Ubisoft says it needed to work on Avatar and Star Wars at the time

Specifically, Banchereau says in an interview with MP1st that The Division 2 updates were planned to end due to the studio’s obligations with other projects at the time:

Yes, the plan was after Update 12, at the end of 2020, the plan was to stop supporting the game… We started working on the Star Wars game, we have the Avatar game. Everybody’s very busy at Massive and the idea was that we just need the people on those projects.

He clarifies that this isn’t because Ubisoft thought “The Division was bad,” though after the release of the Warlords of New York DLC, the game was “probably more successful” than the publisher had anticipated.

Since Ubisoft didn’t want to pull people already assigned to other projects, it decided to team up with Ubisoft Bucharest. It took a while for the studio to learn everything about The Division 2, but he believes Year 5 content will impress fans.

Accordingly, The Division 3 is apparently not in development, though that’s not too much of a surprise considering that they have plenty of work to do with The Division Heartland and The Division Resurgence.

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Ubisoft’s Division Day livestream date and details

As noted by an official tweet, the Division Day showcase will start on Thursday, April 20 at 11 AM PDT / 8 PM CEST / 2 PM EDT. You can catch the livestream either on Ubisoft’s Twitch or YouTube channel.

The showcase will cover The Division 2’s Year 5 Roadmap and the new Descent game mode, a roguelike mode with four players where the team has to start from scratch and try to reach the next room.

There will also be a gameplay preview of The Division Heartland, which was unveiled at the Ubisoft Forward event in September 2022. It is a free-to-play survival action shooter that takes place in the heartland of the US and is developed by Ubisoft Red Storm.

Last but not least, the showcase will also reveal a project update for The Division Resurgence, a free-to-play version of the series on mobile. Hopefully, we’ll also get an update of The Division Netflix movie with Jessica Chastain and Jake Gyllenhaal, as it’s been in production for years at this point without a substantial update.

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That said, it does feature some spoilers for the game. This particular breach comes after a series of leaks this week for Avatar Frontiers of Pandora. Hopefully, we will get official details from Ubisoft sooner than later on its progress with the game, after being delayed to 2023.

What we know so far about Avatar Frontiers of Pandora

Most of what we know for sure about the game comes from the First Look trailer shown at last year’s Ubisoft Forward. It is a first-person, action-adventure game developed by Massive Entertainment, in collaboration with Disney and Lightstorm Entertainment. It is built using the Snowdrop engine for current-gen consoles and PC, with Ubisoft having explained why it won’t be released on last-gen consoles like PS4.

The game will feature a new, standalone story where you play as a Na’vi and discover the world of Pandora as you fight against the RDA forces who wish to take over the Western Frontier.

Sony revealed in May 2022 that it has a marketing deal with Ubisoft for Avatar Frontiers of Pandora, hinting that there may be exclusive PS5 content for the game.

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Ubisoft replaces E3 2023 show with own event in June

In a statement to VideoGamesChronicle, Ubisoft said that it has decided to “move in a different direction” but didn’t elaborate further. The company did confirm, however, that it’s opting to hold a Ubisoft Forward event on June 12th in Los Angeles.

The dataminer who originally claimed that Ubisoft was delaying Assassin’s Creed Mirage and The Crew Motorfest also said that the company will have more to share on the games at Ubisoft Forward. The official statement seems to have partially corroborated the leak because up until yesterday, there was no word of a Ubisoft Forward event in June.

This development is neither good for Ubisoft nor E3. The former is already struggling with a scant pipeline of new releases, delays, and middling financial performance, and the latter continues to lose major partners.

VGC’s Andy Robinson says he’s “not hearing good things” about E3 2023 and wouldn’t be surprised if it’s called off.

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Rumor says Assassin’s Creed Mirage could be delayed to 2024

According to a tweet by ScriptLeaksR6 posted today, March 27, both Assassin’s Creed Mirage and Orlando (otherwise known as The Crew Motorfest) have allegedly been delayed.

Specifically, he claims in a follow-up tweet that Mirage is now set for Q4 2023 – Q2 2024 release, meaning that it could match a prior report in December 2022 that the game would come out in August 2023 or that it could be pushed possibly to 2024. It’s unclear how far into the future The Crew Motorfest might be delayed.

The leaker also states that Mirage apparently “runs on [an] ‘old’ Assassin’s Creed engine,” which wouldn’t be too out of line. Assassin’s Creed Mirage was originally pitched as a story-based downloadable content for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, so having it run on the Ubisoft Anvil engine makes sense. The leaker believes that the game will run on a “2019 version of the engine.”

Meanwhile, The Crew Motorfest is rumored to run on a new engine and will be set on the Hawaiian island of Oahu. The new racing game is being developed by Ubisoft Ivory Tower Studio and players can register to participate in the game’s Insider Program to test it before release.

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Electronic Arts and Ubisoft outrank Activision as Sony and Microsoft suppliers

In a handy figure included in its response to U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), Microsoft revealed that the house of sports games EA is the biggest third-party supplier when it comes to console games, followed by Ubisoft and Take-Two Interactive. Although Microsoft stressed this is the case for PlayStation, the figure reveals the same is the case for Xbox as well.

Where things change is when it comes to Sony Interactive Entertainment as a publisher. Apparently, Sony itself is the fourth largest game publisher, surpassing Activision Blizzard, who ranks fifth. “Sony has 286 games which are exclusive to PlayStation,” Microsoft said, adding that Sony keeps its own first-party games “almost entirely exclusive to PlayStation.” The company then name dropped God of War, Spider-Man, and The Last of Us.

Speaking of The Last of Us, Microsoft and Activision evidently want regulators to take note of the HBO television show. Not only did an Activision executive previously claim that The Last of Us’s success is a good reason for the merger to go ahead, Microsoft went the extra mile to point out the show’s success to the CMA.

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Ubisoft closing offices as soon as April 2023

The email cites “external factors” as the reason for the closures. Speaking of the Benelux office specifically, Ubisoft said that “most” of its employees will depart starting April 1st.

“At this time, Ubisoft is facing several challenges due to external factors, such as the decline in sales volume of physical games in favor of digital sales, the centralization of marketing by digitizing all our communication channels, the shift from major retail releases to F2P, mobile and seasonal games and less major physical shows,” the email reads.

It’s unclear which other European subsidiaries Ubisoft is set to close, but the mention of “less physical shows” is interesting as the company just announced its presence at E3 2023. Nevertheless, Ubisoft is one of many companies that have transitioned to digital showcases so physical events have indeed reduced significantly in recent years.

For now, it looks like the closures only impact Ubisoft’s marketing and distribution offices.

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Ubisoft Montpellier’s managing director is the latest to leave

There have been many complaints about the Beyond Good and Evil 2 15 year development process and the large turnover of staff as a result, including the departure of the creative mind behind the franchise, Michel Ancel. The latest high-profile departure is the studio’s managing director Guillaume Carmona, who failed to return to Ubisoft Montpellier after taking leave at the start of the year. A reason has not been given for his departure because of legal confidentiality.

Sources told Kotaku that his departure follows a year where dozens of developers took extended leave for stress or sickness, including many lead developers. This is what has seemingly triggered interest from the Inspection du Travail, who is now interviewing Ubisoft studio employees to prepare their report on labor violations. A Ubisoft spokesperson said:

The health and wellness of our teams is an ongoing priority. Given the length of the development cycle with Beyond Good & Evil 2, the Montpellier development team is undergoing well-being assessments through a third-party for preventative measures and to evaluate where additional support may be needed.

Whether Beyond Good and Evil is ever released remains to be seen, but it is definitely stuck in development hell.

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All Assassin’s Creed projects confirmed and rumored to be in development

We already know that Ubisoft has at least five Assassin’s Creed games in development: the upcoming Mirage, a project code named Red, code name Hexe, code name Jade, and multiplayer game code named Project Invictus. According to known insider Tom Henderson, a VR game code named Project Nexus will be revealed at E3 2023 but Ubisoft is already internally discussing a sequel to Nexus. That’s seven games right there. But that’s not all!

In a new article on Insider Gaming, Henderson claims to have heard from his sources that at least three more Assassin’s Creed games are also in development. That brings the total to ten.

According to the report, all three games are full-fledged Assassin’s Creed outings code named Nebula, Raid, and Echoes. Each of the games will be developed by a different Ubisoft team. A summary of the leak is as follows:

• Ubisoft Sofia pitched Nebula with three settings: India, the Aztec Empire, and the Mediterranean
• Ubisoft Chengdu pitched Raid – a free-to-play four-player, player-vs-environment, co-operative game. The characters will supposedly be from the AC universe
• Ubisoft Annecy pitched Echoes, another multiplayer game

Henderson’s sources further claim that Ubisoft plans to return to Assassin’s Creed’s annual release schedule.

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Assassin’s Creed Valhalla final update 1.7.0 patch notes

Title update 1.7.0 will be released on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC at 7 AM EDT/4 AM PDT tomorrow, February 21. The small patch size of 0.5 GB on PS5 and 1.6 GB on PS4 reflects the fact that there is no new content in the update. However, the list of bug fixes includes issues with Captain at Katzenelnbogen in the River Raid, conflicts with the Light-Fingered skill, the ability to upgrade the Raven Clan Crew Outfit, and several problems in the Helix Store. You can find the full patch notes below.

River Raids

Addressed:

• The Captain at Katzenelnbogen isn’t counted when the kill is confirmed.

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla

World

Addressed:

• Resolved most of the rare instances where Light-Fingered skill prevented the pickup of key items.
• Eivor’s hair can clip through the hood after completing an Animus Anomaly.

Armory & Inventory

Addressed:

• Previously purchased items are missing from player inventory.
• The Raven Clan Crew outfit cannot be enhanced or upgraded to a higher quality.
• The total number of Opals in the inventory doesn’t update when picking up an Opal in the world.

Miscellaneous

Addressed:

• Resolved the error that occurs when trying to claim the Weekly Free Item.
• Gear packs still appear in the store when the content of the pack is already owned.
• Items incorrectly appear as owned in some situations.
• Korean language cannot be applied via Steam Language tab.
• It is possible to lose Helix Credits when purchasing the Twilight Set if 5/5 pieces of gear are already owned.
• Issues with pricing of Helix Store items when redeeming pieces of a full set.
• On Xbox, when buying Helix Credits through the store, they are not correctly added to the player inventory.
•  In-game pop-ups no longer appear for Shared History and The Last Chapter when launching into the game.

This update is now likely to be the actual final update for the game, although Ubisoft had also said that version 1.6.2 released back in November was also the final update. This update included The Last Chapter, a free DLC chapter that attempted to provide some closure on Eivor’s time in the Raven Clan.

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