Ubisoft cancels 6 games, including Prince of Persia, due to low quality

Ubisoft cancels six upcoming games, including its highly anticipated Prince of Persia Remake

Ubisoft has announced a major strategy shift, cancelling 6 upcoming games and closing its Halifax and Stockholm studios. Ubisoft’s Prince of Persia Remake is the most high-profile cancellation, with the other games being unannounced. Three of these games were new IPs, including one mobile title.

Ubisoft claims that their plans moving forward are to focus on key “Creative Houses” with “Open World Adventures and GaaS-native experiences” being their “core pillars”. Resources for Ubisoft’s cancelled games will now be focused on other games. Seven unannounced games will be given more development time to ensure that quality benchmarks are met.

Ubisoft has discontinued 6 games that do not meet the new enhanced quality as well as more selective portfolio prioritization criteria at Group level. These include Prince of Persia The Sands of Time remake as well as 4 unannounced titles, including 3 new IP’s, and a mobile title.

In parallel, the Group will allocate additional development time to 7 games in order to ensure enhanced quality benchmarks are fully met and maximise long-term value creation. This includes the unannounced title initially planned for FY26, that has been delayed to FY27.

– Ubisoft

With the cancellation of their Prince of Persia Remake, Ubisoft has given up on a project that has been in development for most of this decade. The fact that this project could not be salvaged sets low expectations for Ubisoft’s future projects.

Expect more of the same from Ubisoft

At this point, Ubisoft should now be better known for its failed projects than its successes. Remember Hyper Scape and XDefiant? What about Beyond Good and Evil 2? Skull and Bones did release, but it wasn’t a hit. Ubisoft has become adept at investing in failed projects. If nothing else, Ubisoft’s announcements today are a continuation of a long trend.

Ubisoft needs a major reset. Note that Ubisoft is making a “continued shift toward a persistently more selective AAA market and an increasingly competitive shooter landscape”. If that is anything to go by, Ubisoft wants to continue developing large, high-budget AAA open-world games and continue investing in existing shooter IPs. It looks like there will be little to no focus on new IP. If that is the case, gamers may only expect more of the same from Ubisoft moving forward. All the same “established franchises” and nothing fresh.

You can join the discussion on Ubisoft’s cancelled projects on the OC3D Forums.

Mark Campbell

Mark Campbell

A Northern Irish father, husband, and techie that works to turn tea and coffee into articles when he isn’t painting his extensive minis collection or using things to make other things.

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