Ubisoft have done very well out of their new strategy of making games that expand and develop constantly – live games. Rainbow Six: Siege never stopped growing, For Honor is one of the year’s early success stories and The Division’s patches have driven people back to the game quickly. However, Ubisoft VP of live operations Anne Blondel says this doesn’t mean the company is done with solo games.
Plenty more open-world sandbox games to come from Ubisoft then.
“Obviously we see that [live games are] not a gimmick, it’s really here to stay, it’s the way gamers are playing their games,” she explains of Ubi’s current strategy. “But we realise that gamers, sometimes, they like their very solo, linear, story-orientated and focused games so we’re not looking at not doing them anymore.”
As for what they’ll be there’s no announcements today, naturally, but Blondel points to the obvious: “We know that some of our brands are much more in that line. Like Assassin’s Creed, for instance, even if we’re implementing some live elements with events.”
She goes on to say that each Ubisoft brand demands a different level of live support, and they try to “push the envelope” in each case to develop for it. This looks at how people have enjoyed a game before now, how they might change in the future and where, if at all, multiplayer and regular updates fit in.
“I think we will [keep] doing [both] of them because we want to make sure we have flavours to fit each gamer’s taste. Just because you’re a multiplayer gamer doesn’t mean you don’t sometimes enjoy the solo narrative games.”