Ubisoft doesn't want to throw money away by releasing a PC version

Nov 24, 2011 22:21 GMT  ·  By

Ubisoft has once again talked about the state of PC gaming and how the rampant piracy is seriously affecting the chances of seeing some of its new titles, like I Am Alive arrive on that platform.

PC gaming has seen lots of growth in recent years due to the popularity of digital distribution services like Valve’s Steam, but quite a lot of publishers are still reticent about bringing a game to the platform, or sometimes delay that version of the title to allow console gamers to try it out first.

Ubisoft is definitely one of the biggest culprits of this practice, delaying plenty of games this year on the PC, including From Dust, Driver: San Francisco or the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Revelations.

Now, while talking about the upcoming I Am Alive, Ubisoft Shanghai’s creative director, Stanislas Mettra, has revealed that piracy is still affecting the company’s games, so the downloadable title might not appear for the PC platform.

"We've heard loud and clear that PC gamers are [complaining] about there being no version for them," the Ubisoft developer told IncGamers. "But are these people just making noise just because there's no version or because it's a game they actually want to play? Would they buy it if we made it?

"It's hard because there's so much piracy and so few people are paying for PC games that we have to precisely weigh it up against the cost of making it," he added. "Perhaps it will only take 12 guys three months to port the game to PC, it's not a massive cost but it's still a cost. If only 50,000 people buy the game then it's not worth it."

Ubisoft isn’t making itself loved by PC gamers these days, as after delaying games for that platform, it usually tries to protect them with restrictive anti-piracy measures, like some which require a permanent Internet connection, but that quickly backfires as the systems are cracked by various hackers.

I Am Alive, for what it’s worth, is scheduled to appear for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, as a downloadable title, this winter.