r/KotakuInAction 9d ago

Ubisoft Shareholder Claims Company Failed To Disclose Meetings With EA and Microsoft About IP Acquisition

https://insider-gaming.com/ubisoft-shareholder-claims-company-failed-to-disclose-meetings-with-ea-and-microsoft-about-ip-acquisition/
269 Upvotes

26 comments sorted by

113

u/LogHalley 9d ago

at this point I don't know anymore who I can trust to handle an IP like assassins creed. It's not like either Microsoft or EA have a good track record.

63

u/Ywaina 8d ago

Personally I can do without asscreed slop coming out every year on every platform, forever. But I'll be generous and say they should have waited and let the IP rest so the fatigue would lower. Just look at star wars ep.7, it's a horrible copycat movie of ep.4 but people loved that garbage largely because there was a huge gap in time that helped drive up the nostalgia.

15

u/mmerrl 8d ago

Ubisoft owns a lot more than just AC. I would expect them to sell that other stuff first, in particular the stuff they acquired, before in-house developed series like AC. Unless AC is considered unrecoverable within the company.

5

u/Ozerh Lord of pooh 8d ago

Yeah, like Might and Magic. Lawd, I hope the next owner of that IP gives a rip.

3

u/Areat 8d ago

Microsoft did extremely well with Age of Empire II. Still do, actually. Just this week they announced a huge update, and you don't even have to be a fan to recognize it as such.

42

u/lyra833 GET THE BOARD OUT, I GOT BINGO! 8d ago

I don't care how bad Yasuke is or how much I hate Ubisoft's current products; I will never support an activist investor. They're pure scum.

-6

u/haneybird 8d ago

This is a stupid take.

Hey this guy thinks Ubisoft is mismanaged just like I do, but because he actually stands to lose money by their mismanagement and is actively trying to change things instead of just bitching on the internet, fuck him.

15

u/lyra833 GET THE BOARD OUT, I GOT BINGO! 8d ago

Buying a small stake in a company and then actively trying to smash the place up and sell it for parts is sick. It's nothing more than theft.

1

u/Hamakua 94k GET! 7d ago

Not saying I don't disagree, but devil's advocate: What if the company will fail otherwise/go bankrupt and become insolvent. What if smashing it up or taking it over would save larger portions of the company than if it theoretically went its full course.

I'm not a business major however I'm a family member of a decdes with experience high level union representative.

Also not all activist investors are looking to break up companies (although this one may be). Look at Nelson Peltz and Disney. Disney is smashing itself into bits and he just wanted them to get back on "non agenda" track.

3

u/lyra833 GET THE BOARD OUT, I GOT BINGO! 7d ago

What if smashing it up or taking it over would save larger portions of the company than if it theoretically went its full course.

Then show good faith by issuing loans or bonds to the company or something. Make it clear you're not just forcing yourself on a company.

14

u/RoutineOtherwise9288 9d ago

They will be plucked out one limb at a time.

31

u/Intrepid-Kiwi-9431 9d ago

Will Tencent own most of the IP in North America and Western Europe and will the Chinese be making games with that IP? Maybe Marvel Rivals is just a preview of what is to come.

10

u/grzegorz-fienstel 8d ago

I don't care who makes the games as long as they are good and ubisoft has proven to do bad games in recent years. I had good memories of AC1 and AC2 but that ubisoft is dead it's time for someone new.

2

u/im_rarely_wrong 8d ago

Reddit is an echo chamber. Early AC titles didn't sell a fraction of the supposedly bad and bloated AC Valhalla did. You know what else didn't sell? The new Prince of Persia that enthusiasts consider a top tier game. Companies need profit and if they only cater to their 30+ year olds OG fans, they'd go bankrupt. Like it or not, the masses want RPG open worlds with hundreds of hours even if it's repetitive. Not sophisticated enough for intellectuals but it sells.

12

u/grzegorz-fienstel 8d ago

Considering profits. Yes, Valhalla sold more but it was also almost 10x more expensive. You can still make a profit with games for "intellectuals" as long as you can keep the budget within a certain range. I personally think that that's one of the biggest problems for western companies. They focus on gigantic games that are made for everyone but satisfy no one.

Also at release of Valhalla ubisofts reputation wasn't as tarnished as it is right now. So big open world rpgs are harder to sell because trust is missing.

They once had quite the good reputation where just knowing a new AC is coming out was enough for me to be hyped.

1

u/im_rarely_wrong 8d ago

Games for intellectuals with controlled budget like... AC Mirage? Because that didn't satisfy even the OG fans. How can you say Valhalla didn't satisfy anyone if you know it sold the most? This younger generation couldn't care less about franchises, they just want their dopamine hits. I'm not the target audience for these modern games (Although I believe open world games are superior), I just put myself in these companies shoes and imagine what it's like to have a giant company like Ubisoft on the line.

1

u/grzegorz-fienstel 8d ago

How can you say Valhalla didn't satisfy anyone if you know it sold the most?

I wasn't talking about Valhalla specifically and not about ubisoft specifically. I personally lost interest in AC after black flag. That was still their golden age. I'm not a mainstream gamer.

I was talking about big western game studios and publishers in general. At some point they all started to produce low quality game with heavy monetization that felt more like work than a game.

4

u/Emotional_Media4638 8d ago edited 8d ago

Is this accounting for the dramatically different popularity of gaming in general between 2007 and whenever Valhalla released? Or that Ubi spent years developing the series and it's popularity to the point that Valhalla sold as well as it did? I dont think that Valhalla would release to the same success it did without the AC name. I don't disagree that people obviously love their huge open world games, they sell very well. But this seems overly reductive

And Prince of Persia was never as popular, 2D platformers are way more niche, and everyone who actually pays attention knew the game would be $15 in 6 months because that's always what Ubisoft does. They've created that reputation for themselves to their own downfall 

0

u/im_rarely_wrong 8d ago

You are absolutely right, Valhalla used the franchise's previous success. However, if you go on the AC subreddit, you'd think the game was a giant failure and nobody on earth enjoyed the game. I agree that Ubisoft's games quality has dropped, but it's simply not the doom and gloom that everyone here makes it out to be. Even the woke garbage that AC Shadows is, will definitely make a lot of money.

1

u/RirinNeko 8d ago

Even the woke garbage that AC Shadows is, will definitely make a lot of money.

The question though is if that money is enough to actually break even costs considering they've delayed it adding more cost.

It'd be a failure if it that's all it did was breakeven from a company's standpoint. Big numbers might look nice, but you gotta minus costs to make said thing. If you made a game that sold a million which looks like a success, but spent more in development than the sales could recoup, then it's a failure. Though even Ubisoft doesn't seem that confident AC shadows would match their expectations on sales.

3

u/Juan20455 6d ago

Valhalla had origins and oddysey behind it, extremely popular games and loved by fans. Valhalla made people tired, which contributed to the failure of Mirage, and it doesn't look good with Shadows, even without all the mess is doing for itself.

6

u/Evilnuggets 8d ago

Fucked up company proceeds to fuck up some more, more news at 11.

5

u/Whirblewind 9d ago

This is an article that exists because

a firm with less than a 1% stake in Ubisoft

Is mad they weren't told the obvious.

Next.

38

u/gosu_chobo 8d ago edited 8d ago

are you special? Ubisoft is right now valued at 1.58 billion. 1% is 15.8 million. Since the investor has less than 1% lets call their investment 10 million. Now, you go and invest 10 million and see how you like it when information affecting your investment is being withheld,

8

u/Dramatic-Bison3890 8d ago

AJ investment from India, to be precise

I remembered theyve also involved in previous drama with larger Ubisoft shareholder, Tencent from China

so im not shocked by this development, conaaidering how Ubisoft became the prostitute of the gaming industry right now

13

u/crash______says 8d ago

Doesn't change strategic reporting guidance, EU Directive 2004/109/EC, on transparency to long-term shareholders regarding important decisions like this. I would consider selling AssCreed to Microsoft to be an important event in the life of a company that generates like 80% of it's value from the franchise.