I think the explanation is simpler, and much less sinister, than that. Their last few attempts at major releases have gone really poorly, and the AC franchise has lost traction with their more action-focused, huge-world style game like Odyssey, Valhalla, and Shadows. I believe the drop-off in players between Odyssey and Valhalla was around 50%, in both revenue and player count. Mirage seems to have had higher revenue than Shadows, despite being a smaller production (both in scope and budget). Ubisoft shares have dropped dramatically in the past few years, long before Shadows was released and anyone was upset about a character in the game.
SW: Outlaws was a monumental failure, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora flopped (they struggled to pass 2 million players, on a huge budget), XDefiant crashed and was shut down, amid the general noise concerning live-service overload, Skull and Bones is among the biggest failures in company history (not sure they even sold 1 million copies).
Ubisoft is a heavily mismanaged company in deep trouble, and has been for some time. Blaming their caution on American culture wars and adverse reactions to a character in an AC game is just deflection, and likely a strategy to avoid accountability for their own shortcomings over the last half-decade or so.
Existing User Log In
New User Registration
Register for a free account to gain full access to the VGChartz Network and join our thriving community.
