After announcing that The Crew, The Division, and Rainbow Six Siege all have over 10 million registered players, Ubisoft held their earnings call yesterday, where they discussed some of their upcoming games, including Watch Dogs 2.
Set for release on November 15, Watch Dogs 2 is seeing lower than expected pre-order numbers, CEO Yves Guillemot revealed:
The pre-orders are not as high as we thought they could be, but we feel like the experience is a fantastic experience so we feel it can do extremely well.
Watch Dogs 2’s pre-order numbers might not be indicative of actual sales though, with Ubisoft pointing out that Far Cry Primal had low pre-orders but went on to sell really well. Additionally, Rainbow Six Siege’s launch sales were “okay,” but post-launch support and word-of-mouth helped it reach 10 million players to date. CFO Alain Martizen added that, while pre-orders are important, adding new content over a long period of time is also key to a game’s success:
What we are trying to say are pre-orders are indeed very important, quality is very important, but also the attention that you put on the game over the long term is also very very key.
This is why we’re doing exactly that on The Division. We believe that for the good of the brand, the fact that we are proving to our customers that we continue improving and listening to them to come with a perfect experience, is what will be the most valuable for the success of that ...