Ubisoft confirms it is working on a new Ghost Recon game, and it sure looks like it'll be a live service affair
Ubisoft has confirmed that a new Ghost Recon game is in the works—the first entry in the series since 2019's Ghost Recon: Breakpoint.
During Ubisoft's annual general shareholders' meeting (via Game File) CEO Yves Guillemot was asked about the publisher's history making live service games. Guillemot responded by pointing to the success of Rainbow Six: Siege, before outlining the company's broader strategy going forward:
"In addition to the flagship game that I just mentioned," Guillemot said, "our objective is to also make strong progress in the growing market, generally speaking, by continuing to enhance our current experiences that we offer—and capitalizing on upcoming launches, such as The Division and Ghost Recon."
That's all Guillemot had to say about this as-yet unannounced Ghost Recon game. But later in the meeting, Ubisoft's CFO Frederick Duguet also addressed the subject of Ghost Recon. This time, the context was how Ubisoft plans to use its investment from Tencent, which acquired a 25% stake in a new subsidiary formed by the French publisher back in March.
To this, Duguet explained the investment will be "used for future development of other major brand names. So we’ve got… Ghost Recon is just one example, for our first-person shooter-type games." Duguet also said the funds will be used to "boost our live games" citing The Crew and For Honor as examples.
Rumours of a new Ghost Recon game have circulated for years, with a new entry purportedly being developed by Ubisoft Paris as far back as 2021, under the codename OVER. Whether this is the same game that Guillemot mentions as an upcoming launch, or a different project entirely, is unclear.
While details are thin, Guillemot's statement strongly infers that this next Ghost Recon will be a live service affair. This wouldn't be vastly surprising, given the success Ubisoft has found with both Siege and The Division 2 as live service experiences. The most recent Ghost Recon game, Breakpoint, also strayed into live service territory, receiving numerous major updates between 2019 and 2022. Admittedly, this was primarily because the game was rubbish on launch, as I discovered to my dismay in my Ghost Recon: Breakpoint review. But Ubisoft partially salvaged its reputation in subsequent years (at least, until it tried putting NFTs into the game) and that experience may have pushed the company toward a live service model for the next game.
Duguet's comment about it being an FPS-type experience is also interesting. The previous two Ghost Recon games, Wildlands and Breakpoint, were both primarily third-person cover shooters, so this could mean Ghost Recon is returning to its tactical-FPS roots. Then again, Duguet could have been using "first-person shooter" as shorthand for "action game", so it isn't wholly clear at this point.
It's also worth noting that Ubisoft tried making a live service Ghost Recon game once before, in the form of free-to-play battle-royale shooter Ghost Recon: Frontline developed by Ubisoft Bucharest. But that project was cancelled following intense backlash to its announcement, so it'll be interesting to see what lessons Ubisoft has learned from that, if this new Ghost Recon is indeed a live service affair as Guillemot suggests.
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