Ubisoft Shares Drop Following Weak Game Launches

By Alban Kacher
(Reuters) – Shares in French video game maker Ubisoft fell for a second consecutive day on Tuesday, following a lackluster performance of its two recent releases, including the highly anticipated “Star Wars Outlaws”.

The shares, which closed 5.1% lower on Monday, were down 2.4% by 1114 GMT, trading at their lowest levels since 2015, contributing to an over 30% decline since the start of the year.

This decline was primarily driven by the muted reception of Star Wars Outlaws, released on Friday, alongside lower-than-expected interest in Ubisoft’s free-to-play game Xdefiant, according to Midcap Partners analyst Charles-Louis Planade.

Outlaws was one of Ubisoft’s major game releases scheduled for this year, with Assassin’s Creed Shadows set to launch on Nov. 15.

After four years of negative cash flows due to game cancellations and delays, the family-owned company has been relying on these releases for financial recovery. Chief Financial Officer Frederick Duguet mentioned in July that Ubisoft anticipated the launch of Outlaws would boost net bookings for the July-September quarter.

Despite favorable critic reviews, Star Wars Outlaws received a “generally unfavorable” user score of 4.9 out of 10 on Metacritic as of Tuesday. J.P. Morgan analyst Daniel Kerven noted that Star Wars Outlaws has not met sales expectations, despite critical acclaim.

The game’s development budget was at least 30% higher than that of Assassin’s Creed Mirage, released last year; data from Twitch also indicated that Outlaws was underperforming AC Mirage by about 15%. Kerven revised his sales expectations downward by 2 million units, now estimating 5.5 million units sold by March 2025.

Planade mentioned that following an initial surge in interest for Xdefiant, Twitch viewership has sharply declined, leading to expectations that it will have minimal impact on Ubisoft’s results in the upcoming quarters.

Ubisoft did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment on Tuesday and declined to comment on the games’ performance on Monday.