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Are Ubisoft actually really good?

Started by Barry Admin, April 17, 2019, 11:06:22 AM

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Barry Admin

I think they get flak for peddling shitty, generic open-world games, but all I've been playing lately is Ubisoft stuff.

Obviously Division 2, game of the year, fucking genius shooter.

Watch_Dogs 1, free on Xbox, banged through it in anticipation of buying the second one in a sale, and knowing the follow-up is much better. Actually enjoyed the first one a surprising amount, given I just stuck to the story and whizzed through it.

Been dabbling again with For Honor, and wish I'd stuck with it - they're still supporting it even now, and it has a small enthusiastic fan base. You could say that of anything though, remember that website celebrating fat girls wearing party hats?

Rainbow Six Siege is a game I keep meaning to get back into, it's brilliant.

Just picked up Assassin's Creed Odyssey cheap in Asda, and it's bound to be good. 

Are Ubisoft actually a great bunch of lads?

Moribunderast

They're just reliably good at making the exact kind of game they make. They're all pretty much identical and full of pointless busy work but they still feel fun to play. I have to limit myself to one Ubisoft game a year, at most, because they do just blend together but I loved Watch Dogs and recently really enjoyed playing Far Cry Primal - that game caused me to stop playing Red Dead 2 because it remembered something Rockstar forgot in their race to be the most realistic, authentic experience EVARR: games should be fun. I much enjoyed the faster paced chaos of Far Cry to the slow meander that Red Dead was becoming for me, in spite of the fact RDR2 obviously had much better writing than any Ubisoft game.

Do Ubisoft make Asassin's Creed? I've never gotten along with those but have heard very good things about the two recent iterations.

Barry Admin

They're also really dedicated to their games, because of the whole "live service" model that's been pushed in recent years, and I like that. Obviously they're doing it to make more money, but games have become so much more disposable over the years, so it's nice to see that a game like For Honor is still chuntering along with new characters and balance tweaks. (Or "seasons", as they put it.)

madhair60

They're great. Probably the best of their type. Their games are routinely rich and interesting.

St_Eddie

I wouldn't know.  I only play games by obscure developers that nobodies ever heard of.  Developers with names like 'Flootensnooting Inc.' and 'Mung Bean Cuttlefish'.

Timothy

They are. AC Oddysey was great. Division 2 is great. South Park was great. Watch Dogs 2 was awesome. FC and Trials was fun. Rayman was amazing. They got a lot of BS for nothing.

One of my fav developers. So good that even Nintenso stole half of their gameplay elements for BOTW

madhair60

Gonna buy Splinter Cell Blacklist on XB1 back compatability I think.

Neil, I reckon you'd be well into that (unless you hate stealth games). Properly fucking nails stuff. Brilliant.

Barry Admin

The one where you go in prison? I still have that somewhere, it's great, I nearly finished it.

I like Watch_Dogs because the stealth is sort of shonky and silly, and tailored to my hyperactivity. You can just force your way through those bits at a decent pace, you don't have to sit around for fucking ages waiting for some NPC bastard to finish smoking his feg.

biggytitbo

I don't really get the criticisms about their open world games. Sure they follow a formula, but its a damn good formula, and the games are always impeccably made, fun, atmospheric and generally (relatively) well written.

As much as I ended up enjoying Witcher 3 I was always niggled throughout by how much better made Assassins Creed Origins was in almost every respect, especially in its basic game mechanics, the controls, combat, climbing, menus and general presentation. Watchdogs overcomes a dreary central character by being super solid in almost all other respects and its sequel is flat out one of the best open world games ever made, with an almost Nintendo-esque sense of inventiveness and variety in its gameplay.

I also played Assassin's Creed Unity recently and its brilliant now all the bugs have been patched out.

madhair60

Quote from: Barry Admin on April 17, 2019, 11:44:07 AM
The one where you go in prison? I still have that somewhere, it's great, I nearly finished it.

I think that's Double Agent. Blacklist is on XB1 for £7.99 at the moment, I really recommend it. Lets you tackle missions however you like, lethal, non-lethal, ghosting it, killing everyone, it's ace. Really brilliantly put together.

boki

I like the fact that they're still pumping out Just Dance games for the Wii.  I bought last year's mainly so I could kid myself for a fleeting moment that I was Current Gen.  It's got a banging chiptune-inspired version of Hall Of The Mountain King on it.

Kryton

https://news.ubisoft.com/en-us/article/348227/supporting-notre-dame-de-paris

They're donating to restoration of Notre-Dame and a free copy of Assassins creed unity for one week

QuoteIn light of Monday's events, we will be donating €500,000 to help with the restoration and reconstruction of the Cathedral. We encourage all of you who are interested to donate as well. In addition, we want to give everyone the chance to experience the majesty and beauty of Notre-Dame the best way we know how. For one week, we will be giving Assassin's Creed Unity away free on PC, for anyone who wants to enjoy it. You can download it now for Uplay PC here:

Zetetic

Really good at knocking out pretty assets and entertaining enough gameplay.

Terrified of any of it really meaning anything, which is a shame.

AC Odyssey is one of my favourite games of last year and it's the game which basically killed RDR2 for me. It's gorgeous, very gamey, loads of layers and systems to keep you in one loop or another. It's not especially nutritious but it's very tasty and moreish.

I'd love them to evolve the FC series in a similar way. It's due a bit of an update.

biggytitbo

Get it! The detail and atmosphere of the world is incomparable even 5 years on, and the game itself I found more fun than previous entries, with the introduction of crime solving style missions and lots of Hitman esque situations where you can approach the assassinations in a variety of ways. There's also interludes where you get caught in a time rift and end up in WW2 era Paris, climbing up the Eiffel tower whilst been chased by war planes.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Kryton on April 17, 2019, 05:35:47 PM
https://news.ubisoft.com/en-us/article/348227/supporting-notre-dame-de-paris

They're donating to restoration of Notre-Dame and a free copy of Assassins creed unity for one week

Got to love the way that a company will use the burning down of a historic cathedral as an opportunity to get some good PR out of it.  I don't think that they'd have had the balls had anyone actually died in the fire.  I bet they were counting their blessings when they learned that there were deaths involved.  "Yes! Get in there!"

Timothy

Quote from: Kryton on April 17, 2019, 05:35:47 PM
https://news.ubisoft.com/en-us/article/348227/supporting-notre-dame-de-paris

They're donating to restoration of Notre-Dame and a free copy of Assassins creed unity for one week

Understandable that they want to help since theyre a France company. Nice thing to do and to read. Ubi is a good company. No need to be cynical here.

Also Unity is very good. Get it when you can.

Thursday

Aye, I mean compare them to EA/Activision and they're streets ahead.

It is annoying they keep making all these games that draw on all these political themes and say "we're not making a political game" though.

St_Eddie

#18
Quote from: Timothy on April 17, 2019, 06:48:56 PM
No need to be cynical here.

I'm sure that there's an element of a genuine desire to help on Ubisoft's part but you're being incredibly naive if you don't think that Ubisoft aren't also (and possibly primarily) using this as an opportunity to get some positive PR for themselves and for their Assassins Creed franchise.  Did Ubisoft quietly donate some money to restore the cathedral?  No, they made sure it made it to all of the news outlets and also used it as an opportunity to entice new customers to one of their biggest franchises by way of offering a time-limited free copy of Assassins Creed Unity (how does that 'gesture' in anyway whatsoever benefit the restoration of the cathedral?).

For a company the size of Ubisoft, a €500,000 donation to the restoration of Notre Dame is helpful but it's also an absolute bargain of a price, a drop in the ocean, in terms of how much bang for their PR buck they'll get out of it.

Quote from: Timothy on April 17, 2019, 06:48:56 PM
Nice thing to do and to read.

And why do you think that you're reading about it?  Incidently, this quote was also included within Ubisoft's press release...

QuoteWhen we created Assassin's Creed Unity, we developed an even closer connection with this incredible city and its landmarks – one of the most notable elements of the game was the extraordinary recreation of Notre-Dame.

Video games can enable us to explore places in ways we never could have otherwise imagined. We hope, with this small gesture, we can provide everyone an opportunity to appreciate our virtual homage to this monumental piece of architecture.

Quote from: Timothy on April 17, 2019, 06:48:56 PM
Ubi is a good company.

A good company?  As in kind of heart?  As in altruistic?  Get real, man.

QDRPHNC


St_Eddie

Quote from: QDRPHNC on April 17, 2019, 08:33:15 PM
Ass holes.

Just to clarify; good can come out of the actions of self-interest.  Ubisoft's donation to the restoration of Notre Dame Cathedral is a good thing.  That benefits a good cause.  It just irks me when people confuse a good result with good intentions.

To use an extreme example, Jimmy Savile gave a ton of money to charity.  That's ultimately a good end result for those charities.  That doesn't mean that his motivations for doing so were pure though, as we now know.  The beneficial gains of the charities which he donated to does not mean that he was a good person.

Just to be clear, I am NOT saying that Ubisoft is like Jimmy Savile.

madhair60

HOW MUCH HAVE YOU DONATED YOU SANCTIMONIOUS BAST. NOUGHT POUNDS NOUGHTY NOTHING I BET.

HOW MUCH HAVE UBISOFT DONATED HALF A MILLION MATE. HOW MUCH MORE IS THAT THAN WHAT YOU DID. EH. AND THERE'S LOADS OF THEM WHICH MAKES IT HARDER. ONLY ONE OF YOU MATE. WHERE'S YOUR HALF A MILLION EH. WHERE'S YOUR GAME. OH THAT'S RIGHT

OH THAT'S RIGHT YEAH. NOTHING LITERALLY SOD FUCKING ALL. THAT'S WHAT.

St_Eddie

Quote from: madhair60 on April 17, 2019, 08:48:59 PM
HOW MUCH HAVE UBISOFT DONATED HALF A MILLION MATE.

Half a million euros.  That's literally 12 pence in pound sterling.

kidney

they're good at making the same game over and over again

Sin Agog

They have made/distributed some interesting would-be indies like Child of Light, Valiant Hearts and Beyond Good & Evil.  As to the rest of their stuff, Iunno I guess the public gets what the public wants.

Timothy

Quote from: kidney on April 18, 2019, 05:54:29 PM
they're good at making the same game over and over again

Give some examples. Most of their games seem to have the same elements but are quite different.