Even if they are usually boring the fiscal reports of the gaming companies might contain valuable clues for the gaming community, such as the probable release dates of certain titles.
Amongst all those details about earnings and revenues, the companies divulge also their plans regarding certain franchises or titles. And Ubisoft’s latest financial report makes no exception from this rule.
On the financial side, it seems like the third financial quarter of 2008-09 was a good one for the gaming company as Ubisoft reported that the sales came to 508 million euros, up 12.9%, or 17.0% at constant exchange rates, compared with the 450 million euros recorded for the same period of 2007-08.
Ubisoft highlighted “Far Cry 2” and the games for Wii, “Shaun White Snowboarding” and “Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party” as the best performers in the last fiscal quarter, while the sales for “Prince of Persia” were described as a slower take-off.
As of the gaming part, which is more interesting for us, Ubisoft confirmed the released dates of several widely expected games. First of all, Ubisoft said that its new title “I Am Alive” will require further development time and will now bolster the line-up for 2009-10.
“I Am Alive”, which is described by the company as a survival game, was announced by Ubisoft in last July. However, he company was very secretive about the game and all we know so far is based on a trailer released at last year’s E3. The action of the game will take place in a ruined Chicago and the cause of the devastation is unknown. Initially, Ubisoft intended to release the game this spring.
Also, the company confirmed for the 2009 – 2010 lineup the sequel of Assassin’s Creed, Assassin’s Creed 2, as well as 4 license-based games including James Cameron’s Avatar and 3 new brands. For the fourth quarter of the 2008 – 09 fiscal year we could expect “Tom Clancy’s Hawx” for the Xbox 360, PC and PS3, “Tom Clancy's EndWar” for PC, “Grey's Anatomy: The Video Game” for the Nintendo DS, Wii and PC and new casual games for the Nintendo DS and Wii, including Imagine, Petz and Jake Power titles.
During the press conference, Yves Guillemot, Chief Executive Officer of Ubisoft, has also accidentally confirmed a sequel for first-person shooter Red Steel for Wii console.
"We have lots of products coming for the Wii next year; we have Red Steel.... Sorry, I mentioned a game that I wasn't supposed to mention," he said.
