LogIn"If gamers should get used to not owning games, developers must get used to not having jobs."
Ubisoft
Ubisoft's Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was a pleasant surprise from the studio that is fully focused on sequels and sequels of sequels. The game was received well but, unfortunately, wasn't very successful financially.
In the end, Ubisoft disbanded the team that developed it. The director of publishing at Larian, the creator of Baldur's Gate 3, Michael Douse, feels that low sales are Ubisoft's fault. The Lost Crown was first released everywhere but on Steam, where it appeared 7 months after the launch.
"The last notable game on their platform was arguably Far Cry 6 in 2021. The Crew, Mirage and Avatar came in 2023 and didn’t perform, so you can assume subscriptions were at a lull when PoP released by 2024. Which means people wouldn’t be launching their store all too much," Douse said.
Ubisoft
He believes that if it had been released on Steam, it would have been a "market success," and there would likely be a sequel "because the team are so strong. It’s such a broken strategy. The hardest thing is to make a 85+ game – it is much, much easier to release one. It just shouldn’t be done as it was."
Speaking of The Crew, Ubisoft is known for its unpopular decisions lately, and one of them is shutting down the game, meaning players can't play it anymore even though they paid money for it. this whole situation basically reinforces the company's opinion that players should get used to not owning their games.
"If the statement 'gamers should get used to not owning their games' is true because of a specific release strategy (sub above sales), then the statement 'developers must get used to not having jobs if they make a critically acclaimed game' (platform strategy above title sales) is also true, and that just isn’t sensible – even from a business perspective," Douse shared.
After keeping its games on its own platform and EGS, Ubisoft is slowly coming back to Steam. Hopefully, this situation will teach it something, and we will see more releases on the most popular digital game store in the future.
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