Today Ubisoft announced that it’s hitting the brakes on the release of Assassin’s Creed Shadows once again.
The game was originally supposed to launch on November 15, 2024, for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S, but Star Wars Outlaws happened, and its underperformance likely sounded like a warning, convincing the company to delay its Assassin’s Creed game to February 14, 2025, to give it more time in the oven.
Now, Ubisoft has decided “to provide an additional month of development” according to a document shared with investors, to “better incorporate the player feedback gathered over the past three months and help create the best conditions for launch by continuing to engage closely with the increasingly positive Assassin’s Creed community.”
As a result, the new release date is March 20, just before the end of the company’s fiscal year. This is part of a “renewed focus on gameplay quality and engaging Day-1 experiences.”
Yet, that is not all. The company is seeking deeper transformation and “taking decisive steps to reshape the Group in order to deliver best-in-class player experiences, enhance operational efficiency and maximize value creation.”
To that end, the board of directors has appointed “leading advisors” with the goal of “pursuing various transformational strategic and capitalistic options to extract the best value for stakeholders.”
Apparently, this involves “transactions” as the company mentions that it’ll inform the market once one materializes. This could indicate an opening to a sale or to at least external investment, albeit the wording is very vague.
On the operational side, the publisher will keep trying to reduce its costs significantly and will take a “highly selective” approach to investments.
The goal is to reach €200 million in reduction of its fixed cost base by fiscal year 2025-26 (which is the one that starts in April) against fiscal year 2022-23.
Ubisoft also mentions that its Q3 net bookings (basically revenue) are expected to be lower than previously forecasted at €300 million due to lower-than-expected Holiday sales mainly for Star Wars: Outlaws on top of the discontinuation of XDefiant.
Net bookings for the full fiscal year are expected to be approximately €1.9 billion and the company still expects to break even in terms of operating income.
We also get a comment from CEO Yves Guillemot himself.
“We made good progress on the strategic and execution reviews initiated a few months ago and are confident that this will position Ubisoft for a stronger future. We have taken decisive steps to reshape the Group in order to deliver best-in-class player experiences, enhance operational efficiency and maximize value creation.
We also recently appointed leading advisors and are actively exploring various strategic and capitalistic options to unlock the full value potential of our assets. We are convinced that there are several potential paths to generate value from Ubisoft’s assets and franchises.
Additionally, we are all behind our teams’ efforts to create the most ambitious Assassin’s Creed opus of the franchise and made the decision to provide an extra month of development to Shadows in order to better incorporate the player feedback gathered over the past three months that will enable us to fully deliver on the potential of the game and finish the year on a strong note.”
If you’re interested in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, you can check out some gameplay showing the combat styles of the two protagonists.
