Ubisoft abandons dependence on AAA versions

Ubisoft doesn’t want to be as reliant on AAA game releases as it once was, and will instead take a closer look at free-to-play games and its back catalog to make money. financial results, the publisher said its plans for fiscal 2022 (the period April 2021 to March 2022) included three versions of AAA games, but that in the future Ubisoft did not want AAA games are at the center of its business model.

“We’ve been saying for a number of years that our normal model is to come up with three or four AAA games, so we’re going to stick with that plan for fiscal year 2022,” said CFO Frederick Duguet. “But we see that we are gradually moving from a model that was once only focused on AAA versions to one where we combine strong versions of AAA and strong back catalog dynamics, but also complement our program of new releases. with free-to-play and other premium experiences. “

He went on to clarify that the company had a number of titles, AAA and otherwise, in the works, naming Far Cry 6, Rainbow Six Quarantine, Skull & Bones, Riders Republic, the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time remake, and Roller. Champions. He also nodded at a previously announced Assassin’s Creed mobile game that was due to come to China with the help of Ubisoft investor Tencent, who he said was part of the company that was increasing its investment and its interest in free games, especially on mobile. Mobile currently represents around 9% of the company’s total activity.

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“During fiscal year 2022, we will continue our evolution from a model focused on AAA versions to a model where AAA rubs shoulders with new innovative premium and free experiences on all platforms,” said Duguet. “These diverse experiences will feed off of each other through complementary gameplay and business models.”

Notably, there wasn’t a single mention in the call about Ubisoft’s free battle royale, Hyper Scape, which flopped hugely at launch and is currently in the process of being redesigned.

Elsewhere in the call, CEO Yves Guillemot also noted that the company’s back catalog – or its already released games that still bring in long-term revenue – will also play a bigger role in the company’s revenue to the future, and already are. As an example, the six-year-old Rainbow Six Siege has added 15 million new players in the past 12 months, growing to 70 million total players since launch, and remains a major revenue driver for the world. ‘editor.

“We continue to evolve towards an increasingly pronounced recurrence of our revenues thanks to a growing audience,” said Guillemot. “Therefore, we expect our highly profitable back catalog to represent an even larger part of our business going forward.”

Ubisoft has struggled in recent years to release its AAA games on a timely basis, with the publisher postponing Rainbow Six Quarantine, Gods & Monsters and Watch Dogs Legion a year after their scheduled release in a 2019 earnings call and then pushing Quarantine. again the following year alongside Far Cry 6, and delaying its next Avatar game to 2022. And that’s not to mention everything that’s going on with Skull & Bones, which has been delayed multiple times and appears to have been rebooted entirely. at mid-development.

Meanwhile, Ubisoft’s financial data indicates that games like Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle, Far Cry 5, The Crew 2, Anno 1800, the older Just Dance games, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, and the aforementioned Rainbow Six Siege are still doing it. significant numbers for the company, meaning it doesn’t necessarily need to produce multiple blockbusters per year to continue making money – although based on Assassin’s Creed Valhalla launch sales records, that doesn’t certainly does no harm.

Rebekah Valentine is a journalist at IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.