A financial performance update reveals Ubisoft’s plans for DS development, game delays, and new games.
According to a financial performance report, Ubisoft is delaying Splinter Cell: Conviction and R.U.S.E. to April 2010 and a hazy “2010-2011″ respectively.
The also report says Ubisoft is developing new titles for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 and scaling back development for Nintendo DS games. CEO Yves Guillemot revealed that the company fell short of its financial goals this year between shrinking sales in the DS and Wii casual markets and under-performing or under-selling titles like James Cameron’s Avatar: The Game.
Interestingly, the report lists the Conviction and R.U.S.E. delays as contributing factors in Ubisoft’s operating losses, suggesting that they’re not part of a financial strategy to shield the games from competition in the February release lineup. Calls to Ubisoft for comment on this matter were not immediately returned.
It’s not all bad news out of Ubisoft, however, as the report also reveals that Assassin’s Creed 2 sales topped 6 million and that the game is on-track to hit 9 million by the end of March.
Going forward, Ubisoft plans to scale back development for the DS and ramp up development on its major franchises on Xbox 360 and PS3. The report reveals that Ubisoft is already working on a new game in the Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon series, Driver, a fourth Raving Rabbids game and a new “episode” of Assassin’s Creed which they say will have an online multiplayer mode.