bonelab, into the radius, and sairento are honest to God the only games that come near reaching that AAA level of being worth sinking time into. People are begging for a big studio to make a purpose built vr game with a comfortable budget. It would sell. I can't stress enough that there really is no competition besides res 4 which is a shoddy port of a game never built with VR in mind. So sad.
Apparently there is a assassin's Creed vr game in the works but melee has only been done to a decent level by blade and sorcery which has a full purpose built system just for physical interactions. They wanna roll the dice on making satisfying melee over the much easier to get right stealth shooter? What are they thinking?
They fcked up For honor and made it to generic fighter game, only tps not 2d view🤦🏻♂️
This is probably why there is almost no chance of a new Rayman or Splinter cell game releasing. Ubi can't corrupt them with it's generic open world formula.
"Assassin's creed is a good franchise."
"Assassin's creed is a good franchise."
"Assassin's creed is a good franchise."
Ubisoft made some of my most favorite games back in the early 00's. I hope they turn around but they also are completely responsible for the situation they're in.
A (good) Prince of Persia for current gen would send me over the moon, I don’t even own current gen.
That cancelled splinter cell, man.
Yeah that's the problem, arguably they haven't made a good game in over a decade. All their top tier titles these days are copy/paste trash. No innovation, no passion for the games they make and the focus is solely on profit. They like EA and some others have failed to realise that without the love and passion to make the best game possible you are never going to have the best game and therefore profits will tank.
Sad to hear Sparks of Hope isn’t selling. Many Ubisoft IPs started out as tightly designed single player experiences and have since been bloated into games as service formats. Over time many of the games have become far removed from what players actually like and it’s been so long that players are voting with their wallets.
Rainbow Six, singleplayer tactic shooter (ravenshield). Now multiplayer hero shooter (siege).
For me I miss the fights taking place in the world now I don't really like the loading I between fights
To be honest, I would love to play Mario + Rabbids series but I am not going to buy a Switch just for that. Would greatly love to see it on other platforms, though (at least on PC as well) - not sure if Nintendo would agree on this.
Sparks of Hope just have a really unfortunate timing, releasing at the same time as Bayonetta 3 and Persona 5. Also add to the fact that tactical RPG is a niche market.
@@BlueV205 plus the other non-nintendo games
Im calling it, it is the era for indie games.
Triple A companies are getting too greedy just trying to grab money and releasing broken crappy games.
With the amazing tools now available to everyone through things like Unreal Engine, very soon we will see great games from actual players who want to play great games.
For every bad triple A game there are ten terrible indie games. They are indie for a reason, don't delude yourself into thinking just because the big boys are struggling that somehow means indies are gonna have this massive fuck off Renaissance where they create god tier games left and right.
There is still a reason for choosing indie though
It is getting to a point where AAA games is nearly garrenteed to be a cash grab copy of one of their existing games, while he’s there is probably more bad indie games, but they are naturally weeded out though nature selection, allowing the good ones to shine though, while AAA could rely on the “too big to fail” and milking IPs for some time
I'd say that Triple A companies like UbiSoft & EA are the ones getting greedy and release half assed games like FIFA, Madden and the more recent Assassins Creed games (Odyssey & Valhalla). There's still a ton of other Triple A companies that produce so many hits like Insomniac, Santa Monica Studios, NaughtyDog, FromSoftware exc. Though I do agree many new and upcoming Indie games are getting really good and I find myself playing some that I otherwise would've never in a million years thought I'd play
@@robertsteiner4696time has proven you very wrong
The biggest problem with any company is that if the company is doing shit it’s usually due to a lack of right direction and leadership from the person running the company
Not to defend them or it's an arbitrary metric, and it's perfectly normal for a company to have its highs and lows.
My guess is that the guys on top dont play/know jack shit about gaming culture and they just want to see high sell numbers and that reflects the quality of your product/service, they have games like division that can be a very good way too get money but they dont do much there, like no new expansion and the season pass is not enough i stoped playing that, and switched to destiny2.
* Dice staff trying to slide under the board room table *
@@Airflow80 completely agree. I do think The Division 1 and 2 are pretty fun and the WONY expansion is actually very good. I just wish Ubisoft would stop with this live-service online-only bullcrap and give us good single-player experiences again cause lemme tell ya, those were THE DAYS.
Love you Gameranx
❤️
*_which one_*
Lol
@@SFADonuttunoD all of them
@@gameranxTV I love Falcon.
1 YEAR LATER .... 613 people playing Skull and Bones in real time. Cost 200 millions + 20 to 40 millions in publicity. Dev 10 years, Ubisoft Studio's involved = 6
oof
I think they had no option but to delay skull and bones after the push back they got after the gameplay reveal. I don't think the reason is "polish and balance" but more on the line of reworking the systems in there entirety because nobody wants to be gathering resources with their ships canons and have cutscenes on land rather than explore on foot.
Hk government ?
It literally looked like a shitty mobile game ad
About time we acknowledged the fact that the developers of many of the industry's leading franchises who used to be really special have been taking Ls for years now
They lost their creativity. That’s why the most groundbreaking games are indie
yeah, it feels like there's no creativity anymore. Everything is very corporate and is just another investment stocks and pleasing the investors instead of caring about their own player base and making sure the game is test played, finished, and can be completely played vanilla or launch.
it's because younger devs are making crap that older gamers aren't interested in
@@naplzt4k it's more like management was taken over by marketing which is only concerned with selling more with the minimum time and ressources ... They just release the same games over and over with a new coat of paint and call it a day
@@naplzt4k whatever you say, boomer 👍
Its really not too surprising to see the publishers with 1 huge franchise propping them up and a complete unwillingness to try new things rather than just put out a bunch of the same thing over and over run into issues. This has kinda been a long time coming.
This is the fun part, they have like 10 big ass franchises, but they are doing poorly, they own Rayman, Tom Clancy's things, PoP, AC, Just dance, Far cry, Might and magic, Driver. Just yikes
You guys are so consistent with your uploads, much love!
Always!
11:08 For me it's also about not being scummy and rooting out the abusers in the company. The main reason why I haven't been interested in buying Ubisoft products lately is because of the mobile game-like monetisation schemes and the lacklustre reaction to abuse allegations.
Thank you! You're the only person I have seen point this out in quite awhile. I haven't played a Ubisoft game since Far Cry 5 because of this.
So you want them to expose and fire employees based on “allegations”? I think it’s a good thing they don’t throw their employees under the bus to appease twitter children.
@@halfcutonion6342 That's not what it's about. It's about lack of transparency, not receiving updates and inaction. And it seems to be a serious problem. 25% of employees claim to have seen or experienced workplace misconduct. So it's not just some twitter children in this case.
Personally I think a problem seems to be that those who are accused of the the misconduct are working at Ubisoft for a long time and are hard to replace, which might be why they overlook stuff and try to sweep it under the rug.
However they _do_ take measures. At the end of the day it's hard to say wether said measures lead to an improvement or not.
@@ThePandafriend This lack of transparency you talk about is a good thing, not a flaw. The last thing we need is for a company to be able to publicize employee information without repercussions, if there is a legal problem with an employee they should be dealt with privately.
@@halfcutonion6342 I'm talking about lack of transparency of the investigation.
With that I don't mean transparency to the outside world, I mean transparency to the employee(s) who asked for that investigation.
Clearing up some info, Mario and Rabbids did not do poorly. All they said was that it underperformed over Christmas and the week after Christmas. It most likely sold extremely well. Gotta keep in mind that their expectations for the game might have been in line with a Square enix outlandish sales number.
The problem with Mario and Rabbids is that the vast majority of the people that bought the game, did so for the novelty of the experience given their admiration for the characters. The idea of a sequel would have no appeal to such a person; Unless they bought into the entire turn based tactics genre at that stage, there was no way there were going to invest in a sequel.
Good point.
Perhaps if it only had the novely factor going for it, but for all accounts (I haven't played it) the first game was good in and of itself. The sequel also seems to have improved upon the first a lot.
That... and the fact the game was actually really good..
Also, the original came out during the Switch's launch year, and many early adopters of the game bought it because it was one of the few Mario game on the latest Nintendo console (at the time, the only other Mario game was Mario Kart 8, which released about 3 months prior).
I have an interest in Mario Xcom, I have no interest in rabbits who's entire joke is that they scream
With the CEO's comments, it is no surprise things are a mess. Sucks for the workers there, but it is not really a surprise after the bloated games, NFT decisions and general dumb actions
*In Ubisoft term and conditions:*
We don't take responsibility if our software or game infect your pc with malware also we have full of your games
You don't own any Ubisoft game
@@royalkumar795 you don't own any game actually. Be it ubi, from software or sony, you only own game licences, not the games themselves. even if u own the cd.
@@hawken796 yup, but if yoi have the cd, they cant remove the licence from you
@@cakeassassin6277 now they can, you put in the cd and if your licence is revoked, then it's just digital waste. Pre steam/psn era it wasn't the case.
@@hawken796 yea always online feature removed all ownership even for CD owners. There are few games u can play without internet but thats very few.
Thanks for the insight, but I think there's more to the story that we don't know.
I feel like there's a bigger thing happening that gonna affect the future of the entire Ubisoft - creative people or important employees that move to other companies.
I hope it's not true, but I'm guessing they lack these key people at the moment.
I believe that behind the scenes, huge studios like Microsoft tend to "buy" (steal) everyone, or at least these key people from other studios, or something like that.
What is happening now in France, huge protests (for changing the retirement age from 62 to 64 and high cost of living) also adds a lot of tension through employees, and it does add a level of uncertainty to the whole industry.
there are rumors that Ubisoft are looking for buyer, or they are looking to merge with some other corp. Things are not great for them
Accountants are running those big companies, instead of game passionates like they used to. They are making the same repeatable lazy crap, with a focus on microtransactions and people are getting tired of it. There's no hidden depth or meaning to all that.
I love that this video reminded me of the types of editorial articles I'd read in gaming magazines back in the 90s. Not sure who wrote it but kudos to both you and Falcon on that.
I swear Falcon's narrations sounds like a cool uncle that is passionate about video games and the way he expresses his love for video games is very informative.
chuck he said he already have boyfriend earlier. u too late :(
@@fireboy1996 oh darn, I always look at uncles for boyfriend material because we like to keep it in the family.
@@Iruleyoufail looool
He always has the worst takes though
That anti-govi uncle
I really loved far cry 6, spent a month on it and once you've collected everything, upgraded everything and blah blah blah. There's just nothing to do. Like, half of that month I spent was just running around.
👍🏼
It’s honestly insane and sad seeing this company as shell of it’s former self ..like at this point what games do they actually have planned to release this year and where is beyond good and evil 2
Honestly I think they were deep into the development of Beyond Good and Evil 2 and decided to strip the paint off of it and turn it into this Star Wars game. They were really putting A LOT of work into BG&E and they probably figured if they translated that game structure into a brand as big as Star Wars it would be a much bigger return on there investment. So I think they're going all in on that and they'll probably rush and throw together some BG&E online multiplayer game that looks good but doesn't have much substance. 🤷🏽♂️just my theory
I wouldn't expect it to be good since it is made by one of the writers who did saints row reboot
Assassins creed mirage, skull n bones, assassins creed 1 remaster.. just name a few that they have planned for release this year
They got too greedy. They should return to their roots and focus on making good single player games. Sony has proved that its still very viable.
@@dipanjanghosal1662 facts, they have great IPs ,getting back to their roots is needed
I have conflicting feelings about the remark on the 7 canceled games having no investment. The public knows little to nothing about them, so there's no external hype, but it could be heartbreaking internally. Besides that I used to be a big fan of Ubisoft games, just not really the last decade. Thanks for this breakdown Falcon!
For real, everyone who worked on them must be devastated. I have a friend in comics who has had a few projects they were involved with shelved recently, and it has not only hurt them financially, but really broken their heart.
You’re telling me Ubisoft shifted to generic empty open world games years ago, stripping all their franchises of uniqueness, and now they’re having trouble??
Thanks for keeping me updated on gaming news Gameranx.
🤝
lol most of this video was speculation tho
@@waitwho3074 🤡
@@waitwho3074 You l + ration+ momless creatures
Ubisoft: *in trouble
Microsoft: *heavy breathing
😅
👌
It's time to buy French gaming company
Honestly it'll be good IMO, Xbox seems better than that stupid Ubisoft Connect.
How did one of Ubisofts biggest releases coming out not get mentioned, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora? Its planned for this year or early next. My guess would be next winter(2023-2024). It's done by the studio behind division and now following the Huge Success of Way of Water this could be the big cash flow boost Ubisoft needs.
Yep let's go! Avatar FOP will probably be insane, same with Beyond good and evil 2 and mirage, they're gonna clean house
It is winter.
Its this winter, where’s the game?
@@pandaketamine its fixed. Thanks for letting me know about the error. Guess my understanding of which winter is which was off.😆
Avatar 2 Way of Boring Water sucked balls
They need to polish and balance the in-game cash shop… I stopped playing Ubisoft games when they started their live service model for single player games.
Not gonna happen, also long as they investing money on Denuvo drm with VM protect then this company will never grow only down to hill
Yeah. It's been a big issue for me as well. No need for it.
amen
That Star Wars project sounds amazing, but I'm worried it'll be delayed or canceled all together. Scary times for ubisoft and Star Wars fan big time.
Jedi Survivor is coming this year dont worry
Bruh, a fan of ubisoft? Tf
There's always going to be studios taking on Star Wars games because of how big a franchise it is and how many Star Wars fans there are, so I wouldn't worry too much about the future of Star Wars games.
Im kinda sceptical about Ubisofts Star Wars game, because apperantly they are looking for a microstransaction expert for the Star wars game.I hope thats not true, but it might sadly be.
Sparks of Hope didn’t sell as well because people saw how cheap the original went on sale for after barely a year and decided it was worth it to wait for a steep discount
I want an Assassin’s Creed/Prince of Persia crossover dammit! The dagger, the hourglass, and the medallion could easily turn out to be Pieces of Eden and maybe The Prince had previously unknown training from the Order of Assassins but was forced to go separate ways because time displacement. It’s too perfect not to make it a reality.
Falcon my Hero, please make a video on all the insane possibilities that could result from this so there’s a better chance Ubisoft hears it 🙏🏼
Have to deal with the rights issue first. Ubi doesn't own PoP as an IP and that's proven to be problematic in the past. In fact, that's what spurred the creation of Assassins Creed in the 1st place.
Hire this guy ubisoft.
I mean if it makes you feel better Mirage has a pre-order bonus or something that gives you a Prince of Persia cosmetic pack or something like that
The reason why AC was made is because of PoP. There was some issue with the ownership of PoP so ubi just went fuck it we will make our own PoP with hoods and parkour and it seemingly became a huge hit
And this is why I trust gameranx for unbiased gamer news
Ubisoft has made some games that i really liked : some of the AC games, Splinter Cell series and some Ghost Recon games.
When Falcon couldn't think of any other AAA-game that has been in development this long I was subtly reminded and saddened by the memory of Beyond Good and Evil 2 supposedly still getting released some day
Honestly I’m not sure if I’d prefer them to just cancel it just so I’m not living with this false hope.
You know what doesn't help a profit decrease? Cancelling 7 games.
When you make Ubisoft games it does 😂😂😂
They made truckloads of money from Valhalla. They'll be fine lol
@@wrydstepbr0_0 A single game can't hold an entire company unless it's GTA or FIFA.
Haven't you seen the news? They've spent the past few months begging around for someone to buy them, and everyone refused.
@@davidstinger1134 even if they did get bought out, AC is their bread and butter franchise. I dont see it going away
When a game company has significant delays (Like Skull & Bones) if gives players like me pause. Although I am absolutely excited to see something come of this game, at this point I am VERY skeptical about buying it on release. Most likely I will wait 5 or 6 months to buy it so I can see how it's received and how it performs. In fact, at this point I never actually buy ANY game on release - nor do I per-purchase them... I wait 30days minimum post-release to see how the company handles all the inevitable bugs & crashes that come with a new release.
I wish that sea of thieves would port to Playstation
I'm glad the delays have brought to light how much they've removed from Skull and Bones and for most the stuff they wanted to play it for
Never forget "Beyond Good and Evil 2", by the same publisher and developer team. A forever upcoming game from my childhood.
“they’re not in any danger of folding…” I wouldn’t be so sure about that. They tried to be acquired by other companies and got rejected 😂 that says a lot about their situation. I do hope they make a comeback because competition is good but they really have to make an effort.
Yeah because the family that owns Ubisoft wants someone to buy it, but they still want control
Time to sell some of those IPs. Give ghost recon to Respawn and assassin's Creed to bethesda.
@@ItzBirdMan1337 yess! Honestly I need battlefield and ghost reacon to be given the love they deserve, the last ghost reacon game I enjoyed was future solider... Holy crap that was so long ago
@@ItzBirdMan1337 for the love of God don't give any Ubisoft franchise to Bethesda
@@andrewrights are you suggesting Ubisoft open world is better than bethesda
EDIT: FUCK GIVE AC TO OBSIDIAN
What the hell is rainbow six quarantine? I work at a game store and have never heard of that before this video…maybe I’m just bad at my job.
I’m still mad at this company for not making a remastered or anniversary edition of the original Rayman games. They keep ignoring that classic character. Rayman 3 is my favorite game and they keep pretending it doesn’t exist. Making a remastered edition of the game would be a massive gold mine but they keep on wanting to make more AC games that get a bit repetitive & confusing at times lol 😂
Yup, every ray fan is still waiting on a Rayman game, heck I want voice acting to come back like in the original trilogy, Rayman speaking wasn't all bad and it can still work, rather than being the silent protagonist, which isn't bad either.
Now I might be wrong but the last two Rayman games didn't sell very well platformers are pretty niche these days and Rayman was never one of the top I.P in that space so yeah not the best time sorry
Or even having one two and 3 in one game would be amazing. Never played 3 but 2 was probably just as good q:
While I would definitely love this personally, having grown up with them as a kid, I do realize this is mostly just nostalgia talking. Most people who've played them way back when probably wouldn't have the time or/nor the money to play them now in a shiny refurbished expensive form.
Nor the time due to difficulty. When I talk games with my friends, they oft tell me how games are too hard nowadays (citing Sekiro, Elden Ring, Souls etc). Hard _nowadays_ ? Rayman was downright _sadistic_ with its difficulty. I was never able to beat it as kid, nevermind reach the later levels. I think, even, a part of the appeal of it was wondering about and imagining what those later levels could even be, seeing as I realized I probably would never reach them! (I played it at a friend's house's PC for the most part)
I doubt this would much appeal to the younger generation, either, who are used to Fortnite-like dopamine drip feed.
@@samuraicupcake289 Hold on here Rayman 2 and 3 are not that difficult. The first one makes you want to pull your hair out(like crash bandicoot). That’s a fact. There is some challenge in two and three but it doesn’t waste your time.
It almost as if "time savers" and gameplay designed to push you to buy them was a disgusting idea, and now they are reaping the rewards of people avoiding their trash.
*Laughs in War Thunder grind torture*
Great vid! But you forgot they also have Avatar game coming
I’m really sad about Sparks of Hope not selling well. I loved it, really didn’t see any major performance issues that ruined the game for me (still looks amazing Imo), and ultimately it’s sad to see it most likely not getting any future support.
maybe when Rayman dlc come it will fix it I'm hope
The problem isn't the game, it's the console. The switch is mostly dead. Only games like BOTW2 and pokemon games have any chance of performing there, imo.
I was actually shocked that that did not sell well considering how popular Mario is the only reason I haven't bought it yet is because I still haven't beaten the first game and honestly I have like 330 something games on switch and almost 300 on my Xbox series S.
maybe if Nintendo would of released an actual console that can legitimately compete with the new generations of consoles instead of a tablet slower than an iphone sales would have probably be different. and also all of the games they make are the same reused games from 40 years ago.
@@That1PissedOffBoomer Yeah, but it is a strategy game. Not a genre that sells blockbusters and is generally more popular on PCs vs consoles.
Can't forget about the upcoming Avatar game they're making as well. Lot's of exciting titles that they'll hopefully deliver on
They won't. Don't kid yourself. They're absolutely trash now
Love them or hate them, Ubisoft have mastered the act of making bad games for a decade but still getting gullible customers to believe the next game will be different.
Mario+Rabbids Spark of hope is actually really fun to play. A great iteration of the Xcom games that has some really good stuff in it. I'm surprised it didn't get more popular, it's a great game for the switch.
I got the first one on sale and thought it would be stupid. It was so Much fun. It was so well done. Spark of hope is very good as well.
It's sad that guillemont basically owns this company. You cant kick him out that easily but he's the biggest problem.
No mention of the nft's?
Lille info : a strike is annonced in Ubisoft French studios to obtain salaries raises as it was the case in the Montreal studios on the one hand.
On the other hand Guillemot's last public speech created a fear that management is going to get worse and that teams are going to be silently let go.
In the words of Shigeru Miyamoto, "A bad game is bad forever, a delayed game is at least has a chance at being good."
a delayed game will eventually be good is the exact quote
What about a delayed bad game?
No Man’s Sky entered the chat*
@@gabrollos
A phenomenal game now
Why do I have a feeling this quote is inaccurate? I swear it said something else, like a rushed game instead of a bad game
Thumb down every time someone say "cuz it's not marketed."
It didn't sell well because guess what other tactical games are on the platform and DID sell VERY well with little marketing?
It's really really disappointing that people just keep circle jerking the WRONG concept.
Id honestly be down to see a full blown reimagined splinter cell series as activision did with the modern warfare franchise but thats just me personally! 😊
I’m right here with you dude, don’t get me wrong I think splinter cell vr would have been awesome but I would absolutely love to see a new line of games or even just an updated version of the old games. I know it’s the more controversial one but conviction actually ignited my love for the series I played the originals too young and sucked so wasn’t fond but I played conviction fell in love and went back to the originals which I also love.
Or with rainbow....
They have a legit franchise right there that's just begging to be totally remade as a proper challenge to cod.
Imagine a 8 hour single player rainbow game, with modernised RSV2 multiplayer and its got seige added on as an alternative to war zone. Take my money ubi.
Can't recommend the Styx games enough to scratch that true stealth itch.
Reimagined? You know well they would turn it into a live-service open world game, not too different from what they did with Ghost Recon.
@@wydyadoit Imagine they created them all in a big shared universe so the games kinda cross over each other.
At this point it feels like most "AAA" studios have become the fast food of gaming. McActivision and Ubisoft in the box have gotten good at pumping out their menu items, but lack the ability to really make anything unique. As a customer, the game that mom and pop shops have been offering, is a lot more complete, fulfilling, and new.
I agree with this.. but why not "Mactivision"?!
Holy shit so true, Ima call them that way now
Obviously the open world only AC isn’t being received as well
Ubisoft just been making half baked and pretty much unfun games Watch dogs series, Far Cry 6, the division, ghost recon, Valhalla. They’re all beautiful open world games but they just don’t click
They've been doing weird stuff for a while, but I do think it's admirable that they've supported Valhalla with so much free content. I'm also glad they're listening to the fans in terms of Mirage being much more like the previous assassins games
They're still supporting and providing free updates for The Crew 2 after 5 years as well. There's not many positive things to say about Ubisoft these days but that is one of them. I didn't like or get these games but for fans it's great.
And where's beyond good an evil?😂
@@Elwaves2925 and we still haven't got
Beyond good an evil yet.
I’m shocked that AC Valhalla got so much support years later, it’s very impressive to see a game get that type of support. I’d love to see Mirage take things back and give us a classic AC game with a concentrated story.
Valhalla might had free content but don't forget that it was mostly all of it time consuming boring and buggy garbage (festivals, mastery challenges etc) and also don't forget that their microtransaction system in the game is a disgrace and probably that's what makes them most of the money from it's "success" not the game's actual sales
We don't know that they listen. We have no idea if Mirage is an old school AC game. We have footage, kinda looks like AC Valhalla reskinned.
The saddest part is that most people keep buying broken products, companies come and go but the customers always remain stupid.
like pigs consuming garbage they dont care if they are given caviar or litterally mudd covered rotten vegetals.
The issue with Ubisoft is that it separated it's game pipeline from reality, they got attached to a formula and went with it to produce easy money, but as per usual the more time it goes on the more reasons are forgotten and ultimately they forgot what it is that made that formula successful but continue to use it because it used to produce results.
It reminds me of the experiment with the 5 monkeys in a cage with a ladder and a banana. They just keep doing what used to work, it doesn't work anymore but they don't know why because they forgot why it worked in the first place.
They create these giant open worlds that are nothing but a "playground" with copy-paste activities that don't differentiate from one another, where the graphics is the only interesting thing but after a while they are ignored, then the characters are bland and generic, the story is generic and they just throw systems into the game because "RPGs sell" but they don't even are necessary or simply add a way for them to monetize the game.
Ubisoft went soulless, they don't remember how to make good games anymore and that's what has brought about this fall.
huh, i’ve never heard of the 5 monkey thing before. that’s interesting… i’ll have to look into that. thanks!
You would think that as technology evolves it would become easier and easier to make great games, but somehow it’s only gotten harder for most developers.
There's a vicious circle there though: as technology evolves, customer expectations evolve too. So while it would be insanely easy to make Super Mario 64 again with today's technology, the expectation is for something newer, bigger, grander, with better lighting, higher fidelity, more in game systems, etc. At least this is my thought/theory.
@@briar1395 true!
Funny story is that I used to have bad PC and I could only play games after 5-6 years of their releases. Now I have good PC but I still wait a couple of years and buy games for 10$ or 20$ on sale because preordering or spending 50$ is just not worth for me.
The same thing that happens to all big legacy gaming companies that forgot how to make the very games or products that made them successful in the first place. If creating fun and engaging games and appealing to their costumers isn't their first priority then the end result will always be the same.
This. 100%.
it's starting to happen with Bethesda...they used to be great and knocked it out the park with Skyrim then they decided to make Fallout 76 and now Starfield is on the way but feels like it will fail.
They didn't forget, the talent just left and all that's left from the companies that used to make great games is the name.
That talent was replaced with whoever came knocking to the publisher's door, and the publisher only cared about sales.
10:46 wasn’t the first AC set in Damascus Syria?
Man I love these kinds of videos. Falcon, you're nuts but you're brilliant.
Hey, falcon I think you forgot to mention about big developers left Ubisoft because of bad working environment also employees are protesting against Ubisoft in Paris 🇫🇷.
This aged better than ubisoft did.
One of the best channels out there. Way to go Gameranx
I think skull & bones was going to be the pirate game folk wanted from black flag but then ubi changed direction to follow trends towards a BR or live service style focus.
They've made a lot of cash from games but they've also burned money on other things, such as the quartz\NFT fustercluck and BR stuff.
Skull and Bones is not a BR
@@wrydstepbr0_0 At one point the info available was that they'd decided to make it a very pvp focus and then reigned that back after they realised that multiplayer reliant games tend to bomb after the two week twitch hype window slams shut.
I only used BR as an example not that S&B was going to be one.
"Let's take the boat stuff from AC4 and make it a game."
"Cool."
(1 month later) "Okay. Boat combat. What else?"
"..............."
(3 years later) "So... boat combat. What else?"
"................"
(7 years later) "........... flag DLC?"
People just want single-player games man.
This video has aged well. I think Ubisoft are just about to feel more pain.
I'm really skeptical when it comes to Skull and Bones. It reminds me of when they showed off the first Watch Dogs. It looked really good with all the wind and weather effects and even the trench coat was flowing nicely in the wind and what we got was such a bad downgrade where none of that looked like they showed off.
I mean I hope they take the time and really deliver and make it playable with the graphics like those videos of it.
But it's Ubisoft, I wouldn't be surprised if they cut those corners again even after all those delays.
I'm just cautious of that, since they did that with multiple games before, Watch Dogs, Rainbow Six Siege and I think there was some others but those two I remember had those downgrades.
From my perspective skull and bones was dead on arrival (announcement in this case) a multiplayer ship battle could be fun but it just looks boring as hell and bland. It worked in AC but singleplayer seems more suited for that
The division was another bad one
yeah, i've got zero expectations because Ubisoft is good at bait & switch. they still haven't made a Watch Dogs game that looks as good as that first-ever trailer.
@@acomingextinction I agree. Always keep the expectation bar low, so the disappointment doesn't kick as hard when they do let one down. I live by that 😄
Change is good to see. As minuscule as it may be in the gaming landscape as a whole, there is still hope.
Dude, this video is a year old and we were asking this question back then, and now it's even worse, their stock hit an all time low after Star Wars Outlaws and they are in trouble with AC Shadows...
Keep up the great work, Falcon. Although I personally think that ubisoft has waay too much that is reliant on skull and bones, assassins creed and open world star wars game, because of that I think if those three (in a perfect world) all do great than they will be fine just like you were saying, but if it doesn't do you or anyone else think that could be the end of them?
No Far Cry or Assassin’s Creed, maybe? Doesn’t bode well for those of us less enthusiastic about the annual release model…
I bet that next farcry game will be live service because, farcry game director has left the company after he worked on farcry game since FC3
Ubisoft got more flak than it deserved. Their biggest sin was making their trailers look a bit too good back in the day. Nowadays, they actually stick true to the gameplay that they showcase and their games are far less buggy on release than their competitors. They truly pushed the boundaries of gaming.
Beyond Good and Evil 2 still existing is mind blowing.
It never existed and it never will 🙏
All we'll ever see out of that game is "it's still in development!" messages and little concept demos that get scrapped.
Still waiting for Beyond good and Evil 2
The biggest concern I have for this is for the employees. If they are cutting 200m out of their budget, I've worked in enough large corporations over the last 15 years to know that that means downsizing while still expecting the same overall team output. I just hope crunch doesn't get worse for these people, but it likely will.
They also sold part of their franchise for 300m, showing their actually struggling
Random fact: Ubisoft Singapore started developing Skulls and Bones back in 2013, it was originally gonna be a Black Flag spin-off/expansion and an MMO named "Black Flag Infinite", but that idea was later scrapped
Let’s be real, splinter cell in vr, if done well, would be absolutely amazing. I don’t really understand this divide between regular gaming and vr gaming. Vr is early and it’s truly amazing and we need to support it while developers are still trying to use the technology😊
How would you do all the wall and climbing acrobatics that Sam does in VR though?
@@Person-jw7mk look at something like Stride and Espire 1 to see how movement mechanics can work well in VR
I don't want them to make a new Splinter Cell game. They'll ruin it by making it an RPG. Imagine having to shoot an enemy in the head for 50 times as the enemy's big colorful healthbar is slowly dropping off.
Great work, I would hope they capitalize on the Tom Clancy work. The Division series is fun and it’s “constant” fun. Not a roller coaster, but a place to go to play or play with others.
I am personally disappointed to learn that a VR Splinter Cell may have been in the works and then got cancelled. With the PSVR2 coming out, that would have been a game to look forward to.
actually i might have bought that....certainly better than assassin's creed #40
What the delays scream to me is that they're working on too many things at one time.
Yet they're releasing much fewer games than they did 5+ years ago. Hmm I wonder how that logic works
I know you said in another video that you just don't want them announcing release dates if they aren't sure, but I feel like we shouldn't be harping on them as a community. Ubisoft happily rushed out AC after AC leading to Unity(?). I rarely even look into what's being made anymore before it's almost out. I just don't wanna pressure the companies even more to push out unfinished products. And I think it wise for just about every game to have a Beta now to work out (hopefully) final kinks. Certainly online multiplayer games.
ubisoft needs a new leader who can make better decisions for the company and give projects to the team who are excited about the project and can deliver on time if any project takes longer than usual then let other teams help them to make it on the deadline for any big projects like skull and bones and Beyond Good & Evil
i agree.
agree
I love how you present your content. From weekly news, game updates, and top (x) counts, every video is informative and enjoyable.
Keep up the great work!
I agree , I generally am not a fan of top tens , but gameranx nails it.
as a huge AC fan i hope someone buys the rights and does the games well
..when were they well? Pre or Post Witcher 3? ;-)
@@dallesamllhals9161 Both
@@maddworld3317 yeah the new games are also pretty great. Odyessy is a masterpiece of a rpg imo
@@anshitgupta1294 I so agree. I played Odysee nonstop for about a year and a half
@@dallesamllhals9161 They were good before they implemented a storefront and started to focus on microtransactions. The last 3 AC games are nothing more than shallow husks of the past. Nothing more than storefront first, game second and yeah don't bother with a propper written narative.
I Love the Sneaky Clip of Jamie Hyneman Polishing Shit at 4:40 😂😂😂
I will never forget reading an article over 10 years ago about ubisoft only wanting to focus on games that can become franchises. I always remember that quote anytime I see ubisoft in the news regarding their games.
Ubisoft is one of my favorite developers because I love the Assassin’s Creed series. I hope they thrive for years to come.
Those games thrived on good stories in the beginning, now they are just bloated with complete nothingness. Stories are awful and the content is shallow. Origins was not bad and oddesy had nothing going for it other then having a massive mapand decent combat mechanics. Valhalla is so bad neither a large map or good mechanics could save it.
They need to massively scale down their live service stuff and just focus on good narratives. Even ditch the open world stuff. Massive open levels with a hub world seems to be something they can pull off well.
R.I.P Ubisoft games used to be top tier people🤦🏾♂
Remember, Ubisoft games used to everyone's favorite now those days are gone now
I'm so sick of AAA developers. I think we should fully support Indies and Smaller developers from here on out. Just my $0.02.
I'm tired of both tbh AAA developers put out fake trailers indie developers put out fake kick starters rip to this gaming industry. Thank God for the few who still have morals
I'm tired of games taking ten minutes to load on brand new machines because they have to authenticate with a DRM server somewhere.
Make your games actually good and I will buy them. Force me into shitty DRM and I will not.
who would have thought that if you dont listen to your player base, people stop buying your games. who would have thought ?
10:25 That is the Idea for Games. Take as Long as Possible to beat the game. I Rather Have VERY Long games that Take a Month+ to actually beat the game. WHY would You NOT want a game Like that?
Can't say I'm disappointed. This is what I've been hoping would happen to Ubisoft when I stopped buying their products.
I can’t remember a time I was excited to play a new Ubisoft game
In my view, even though that might not generate as much profit (at least as easily) or make sense to the business-people that work there, they should just scale down their productions indeed and make MORE "compact" or "streamlined" and focused games. - I mean, "Mirage" is a good example of that, which... I'm not sure if it will be that good or just kinda watered down because it's by a different studio, but nobody but probably the biggest fans of just the last three is complaining about a more streamlined and "back to the roots" "AC"-entry at this point. They can also do this with most of their other games, such as go back to a more focused and methodical "Rainbow Six" and "Ghost Recon". The "Siege" CoD-like and e-sports type game can still remain alongside of that. But they should really just make their products more efficient, like campaign-based, but also multiplayer-stuff that gives them extra value, like it used to be. - And then they can also go back to single-player games such as for "Splinter Cell", for which they're already doing are remake, but then they could continue with new ones as well. - Then there's also other stuff like Rayman, which they could really exploit with multiple types of games, not only the main ones like the last two ("Origins" and "Revolution", which are artful gems, why not more of that), but perhaps also spin-off type games, maybe even back to the 3D world. - And "Prince of Persia"?... Just get ON it!... Get the remake done and then see what more, it doesn't have to be complex. - Oh, and when it comes to "Rainbow Six", they should just revive that "Patriot"-project they canceled in favor of "Siege".
They have a lot of options and they can just generate money more sporadically with more solid releases that aren't overly... just everything. It all has become too overblown, especially for Ubisoft. But they need to reel it in and kinda go "back to basics", but with all the awesome technology and money they have now. Ubisoft should be a darling of ours, as it was in the past, but it became a monstrosity we can't deal with anymore, and seemingly they themselves can't deal with anymore.
The problem with Ubisoft is that they aren't able to make good games, they just make games to make money, it's not like they are incapable to create enjoyable videogames, they just don't want to create them for players but for cash.