Ubisoft's CEO Just Said The Quiet Part Out Loud 

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Too much bad blood. Ubisoft could fire the entire upper management and rebuild from scratch and I still wouldn't even waste the time and energy to give them the finger.

The CEO did not mention creating "fun" games, just high quality and long lasting, right there tells us a lot.

These days a 70$ price tag is a big no from me. Some of the best games I've played over the past years are from smaller companies charging 30-40$ for a REALLY good game. Meanwhile the industry "titans" ask 70$ for hot garbage that doesn't even work at release. 90% of the games I've wanted I haven't bought during a sale because by the time they're asking a reasonable price I just don't care to play it anymore either. When studios reliably produce good games worth being excited over I'll shell out the cash, but no one is even coming close right now.

It almost feels like the self sabotage is intentional now

When a live service game costs more than a single player game, it's just q big yikes and now quadruple a being a thing is even more worse at this point I'd rather not even play new games or stick to indie games.

Skull and Bones is a AAAA game: It took *_AAAA_* long time to release.

I think ultimately, the elephant in the room that the big media publishers keep missing is that the kinds of huge marjet reactions they chase are not to a specific kind of product. They are reactions to a big cultural phenomenon. People didn't love MMOs, they loved World of Warcraft. They didn't love funny superhero movies, they loved Iron Man. They didn't love ensemble casts, they loved Avengers. They didn't love dark and brooding superheroes, they loved The Dark Knight. They didn't love battle royales, they loved Fortnite. They didn't love fantasy TV shows, they loved Game of Thrones. They didn't love live service looter shooters, they loved Destiny. They didn't love survival games or voxel games, they loved Minecraft. If you're quick, you can ride on the coattails of some of these breakout successes and get some decent success of your own before the flood of shovelware gives the entire niche you're entering a bad name, but if you're going to be chasing trends, the time to do it is before they explode. You need to see Everquest timidly poke its head up from a niche and make World of Warcraft, not see World of Warcraft gorging on everybody's lunch and make Wildstar. That's too late. Even better, make Minecraft. Make a bunch of bold experiments on shoestring budgets, see if any of them catch on. Nearly all of them won't, but you'll have spent bugger all on them. If one does, you scale support for it to match demand.

It's marketing inflation... soon it will be AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA for $250. Companies as a whole... the marketing gimmick is up with most people. Its border line insanity. Even the broadband has done this to the point where people cannot tell the difference between ultra fast, super fast, extra super duper fast and super ultimate superspeed fast.... Ubisoft was added to my list of "don't deal with them again ever" list quite some time ago.

Ubisoft and high quality?! LMAO.

the 4th A means alpha release xD

I haven't bought or played a Ubisoft game in years, I think I'll keep it that way.

Meanwhile, barebones Helldivers just came out at $40 and I’m having more fun with it than any Ubisoft game I’ve ever played.

What Ubi says: "It's AAAA" What Ubi means: "It's massively over budget due to development hell"

I have actively stayed away from certain companies and studios, and Ubisoft is one company that will always be on that list. Sometime it may seem like they will release something good that you might want to play but "trust me bro" you will be fine without.

I will buy their AAAA game at 7 bucks at a 90% discount if at all

"Out capacity to revive old brands" also known as "we want to milk old ips more"

"high-quality", there's the problem with the price point. A gamer can tell what's high-quality, slapping extra A's on a game doesn't make any more quality than less A's. A higher price just makes the buyer more likely to see what quality the game is before paying so much for it.

Well, he better not act shocked when people stop buying games.

It's a 33% increase in "A" for only 16% higher cost? WHAT A DEAL!

Literally the JimSterlings "Why We Need Middle Shelf Games (The Jimquisition)" on YT... what a great vid that one...

I refuse to buy anything from Ubisoft anyway

Fun fact: Ubisoft is a word from an ancient tongue and translates to "don't buy"

It took Ubisoft a decade and a whole new A to add Starfield loading screens to boarding and disembarking your ship.

the additional a stands for ads

"If a bread salesmen starts selling shit, we will slowly find out that he is no longer a bread salesman but instead a shit salesman." Kolljak - 2/12/2024

As a Gen X-er, the phrase "traditionally monetized" at 12:11 just about gave me a conniption

The peak of Quality Mountain was called Triple-A. This new "AAAA" is the cry you let out when you fall off the mountain and tumble into the lake of human excrement at the base.

I'd love to play Prince of Persia, but no Steam release = I'll hold off for now

Just don't buy $70 dollar games. Simple really. When sales tank, they'll lower the prices ASAP b/c of earnings.

Brotato came out on playstation a couple of weeks ago for €4, and I can't put it down.

I did a breakdown of Ubisoft's financial statement. Buried in the Appendix is their actual performance. It said they posted a loss. Their debt has also risen.

It's hard to take this company seriously when it doesn't take itself seriously. They claim AAA games but most of the times we are lucky if they are 'mid' tier games. Then all you have to do is wait 3-4 months and the game is on sale for 60-90% off. Hard to take that seriously

How long until Skull and Bones falls on its face?

Apathy is all I have left for Ubisoft. They dug their hole, now they get to lay down in it.

Piracy has a bright future huh😂

Oh god can't wait for the next 10 years of the same game that they've been releasing for the last 17 years.

Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was great and I hope they make more hope they make more games of that quality

Since Bellular is being revisionist with Destiny it is important to remember that even though the hype was massive with it being the most preorder game ever at the time it turned out to not translate into massive levels interests. Remember Destiny 1 sold about 7.5 million copies in a year while Bungie projected around 16 million sales before the year of 2014 was even over, it was hype for a future and style of game based on the assumption the Bungie would repeat with Destiny what they did with Halo.... but as soon as the game was on the shelves it was clear that that did not happen and in a decade it has not happened.

If Red is closer to Odyssey than Valhalla, im definitely gonna give it a shot. And it’s so nice seeing the live service model crash and burn. Maybe companies will go back to making good games again instead of massive cash grabs that eventually fail

Ubisoft telling me not to buy their low quality games always helps me to save up money for actually high quality games with reasonable prices Thank you Ubisoft! ❤

Duke Nukem Forever is my favorite AAAA game.

I keep repeating time after time, I'm ok with 10-15 hour games that are built on a smaller budget but with artistic and gameplay integrity rather than AAA who put anything that "hype" with braindead gameplay and "ultra realistic" graphics that demand you play them for over 60 hours while you actually experience everything there is to offer in like 5-6.

I have absolute faith in Ubisoft's ability to fuck anything up.

They need a lot of PR wins to not just be considered criminals much less actually liked. I think the biggest problem with the live service model is that it stops working if your customers don't play 80 hours a week and buy every skin.

AC Mirage sold 5M!???? We are doomed and we deserve mediocre games 😭

the AAAA label became a meme already when playing the beta can't see your body when body markings in character creation - AAAA game! disconnect from tutorial fight and have to redo it again - AAAA game! footstep sounds only from the left - AAAA game! can't go on land anywhere - AAAA game! can't board group members' ships - AAAA game! can't walk around on my ship - AAAA game!

the fact that ubisoft exists and that guy has work is amazing to me

Well idk what Helldivers 2 counts as but Im sure as hell sure that game will be much more successful and was cheaper, and enjoying a live service I'm usually not into.

Ubisoft can go bankrupt and nothing of value will be lost.

Raising the price higher just makes it easier to skip when it launches mid at best.

Skull and Bones huh? Yeah, i will wait that year until i get it on the Humble Bundle, Gamepass or for free on the Epic store. (Probably sooner than later)

Keep your feet out of my mouth, said no Quentin Tarantino ever.

That game doesn't even deserve 40 USD / Euro

remember, one A in any Ubisoft game always stands for Abuse.

The key phrase there is "long lasting" ...

"long lasting", keep that quote for when the servers of S&B shuts down within a year, it's bound to age like fine milk

"AAAA experience" 6/10

I'm not even gonna bother. The disconnect between me and the big companies is an abyss at this point. The chance I'd buy a game from them on release was already effectively nil before this newest price hike...

I assure you my foot tastes like cotton candy and olives.

You know what I think is the most important thing a company needs to make good decisions and good games? A CEO that actually plays video-games.

Live service gaming is like VC investing. You only need one succesful project

On the one hand even at 70 we are still paying less in real terms than we did in the 90s for a lot of games (just off inflation times the price of games from back then by two and you get what you paid for them in current money) but on the other games like Skull and Bones isn't worth even half it's current price tag

the 4th A is Alpha release.

Ubisoft needs to feel comfortable with never getting my money. I don't care what they release, the damage was done.

Ubisoft is the Union Carbide of the video game industry.

I would expect gamers to be more influenced by what their favorite streamers says about a game as they play it than by anything a critic says.

The way he expresses his commentary on AAAA-Games sounds Trumpesque to me

I presume B and A games are generally higher quality than AAA games, just using more gpu power than the B games. Mainline FF is an A game series that calls itself AAA. Same with Baldurs Gate III

The last new 'AAA' game I've played was Starfield, which I didn't bought, It came with my gpu. I don't buy games new, hell I rarely buy games entirely these days and for the games thst peak my interest I usually get them when discounted, usually at that point you get the full package for less than the original release and with most bugs ironed out.

Long lasting : Sure High Quality : Where?

Rainbow Six Siege keeps getting more popular and is 9 years old by now.

All Ubisoft had to do was copy AC4s pirate/ship mechanics, remove the assassin parts and bolster the multi-player and it would have been a massive success. Skull and Bones is such a let down. Ubisoft seems incapable of doing anything right

I honestly cannot believe that 5 million people are still buying and playing ass creed games. We can't blame these companies for making crap rehashes, sequels and creatively bankrupt products, its clearly the fault of braindead consumers still wanting this garbage

I really loved the ship-to-ship combat of Black Flag. They improved on it in Rogue, and I was hoping that Skull and Bones would be the along the same lines. From early reviews it's pretty polarizing, so for Guillemot to call it a AAAA game *and* to position it as live service with that price tag is a pretty big bet for Ubi to place on the future. I paid full price for Cyberpunk 2077 at launch, a game that so under-delivered that the company was sued by shareholders. I won't pay full price for an at-launch title ever again - I'll play Skull and Bones if and when it goes on sale

Thanks for the videos! I hope you’re able to continue to be successful, make videos, and support your team!

A quick translation - Consistently: Once a year(maybe twice) High-quality: Low quality slop Long-Lasting: Live service

You know a company is doing great when you regularly watch gaming channels, play on Steam, etc. and are only just now with this video finding out they released a new Prince of Persia game. Heck, I didn't even know such a thing was in the works. Never heard a peep about it.

Skull and Bones truly looks like a free to play game. If I would have to Iron man the claim as much as possible maybe just maybe it's a 19,99 game...

Giving you my complimentary, algorithm pusher comment! Keep up the great work 👍

Here's a good question: Why does every game need to have a budget of HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS of dollars? What truly justifies that ungodly chunk of cash? I've seen some incredible AAA games in the past, and I still couldn't possibly see that kind of cash goes. Starfield is a prime example. How the HELL did that game cost $200 mil to make? If the budgets weren't so psychotic, they could sell a couple million copies and make stacks and stacks of cash.

Wasnt Ubisoft The Same People That Said “GET COMFORTABLE NOT OWNING YOUR GAMES”😒😒😒🤔🤔🤔

PoP looks awesome. Backlog awesome for whenever it's easier to actually play it and on sale would be a bonus.

At some point, we have to say this asking price is too high for a video game, any video game. Especially now that we are in an era where the initial asking price is not the full cost of what you're buying. There's always dlc, add-ons or micro transactions on top of that initial cost.

What is AAAA anyway? Tom (tom&jerry) screaming sound?

Ubisoft AAAA means: A Amusingly fun A Advanced graphics A Astronomical budget A Arrogance related to a self evaluation of a game's value

I was looking forward to Skull & Bones and I’d like to thank Ubisoft for the Open Beta as it has actually saved me money. I did give it about an hour before I uninstalled it. I wonder how many others have done the same?

their out-of-touch-ness is becoming unsettlingly wild... they can't help themselves no more, it's like they are sick of hiding it anymore.

Imagine what kind of great games we would get if only the suits who run these companies said “You know what, we clearly don’t know what people want, so just make a game your passionate about”.

Ubisoft has been saving me money for a long while now. Honestly, I gotta give them props for it. Hell, most of the "AAA" industry has.

I have played about 30 hours in the open beta. The idea is good, the game looks nice. The gameplay loop was enjoyable for the most part. But its not even triple A. For most of the 30 hours I felt like I'm playing a Black Flag with more grind and more numbers and less simulation. The map where you spend most of your time is small, not a lot of space for manouvering, especialy between islands, where most of the trade routes go. (I know there are open water areas but there is nothing there besides lvl9 ships.) The game is waaaay to fast paced. Its like an action game but instead of characters you have ships. Pulling turns that would break even modern vessels. Cannon loading speed is like changing mags in a subgun. One second you try to aim at a ship, the next there is another ship broadsiding you, the ship that was sailing away from you just a moment before. The interface is way too much consol based. The key bind for "take all" changes to "mark" when you hover the mouse over an item (which happens accidently very often), I almost died multiple times because I could not just take all loot after an assault becuase that stupid hotkey didnt want to "context switch" back. Short black loading screens everywhere. I had rank 4 tools after about 4 hours of gameplay. And there seems to be only 5 levels. I dont see where this "big" game is. So far there are 7? 8? type of ships? 3 of them were unavailable in the beta. besides stats and 1 ability they are pretty much play the same. zero RPG element, neither for ships, nor for the character. Pay 1 month of Ubisoft Premium for 18 dollars, play the game for a month, 30-60 hours, then forget it ever existed.

I think Ubisoft's biggest issue is that, as a company, Ubisoft overvalues their impact on the market and the people's perception of their work. And the people that consume their games accept that overevaluation as an accurate representation of the state of the company. Thinking about Ubisoft's catalog; Prince of Persia, AC: 1 & 2, AC:Black Flag, AC: Rogue, even Valhalla to an extent, the South Park games, Far Cry, Rayman, the Rabids games, etc. They have a really solid catalog... of AA quality games.

Well I will say the loud part out loud, Ubisoft no longer exists in by book. Activision, Ubisoft and EA, are 3 studios I will not buy from if I see them on the front of a games cover. I have recently added Bethesda and Rocksteady to the list.

It’s funny to think that The Division and Watchdogs were basically the original The Day Before. Look at the early trailers for these games - they did not deliver even a fraction of their promises.

It's the strange nature of the term 'AAA' being a genuine self-branding by developers and publishers (and also fans), but simultaneously being a tongue-in-cheek way that many people have described these so-called games as so many publishers settled into the practice of knowingly releasing sub-par products with the promise of fixing them later, yet still clinging to the 'AAA' term. No-one, or not enough people, ever properly rejected the use of the term and so it became an inextricable part of the vocabulary when discussing games made by the biggest devs/publishers. While it is laughable on it's face, the 'AAA' games industry and it's fans have kind of necessitated the creation of the 'AAAA' game label as an attempt to appeal to the broadest number of people that they have changed their approach to game design. Most people who don't spend an awful lot of time viewing & reading games media rely on a superficial examination of a game's marketing to decide their purchase, so this kind of labelling is effective, no matter the case that it doesn't really explain anything about the game. Looking forward to the upcoming Penta A game, whenever that may be.

How the heck did spider-man 2 cost so much to make? Especially when you consider the entire map was a copy and paste job with some modifications. Modern prince of Persia fans don’t realize that the game was originally a side-scroller

Complete games full of additional purchases. But it's really complete... If you keep paying. It's big and full of additional purchases. High quality and long lasting ways to fill the board and investors pockets.

Ultimately, we are going to look back at $70 as the good ole days. When your McDonalds meal has gone up by 50% in the last 2 years, do you really expect that video game prices will stay flat? I really don't understand how these companies can justify spending $300M on making a game, same with movies anymore. That just creates a situation where they need millions of sales at inflated prices to break even. If they churn out garbage at high development costs, people won't buy it whether it is $50 or $70 unit cost, leading the studio to go under. Gaming companies really need to learn how to make fun games at reasonable budgets.

Call of Duty did the same thing. Took an add on game, called it “high quality” then sold it for $70

The last Ubisoft game I played was South Park: The Stick of Truth. Prior to that, I dabbled in the original Assassins Greed 1 for the 360. I hate their launcher, and I am not interested in Games as a Service. Cancelled the Microsoft Game Pass after losing access to a game I was still playing through because of arbitrary availability (licensing/publishing agreements, I get it), still -- no way in hell I'm ever buying into scams like that again.