Assassin's Creed Delayed, GRAW 2 Replacement

The next-gen beauty Assassin's Creed has been bumped out further into 2007, reports Gamespot. Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway is receiving similar treatment. Ubisoft is filling the hole in their lineup with Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2, which is some consolation. From the article: "GRAW 2 isn't the only thing Ubi is prepping for gamers' springtime. Also coming by the end of March 2007 will be seven more Wii games from the publisher, including 'one nonannounced new brand.' With the seven previously announced Wii launch games from the company, Ubisoft expects to have 14 Wii titles in stores before April 2007."

Comments

Not surprising

[HappySqurriel]

With how few PS3s will be in consumer's hands in the first half of 2007, and with how the XBox 360 has yet to get to any impressive milestone, I wouldn't be surprised to see several big named games get their release date pushed back until they have the opportunity for better sales.

Re:Not surprising

[Aladrin]

You seriously believe that's why?

The PS3 will still sell out, despite Sony's recent evil. Those 'few' customers will buy anything they can get their hands of for the first few months. And the XBox 360 hasn't hit 'any impressive milestone'... ? It has out-sold the PS2 in it's first 7 months, compared to the PS2's first 7 months. If that's not a sign that it's plenty successful, I don't know what is.

No, likely they've realized that Sony's devkit is harder to work with than they expected, and it's taking them longer to produce a quality game. So they did the smart thing and announce a new date LONG before the original date. Fewer customers will be annoyed, and the team has time to make the game right.

And they can act like GRAW2 is to please the masses all they want. It's simply another money maker for them. Same engine, new levels = quick profit. I haven't played GRAW yet, but I'm not really into those types of games, so I wouldn't be a suitable reviewer for it anyhow. GRAW2 will likely be more of the same, though.

Re:Not surprising

[MSFanBoi2]

How is 10 million Xbox 360's sold by the end of 2006 not impressive?

Re:Not surprising

[JordanL]

It has out-sold the PS2 in it's first 7 months, compared to the PS2's first 7 months.

That is rediculously false. The PS2 sold in only one region for its first eight months, and it sold 900,000 units in its first week. It was also sold out in all regions for the entire duration of the year. That's March 6th - December 31st. Within the first year, the PS2 sold over 6 million units, something the X360 isn't even coming close to, with only about 5.5 million shipped and an installed base of less than 4 million.

Microsoft is doing excellent this round, and the X360 is a nice piece of hardware. But don't delude yourself, they are by no means setting any records, or standards for the industry.

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

It has sold less than the Xbox1 during the first year, it has not reach its sales target to june and will not reach 10 million by year end.
It has not benefit from a full year ahead start.
It is far from a success and this will be evident when the classious PS3 will begin to show off and attract amm attention

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

No impressive milestone. Why isnt anyone giving Splinter Cell Double agent any Love? Maybe I am just a splinter cell fanboy but that game is georgeous. The last one was Xbox game of the year and this one is even better. Its no halo but it has been a big francise for Xbox

Re:Not surprising

[OmegaBlac]

And the XBox 360 hasn't hit 'any impressive milestone'... ? It has out-sold the PS2 in it's first 7 months, compared to the PS2's first 7 months. If that's not a sign that it's plenty successful, I don't know what is.

Vgcharts says your wrong buddy. Check out the links:

http://www.vgcharts.org/usaconscomps.php?name1=PS2 &name2=X360&type=0
http://www.vgcharts.org/japconscomps.php?name1=PS2 &name2=X360&type=0&align=0

Re:Not surprising

[twistedsymphony]

I don't know where you got your numbers but MS had over 5 Million SOLD in June and they're expecting 10 million by this holiday. So yes in it's first year is is outselling the PS2, for whatever reason, be it supply or demand.

Also I believe the GP is refering to the Austrailian market who figures show that the Xbox 360 is currently the fastest selling console in Austrailia.

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

Because there haven't and won't be 10 million sold by year end.

Re:Not surprising

[HappySqurriel]

The PS3 will still sell out, despite Sony's recent evil. Those 'few' customers will buy anything they can get their hands of for the first few months. And the XBox 360 hasn't hit 'any impressive milestone'... ? It has out-sold the PS2 in it's first 7 months, compared to the PS2's first 7 months. If that's not a sign that it's plenty successful, I don't know what is.

First off, as anyone said you're wrong in assuming that the XBox 360 has been selling better than the PS2 ... It has been sitting around 5 Million units world wide for a while now and it doesn't look like they will hit the 10 Million mark by the new year.

What I was talking about (initially) was that the PS3's shipments have dropped from 4 Million in 2006 (at E3), to 2 Million in 2006 (at TGS), and now they're saying they will probably not make those numbers; a good guestimate would put them at shipping 1 Million worldwide in 2006.

If you have just spent $15 Million to $25 Million to create a videogame are you going to release it in a time where ony 6 or 7 Million people can buy it (considering that if you're lucky 25% or 1.25 Million copies will be sold)? In order to justify the costs of next-generation game development a company has to sell (at least) 2 Million copies of a game and they're not going to take a massive risk and release a game until the userbase is there to support it.

No, likely they've realized that Sony's devkit is harder to work with than they expected, and it's taking them longer to produce a quality game. So they did the smart thing and announce a new date LONG before the original date. Fewer customers will be annoyed, and the team has time to make the game right.

That is a possibility, but consider that this is Ubisoft who licences all of their game engines from Epic and A.C. is probably a Unreal 3 engine game; and epic already has the Unreal 3 engine running pretty smoothly on the PS3. If they're delaying this for development reasons that would (probably) imply serious content problems which would (probably) mean bad things for the quality of this game.

Re:Not surprising

[DJ_Adequate]

http://www.vgcharts.org/usaconscomps.php?name1=XB& name2=X360&type=2 This one is even worse. According to the chart, anyway, the xBox 360 is so far underperforming the xBox. I think this whole generation is going to be slow starting up.

Re:Not surprising

[PaulMorel]

Everyone is pointing out that the parent poster is wrong, and he is a bit confused, but let's not forget one simple fact: the first console to hit 5 million in sales has led every generation of game consoles. This is simply because once video game publishers see that a console will have a market, they start orienting their business plan in that direction. This generation, Microsoft has hit 5 million in sales even before the other consoles have launched.

So, the parent is right in a way; the XBOX360 is doing well. The follow-up posts are also right; the XBOX360 is not setting any sales records.

With that in mind, it becomes obvious that this delay probably has little to do with either console's dev kits. I think that if either version were going to be ready next week, they would release it. Since the budget for this game is ginormous (see the article in gameinformer), each launch delay is probably very costly.

I am sad that I won't be able to play this game for a while (Gears should hold me over), but I am also glad that it's not being rushed out.

Oh, and if anyone wants a good book about the time period that this game is set in, they should read Warriors of God, which is a great narrative history of the 3rd Crusade.

Re:Not surprising

[spencerg83]

Well, I take no one's side/opinion but my own. And this I take from wikipedia--

In the 4th Quarter of 2005, XBox360 units sold, cumulatively, were 1.5 million worldwide.
In the 1st Quarter of 2006, the number rises to 1.7 million units sold worldwide.
In the 2nd Quarter of 2006, the number again increases slightly to 1.8 million units.
On the bright side, by June 30th, 2006, Microsoft sold 5 million units worldwide.

And it expects to double that number by the end of the 4th Quarter of 2006, with having sold 10 million XBox360 units worldwide. That will be impressive... when it happens.

As for me, I'm still rooting for the Wii. :D

This is good news.

[Kirin Fenrir]

Game release date delays are almost always a good thing; if the developer does not feel the title is polished enough, please, please delay it and keep working on it. I wish more companies took the Blizzard / Valve route and waited until their games was not only finished, but polished to a fine sheen before release.

Otherwise, you end up with KoTOR 2; a good game (could have been brilliant) turned into a major dissapointment by a rushed development cycle.

Re:This is good news.

[masouds]

Like Duke Nukem forever eh? :-)

Re:This is good news.

[Das Modell]

Judging by their rapid pace, the only thing those guys are polishing are their knobs.

Re:This is good news.

[Fozzyuw]

I just read somewhere (was it here on /.?) that KoTOR 2 was being modded by the community to include all the content that was removed and re-write the ending or expand the ending of the game?

Re:This is good news.

[kaizokunami]

There's the KotOR 2 Restoration Project, which I believe is what you're thinking of. There's a ton of cut dialogue and sequences in the the game files, including a huge amount of material for the ending, which I believe is what they're restoring.

Re:This is good news.

[Cheapy]

Damn straight. DNF is the smoothest game I've ever seen! Not a single bug in it to be found.

cliche, but..

[BenClueless]

"A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever"

-Shigeru Miyamoto

Re:cliche, but..

[Das Modell]

"John Romero's about to make you his bitch"

-A delayed game that was not so good

Re:cliche, but..

[rsmith-mac]

"Ship it now, fix it later" -EA to DICE about Battlefield 2

PC Game revival?

[SuperStretchy]

It seems to me that lately a lot more people have been denying the presence of consoles in their lives and returning to the oft forgotten PC. With Guild Wars: Nightfall, the next WoW, and HL2:Episode 2 just around the corner, I think the PC gaming market share will become stronger!

Re:PC Game revival?

[Fozzyuw]

Oddly enough, I use to be a huge PC gaming fan who's now turning back to consoles. I played all the FPS, RTS, RPG, MMO, games out there and am just missing the one thing that's good on consoles, platform action/adventure games. RPG's feel a little better to me on consoles as well, with the exception of the MMO kind. Of course, I'm also eager to pickup my Wii and try that new experience!

I wouldn't say there's any kind of revival in anything. Games get pushed back all the time and won't kill a platform due to it. Likewise, I guess since the Burning Crusade was pushed back as well, I could argue that the PC gaming market is dying an consoles are gaining popularity with the viral marketing phenomenon of the Wii.

Though, I would say to anyone who's new to PC gaming, you're missing out on some good titles, like the ones mentioned in the previous post as well as Warcraft II and II, Starcraft, and old Lucas Art games like Sam and Max. =)

Cheers,
Fozzy

Re:PC Game revival?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok there's some good pc stuff coming out, but suggesting that pc gaming will overshadow console gaming in the next 6 monhts is ludicrous. Guitar hero 2, gears of war, and zelda will trounce all 3 of those you mentioned in sales and I only had to pick from the next month of releases. You went well into next year...

Pc gaming seems to be diverting into other genres: mmorpg, rts, and online fps, mainly. Everything else is left largely to consoles nowadays. Thats not a bad thing, but people arent gonna forego guitar hero 2 because of guild wars. They're not really in competition.

Wrong two ways

[SuperKendall]

And the XBox 360 hasn't hit 'any impressive milestone'... ? It has out-sold the PS2 in it's first 7 months, compared to the PS2's first 7 months.

Your post here was rather ambiguous - but oddly wrong no matter how you read it. If you meant to say it outsold the PS2 at launch, well, the other poster covered that. If you meant to say that it's outselling the PS2 currently though, that too is wrong. Every month more PS2's are currently sold than 360's.

Personally I don't care, a better game would be what I'd be after so a delay is fine by me. I agree it's a little weird to talk about GRAW2 as a "filler" though, I can't imagine the poor guys slaving over GRAW2 this very instant would feel happy about that characterization.

Taking bets...

[aztektum]

That the unannounced new brand will still be prefixed with "Tom Clancy's..."

They probably can't release 360 before PS3

[jchenx]

With that in mind, it becomes obvious that this delay probably has little to do with either console's dev kits. I think that if either version were going to be ready next week, they would release it. Since the budget for this game is ginormous (see the article in gameinformer), each launch delay is probably very costly.

Actually, I don't think they're allowed to release the 360 version before the PS3. It wouldn't surprise me at all if Sony locked up something in the contract saying that the game has to ship simultaneously on all the platforms. Otherwise, there would be a lot of people that just get the game for the 360 as soon as it came out, similar to what most folks did for GTA for the PS2, and later the Xbox.

Hopefully for the developer, they have something in the contract that enables Sony to pay up if that ever happened. However, I really doubt that's the case. It probably *is* a case that the game just isn't ready in general, but I suppose we'll never know (unless someone on the team leaks it).