Despite the variety of games published by Ubisoft, most of them are played the same way. That is, the progression system in the games is similar and with the same elements as when playing over the network. The same approach and ideas are applied over and over again to all games in their different worlds on an annual basis. The result is players withdrawing from their favorite chains and “crashing” on social media for years without any reaction from the French company.
With Ubisoft focusing on the "games as a service" model that was making money thanks to the success of the first The Division until the company referred to itself as "the era before The Division" and "the era after The Division", it began to relax in story games such as the Assassin's Creed series. With annual releases that are similar in everything, and what made matters worse is that in the last two parts of the series the game was designed in a way that makes progress in it and unlocking skills very difficult and requires a lot of time and adding the option to pay in real currency to facilitate progress, and this is what angered players about the company and its policies in recent years . Not only were the narrative games affected, but even the group that suffered from the same problems, repetition, similarity, unbalanced progress, and versions full of technical errors.
Reports obtained by VGC reveal that over the past two decades, Ubisoft has employed an editorial team of 100 people responsible for writing the directions for all of Ubisoft's games, including designing graphics and writing scripts to keep the games under a single, coherent vision, and learning from mistakes and avoiding them in their next game. This plan succeeded in the beginning until the company's games in the recent period became very similar, and according to a source from within the company, the decisions and ideas on all games come from one or two people in the company, and this is what caused the great similarity in the games and led them towards the open world and the introduction of elements « online” in it.
Frustrating year
The year 2019 was the alarm bell that woke the company from its slumber. When looking at the sales of The Division 2 and Ghost Recon: Breaking Point, we find that the numbers are disappointing and not what the company had hoped, and the reason is, as CEO Yves Gemo said last October, “The games have become very similar. It is difficult to tell them apart.” In addition, the hasty release of games made them full of technical errors and repetition of missions, which caused players to refrain from them and to obtain negative ratings.
Leaves arrangement
Ubisoft is better late than never. She woke up from her nap and decided to restructure the editorial team at the top of the pyramid. According to VGC sources, the editorial team will be strengthened and redistributed to development studios around the world to accompany them in the development process and be more flexible. Serge Hasquet, the creative director responsible for the editorial team, will not change, but 7 deputy director positions will be created, and each deputy responsible for a specific series will be headed by Hasquet in a supervisory role only. The aim of this division is to ensure that each series is given its own identity, whether in design or in writing, and to avoid similarities that occur now.
"leap of faith"
As a result of this “jump,” all of the company’s games due to be released this year have been indefinitely delayed to implement modifications and ensure that each game appears and plays differently from the other. The sources indicate that there is an unannounced game that has reached advanced stages in the development process and has been canceled and worked on again, and several games in its early stages have been changed in text and design so that the company is sure of its distinction in preparation for the next generation of platforms in the holiday season.
Abdullah Heneidy (Jeddah) @sen3bd