In a surprisingly blunt report seemingly acknowledging the challenges and disappointments that Ubisoft has faced in recent years, company CEO and co-founder Yves Guillemot committed to a return to consistently making good games.
"Ubisoft recorded a solid third quarter, with net bookings slightly ahead of our expectations," the CEO's comment in the company's latest financial report reads. "This quarter provided us with positive momentum and marks the beginning of our turnaround to consistently creating and delivering high-quality, long-lasting games. Our performance was driven by the releases of Assassin’s Creed Mirage and Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, by the continued strong trajectory of The Crew Motorfest, as well as by the robust performance of our back catalog."
I'm still struck by how unfiltered this is, especially from an executive, but I'm struggling to find another way to read "the beginning of our turnaround to consistently creating and delivering high-quality, long-lasting games," if not as an acknowledgement that Ubisoft hadn't been doing that for a while but is now prepared to do so again. I realize turnaround refers to travel time and not literally turning around and reversing course, but if this is the beginning of the time spent working toward consistent goodness, well, I'm not complaining, I just didn't expect Guillemot to say it.
Ubisoft's report singles out a "strong sequence of high-quality new releases designed to be long sellers," with Assassin's Creed Mirage topping the list. Ubisoft says that it "successfully harnessed the strength of the Assassin's Creed brand to deliver a back-to-the-roots experience including the return of fan-favorite gameplay."
Ubisoft also points to Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora as "an industry benchmark in terms of world creation" (our Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora review calls it a solid but not spectacular game with a great world), Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown for being "unanimously praised by critics and players in reviving an iconic brand" (our Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown review is here), and also The Crew Motorfest for continuing "to outperform The Crew 2 on acquisition, activity, monetization, and net bookings metrics since launch."
Here's hoping Ubisoft can match this pace with Star Wars Outlaws promising a "deeply immersive" open-world take on the storied IP.
