Ubisoft delays three upcoming games for more polish

Games publishing giant Ubisoft has announced it is giving its studios longer to polish three of its upcoming titles, delaying Far Cry 5, The Crew, and 'one of three unannounced franchise games'.

Announced during the company's earnings call, at which it dropped its sales targets for the coming financial year from €1.7 billion to €1.64 billion, the moves see three of the company's upcoming games pushed back - in one case into an entirely new financial year, likely the direct cause of the company's revised sales targets.

A precise launch date is known for only one of the three delayed titles: Far Cry 5 will now launch on March 27th 2018, a month later than its originally-scheduled February 27th 2018 launch date. The Crew 2, though, has a more open-ended delay: Its original March 16th 2018 release date is now the vague 'first half of fiscal 2018-19,' with no firmer date yet available.

The third delayed game, meanwhile, is shrouded in mystery. Described by the company only as 'one of the three unannounced franchise games initially planned for release in fiscal 2018-19,' the unnamed title will now not be released until the company's 2019-20 financial year - news which will likely not be a disappointment to its eager fans, given nobody knows what the game actually is.

'This decision is in line with our strategic vision of developing even more engaging and higher quality experiences for gamers,' said Ubisoft Worldwide Studios executive director Christine Burgess-Quémard of the delays. 'Taking more time with Assassin’s Creed Origins enabled our talented development team to fully express their creative vision. As expected, this had a very positive impact on the game's quality and largely participated to its commercial success. Taking a similar approach, we have decided to invest additional development time in three upcoming games.'

During the same earnings call chief financial officer Alain Martinez praised the performance of the company's back-catalogue performance, claiming its results demonstrates that 'we are successfully transforming our model to make our business more recurring and profitable.'