14 DAY TRIAL // French publisher Ubisoft has announced a decrease in sales for the quarter, which encompasses the October - December 2009 period, despite the huge success of Assassin's Creed II that managed to move more than 8 million units to gamers. The company generated sales of about 678.9 million dollars, which is 2.7% less than during the same period of 2008. For the first nine months of last year, the company saw a sales drop of more than 22%, in line with the projections it had offered.
The main problem that Ubisoft has is the decline in the Nintendo DS market, which was a strong point for the publisher. The company is saying that it will be producing fewer games for the Nintendo handheld platform and that it will also create more titles internally. James Cameron's Avatar: The Game performed worse than initially thought, despite the very good run of the movie it is linked to.
Yves Guillemot, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Ubisoft, told investors that “It's very important to come out with very high quality products each time you release, so we're working to make sure our teams have enough time to come out with those franchises with very high quality for those games,” adding that “You will see more creativity, and more re-use of tools and engines that will be created.” Plans for more casual games will mainly be linked with the release of Sony's motion tracking wand and Microsoft's Project Natal, now both set for the fall.
Ubisoft has caused a bit of controversy lately by announcing that those who are interested in playing its titles will soon need to have an account with the company and an Internet connection on for the entire time they play its games. Settlers VII: Paths to a Kingdom is the first game to use the system, which is currently tested during the beta.