It’s hard to believe that only mere months have passed since Ubisoft staved off a hostile takeover from Vivendi. From the public’s perspective at least, things are progressing nicely for the French publisher. Their recent E3 showing successfully positions the company to continue building momentum. Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, Skull and Bones, and The Division 2 constitute just a few promising titles on the horizon. Meanwhile, games like For Honor and Rainbow Six Siege constantly receive updates to keep millions of active users returning. All of this effort comes from somewhere and rests on the backs of 12,000 developers worldwide.
Years ago, even half this number for a major publisher was considered overkill. Ubisoft executives were aware of this thinking, but now pride themselves on remaining steadfast in their vision. Evidently, they have no plans to slow down either. Head of Ubisoft North America, Laurent Detoc expresses as much when he sat down with GamesBeat during E3. “We have about 14,000 total [employees], but maybe 12,000 in active development, which is still the biggest group in the industry,” Detoc clarifies. “It shows in our conference, the breadth of content and the variety we offer is second to none in the industry today. That?s one of the benefits of having this large pool of talent.
“If you go back a few years, people were looking at us and saying we had way too many people. Financial analysts were telling us to foc...