Watch Dogs Legion, Gods & Monsters and Rainbow Six Quarantine will all be delayed from their original release dates after Ghost Recon Breakpoint failed to live up to expectations.
Ubisoft announced today that almost their entire mid-range release schedule was being pushed back from the 19/20 fiscal year into 20/21, citing "a sharp downward revision in the revenues expected from Ghost Recon Breakpoint and, to a lesser extent, The Division 2."
The revision represents a roughly 33% reduction in net bookings (that's business talk for sales) from €2,185m to €1,450m, and a new operating income estimate of between €20m and €50m (a huge reduction from the original €480m). Much of the blame for this fiscal adjustment is placed at the feet of new release Ghost Recon Breakpoint, which the company claims has had a 'very disappointing' first few weeks.
"For Ghost Recon Breakpoint, while the game’s quality appeared on track," says Ubisoft co-founder and CEO Yves Guillemot, "critical reception and sales during the game’s first weeks were very disappointing. As we have done with past titles, we will continue to support the game and listen to the community in order to deliver the necessary improvements.
Guillemot continued to identify three major reasons the company believes Breakpoint failed on its recent release:
"First, it is harder to generate interest for a sequel to a Live multiplayer game, when prior iterations benefited from years of optimization. Consequently, we need to make sure there is more time between each iteration of Live games.
"Second, our strategy of introducing gameplay innovations in our games has had a very positive impact on our brands. However, to win over players, these innovations need to be perfectly implemented in order to offer an optimal experience. This has not yet been sufficiently the case with Ghost Recon Breakpoint. While the change of formula has been very well received by some players, with an average daily playtime per player of over three hours, it also has been strongly rejected by a significant portion of the community.
"Finally, Ghost Recon Breakpoint did not come in with enough differentiation factors, which prevented the game’s intrinsic qualities from standing out."
These delayed releases result in Watch Dogs Legion being pushed back from March 6 until at least after April 1 when the fiscal year flips over to 20/21.
