Ubisoft had an absolutely dire 2024 and desperately needs a win

GamesActionAssassin’s Creed ShadowsUbisoft had an absolutely dire 2024 and desperately needs a winWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Assassin�s Creed Shadows promo image

Following a rough 2023, which sawUbisoftwrestling with poor financial results, several cancellations, under-performing games, layoffs, and CEO Yves Guillemot effectively putting all the responsibility on developers rather than looking inwards, the publisher has failed to right the ship. 2024 was an absolutely dire year for Ubisoft.

To give you a rough idea of how well it’s been going, here’s a chronological list of what’s been going on at Ubisoft:

It’s… not great.

Game plan

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Skull and Bones screenshot

Skull and Bonesfollowed shortly after, and while Ubisoft is still maintaining it, the reception was as cold as the North Sea. After countless delays, the result was a mediocre open-world piracy game that didn’t come close to capturing the seafaring fun of its inspiration, Black Flag. Everything about it screamed that it was a game that would have been cancelled if Ubisoft didn’t have a funding deal with the Singaporean government. I doubt the updates will keep rolling in after next year.

I don’t think anyone had high expectations for Skull and Bones, but Star Wars Outlaws was another matter. An open-world Star Wars game starring a smuggler and her two pals, a cute critter and a taciturn droid? It should have done gangbusters. Especially since it threw out so much of Ubisoft’s open-world bloat. I loved it, but itunderperformedand Ubisoft ended up pushing it out on Steam early to try and claw back some cash.

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Honestly, Outlaws' performance suggests that Ubisoft is just screwed. It managed to correct a lot of the legacy issues with the publisher’s open-world model, tapped into some of the coolest elements of the galaxy far, far away, and while it did have some performance issues at launch, it’s a helluva looker. It’s the best thing that Ubisoft’s released in ages, but not enough people cared.

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Star Wars Outlaws key art

A vocal minority lambasted the game for being “woke”—I guess because it has a female protagonist? Or because fighting fascists is bad now? It’s all nonsense, of course, and these toxic weirdos don’t have enough cachet to move the needle. So I just think players have lost faith in the company. Even when it does release something good, people are too hesitant to open their wallets.

Meanwhile, Ubisoft is still struggling to remake 2003’s Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, a game that was announced in 2020 and was expected to appear in 2021.Now it’s due in 2026. Development has already been rebooted once already, and four studios have been involved. If they can’t figure out how to make it work after this long, I don’t think we should be holding our breath.

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Prince of Persia The Lost Crown - the hero fights enemies with swords

These days, it’s pretty common for big publishers to have a few live service games in their pocket to keep generating cash and prop up future game development. Square Enix, for instance, has been able to weather disappointment after disappointment thanks toFinal Fantasy 14. Ubisoft has had some success in this regard thanks to For Honor, The Division and Rainbow Six Siege, but it has been struggling to replicate this lately.

With Skull and Bones failing to make a splash, Ubisoft really needed XDefiant to do the numbers. It was always going to be an uphill battle, though. A Ubisoft mascot shooter trying to compete with Call of Duty? Yeah, that’s a toughie. Jakehad fun with it, but it struggled to reel in players—to the point that Ubisoft started trying totempt folk with in-game cash. Amid all of this, XDefiant’s executive producer claimed that"The game is absolutely not dying". A few months later Ubisoft announced thatit was, in fact, dying. It’s not accepting new players, existing players can’t buy anything, and it will finally be put out to pasture in 2025.

Failure to launch

(Image credit: Ubisoft)

Image of Yasuke striking an enemy in Assassin’s Creed Shadows

Unfortunately it’s picked the worst month of the year to launch in:February. It’s a big enough deal to compete, I reckon, though given Ubisoft’s recent track record, there are probably going to be plenty of prospective players deciding to skip it in favour of Monster Hunter or Avowed or Civ, taking a ‘wait and see’ approach, which could end up costing Ubisoft dearly.

Ubisoft’s failures have also resulted instudio closures and layoffs, while French employeeswent on strikeover a mandated return to the office policy in October. There’s just no way to put a positive spin on things: Ubisoft is in serious trouble. It should come as no surprise, then, that shareholders are looking for a lifeboat, which may come in the form ofa buyout.

Shareholders are now reportedly figuring out how to structure the buyout in a way that would leave the Guillemot family remaining in charge, but apparently the second-largest shareholder, Tencent, has been dragging its heels. Given the huge dip in share price, down from a historical high of $85 in 2021 to a mere $13 this year, the rest of the shareholders no doubt want this to be handled quickly, before even more dips in value.

So! Will 2025 be Ubisoft’s year? It seems unlikely. Everything really hinges on Assassin’s Creed Shadows, so we’ll have a clearer picture in February. If that last couple of years are any indication, though, I suspect that things are only going to get worse.

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Failure to launch#

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Failure to launch