Ubisoft recently released its holiday quarter results and it has exceeded the company’s expectations bringing in $924 million in revenue during the quarter, thanks to strong performances from titles such as Assassin’s Creed: Unity and Far Cry 4.
As a result, the company now expects its full fiscal year, which ends in March, to deliver $1.64 billion in sales and $188 million in profit, ahead of a previously expected $1.6 billion and $171 million.
Sales were up nearly 56 per cent when compared to the same quarter a year prior.
As for the performance of their games, Assassin’s Creed Unity and Assassin’s Creed Rogue combined to ship 10 million units, Far Cry 4 shipped 7 million units, Just Dance shipped 4 million units, and The Crew shipped 2 million units.
CEO Yves Guillemot on a call with investors, cited “lessons were learned” from the launch of broken games like Unity will benefit future games. Pressed for more detail by an investor, Yves said the bugs stemmed from an attempt to “re-do 100 percent of the engine” that the Assassins Creed games run off of.
“2015-16 should see a return to growth in the consoles market, in a more competitive games environment and with a substantial installed base for both Xbox One and PlayStation 4. Against this backdrop, Ubisoft will be offering an exceptional line-up and we intend to drive player engagement further through high-potential live services for our games across consoles, PC and mobile,” he added.
“Our Destiny is in our hands,” says chief executive Yves Guillemot in reference to Bungie’s independence from Activision. “Our performance is all the more impressive given that it is wholly the result of Ubisoft’s teams. Each of these successful games was developed by our in-house studios and we own our brand which means that our destiny is in our own hands and we are internalising the value created for our shareholders.”
With such strong numbers coming in however, Ubisoft does not expect to maintain the momentum in the final January to March quarter. It projects sales of approximately $167 million, down by approximately 25 per cent.
The lone title Ubisoft plans to release in the next sales quarter is a PC version of Assassin’s Creed Rogue.