Ubisoft has had to delay the release of a number of its upcoming games, including Watch Dogs: Legion, Rainbow Six Quarantine, and Gods and Monsters, reportedly because they all need additional development time. While we're more than happy when companies decide to give games more time to make sure they're good — we're looking at your Mount and Blade 2 and Kerbal Space Program 2 — this doesn't sound good for Ubisoft.
It's not entirely uncommon for games to be delayed due to quality issues or just because additional testing is required, but it is odd to hear of a number of games under the same publisher all being pushed back together. That suggests there is something else afoot.
It could well be a financial issue.
The news of the game delays came about as part of Ubisoft's latest financial report, which it revised its expectations for revenue and profit in the next quarter. Expected earnings are down some $700 million, which is enough to send any company scrambling to make changes. This financial shortfall is being blamed on lower than expected earnings from Ghost Recon Breakpoint and The Division 2.
With that in mind, Ubisoft is pushing back three of its major titles to the financial period of 2020-2021. That still means they'll release sometime between April 2020 and April 2021, but will see a few months of stagnation this financial year. It seems as if Ubisoft is looking to shunt more of its profit-generating new games into the next financial year to shore it up against any further losses, accepting that this one will not be strong.
Do you think this will result in better games, though?
