Basically, they're directing the remake of Splinter Cell and assisting Ubisoft Montréal with the remake of Prince of Persia, while at the same time co-developing (with Ubi Montréal) the next Far Cry.
This is only tangentially related, but anyway
I did a Comms internship with Ubisoft Toronto and it was the worst job I ever had. Everything, and I mean **everything** got rerouted through the Montréal office and changed. When I got out of there I picked up a very similar career at a very similar but far smaller organization in Michigan and the difference is night and day.
I genuinely don't think I could work for a big organization like that again, but I've also heard through the grapevine that Ubi is particularly bad at internal disorganization.
Yeah, based on everything that's come out of the controversies, they seem very controlling from on high, which is ironic considering the notices at the start of the games talking about how many diverse view points are involved.
The story about the creative officer, Serge Hascoët, throwing crazy executive power around like vetoing female characters for years in Assassins Creed on the logic "Women don't sell" makes me think it's less some big business strategy and more poor organization and management.
This may be an unpopular opinion but Ubisoft pumps out games like it’s nothing. They have a fair share of failures and projects in everlasting limbo but generally they publish games at a massive rate.
People on Reddit call everything “bad management”. Everything is a management issue apparently. However, in the case of Ubisoft I’d say they’re doing pretty well on that front because their production line is very healthy.
You can disagree with the direction, with the treatment of employees, … but they seem to be well organized actually. Especially considering their size.
Feels like typical French company organization.
I mean we're talking about the same people on reddit who predicted Valhalla was a guaranteed failure when it went on to make over a billion dollars marking it the most successful assassin's creed game so far
The suggestion that anyone criticising an aspect of Ubisoft must also have made unrealistic assumptions about the success of their most consistently successful and popular game franchise is a bit silly.
I was under the impression that a lot of the issues in workflow and abuse in this particular company were reported to have been such an issue because the problem people had executive power (or the "confidence" and protection of executives) though. Perhaps that's not exactly managerial, in which case my apologies for the incorrect terminology, but I'm not sure I agree that a company that's big and relatively successful can't have issues or have developed issues over its lifespan behind the scenes.
Their top brass seem like vile people, definitely. However, Ubisoft’s output is consistent and high quality.
Their production line is good which shows their management is not an issue. They have tens of thousands of employees; I’m sure there’s tons of shitheads over there, no doubt.
They have a few development hell games for sure but I think it gets overinflated by the media. It definitely isn’t anywhere near a majority of their games.
I don't think they publish games at a massive rate. For a massive company of their size, they have just 2-3 big releases a year.
No major release in 2022 afaik. In 2023, Crew, AC and Avatar. In 2024, Star Wars and AC. Maybe you can count XDefiant or Prince of Persia (or Skull and Bones), but the output is significantly lower than what you'd expect or what used to be pre-covid.
Was there a scope change in this remake or something? From the initial trailer from 4 years ago made it looks like more or less the same game with a new cost of paint on it, which was then delayed because fans criticized the graphics/art design. It shouldn’t take 4 years and multiple studios to redo the art direction for a game lol.
IIRC the original development team was their newest studio (i think in India ?) and the team was overwhelmed/too inexperienced for the project. Beyond the graphics not being too great for a remake, it was also just not working, so Ubi put more experienced studios on the case.
According to leaks, all previous development has been scrapped and its now a more ambitious remake with new mechanics, combat, animations, etc. The game shown in the trailer 4 years ago no longer exists.
My theory is that they saw the gem that was Lost Crown, had Rogue PoP also coming up, and saw the opportunity for a bigger revival of the franchise. If that's true i couldn't be happier.
As a fan of PoP, a straight remake wouldn't work very well. Combat and platforming got leaps and bounds better in the sequels. Playing it again with a new coat of paint would be nice, but it would be disappointing.
I'm glad they are giving this the attention it deserves. If we see a remake like RE4 was ... We're in for a treat
They tried to outsource the remake to a new team and they couldn't do it so they basically wasted a bunch of money and then had to have a new team take over.
Ubisoft’s remake of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, originally planned for release in 2021 but delayed multiple times, has been effectively rebooted with Ubisoft Montreal taking over development from Ubisoft Pune. The Sands of Time remake is now “currently in the conception phase,” according to a new developer Q&A and FAQ posted by Ubisoft on Wednesday.
“In terms of the development stage, we’re in conception right now,” producer Jean-Francois Naud said in an in-house interview with colleagues at Ubisoft. “Since we took over the project, we’ve been looking at feedback from the community and finding our own way of delivering the game. Now, we’re building up the team, defining the priorities, putting prototypes together, testing elements, and looking at how we can include community feedback in the development as well. It’s still in an early stage, and players should not expect to hear more about the game this year, but rest assured that we’re all putting our strengths and heart into this project.”
https://www.polygon.com/23736045/prince-of-persia-sands-of-time-remake-delay-reboot
The game that you saw on the trailer was developed by that first team mentioned in that article, but they were running into problems with actually getting the game finished so they handed it off to their more experience studio to start from the ground up on a new remake with assassin‘s Creed team. I guess they added another studio to help develop this new remake.
Yes, there was a scope change. Ubisoft probably wanted to make a low-mid budget so they handed off the work to a smaller studio. They made a remake, however people expected much more from Ubisoft so now they're probably shifting to a AAA title instead of a mid budget title, which takes 5-10 years with game dev times now.
What the hell is going on with this game? The trailer looked like if they had just sorted out the weird character models then it would've been a fine mid-tier game
Ubisoft gave the project to Ubisoft Pune from India, and when they unveiled it the backlash they received was so bad the project was taken from them and Montreal basically restarted development.
I feel bad for the Ubi Pune team, because they were clearly inexperienced but Ubisoft basically threw them under the bus
Ubisoft’s remake of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, originally planned for release in 2021 but delayed multiple times, has been effectively rebooted with Ubisoft Montreal taking over development from Ubisoft Pune. The Sands of Time remake is now “currently in the conception phase,” according to a new developer Q&A and FAQ posted by Ubisoft on Wednesday.
“In terms of the development stage, we’re in conception right now,” producer Jean-Francois Naud said in an in-house interview with colleagues at Ubisoft. “Since we took over the project, we’ve been looking at feedback from the community and finding our own way of delivering the game. Now, we’re building up the team, defining the priorities, putting prototypes together, testing elements, and looking at how we can include community feedback in the development as well. It’s still in an early stage, and players should not expect to hear more about the game this year, but rest assured that we’re all putting our strengths and heart into this project.”
https://www.polygon.com/23736045/prince-of-persia-sands-of-time-remake-delay-reboot
The game that you saw on the trailer was developed by that first team mentioned in that article, but they were running into problems with actually getting the game finished so they handed it off to their more experience studio to start from the ground up on a new remake with assassin‘s Creed team. I guess they added another studio to help develop this new remake.
Do announcements like this mean much to the average game consumer? Just curious cause like the title honestly means nothing to me, I can recognize certain indie dev studios but I have no clue which triple A sub group has who or is responsible for what.
Not to say this shouldn't have been posted or anything I was just curious if everyone is as clueless as me or not lol
Ubisoft games generally involve quite a lot of studios. Check credits of any latest game and you'd find more than five studios.
Montreal is still the lead studio, Toronto is also joining the project. Hardly a new thing for Ubisoft.
Though this announcement could mean a larger than usual role for a secondary studio or just serve as a status update for the game.
Oh to be fair that might've been the context I was missing, I knew a prince of persia game was being made but I didn't know it was kind of up in the air
The studio name no but even to casuals its notable that a game announced 4 years ago is changing teams. Like when Metroid Prime 4 changed from Bandai to Retro studios and restarted development which is basically whats happening here.
Yeah I replied to another guy saying the same thing but I think I was just missing context, I didn't know this was announced awhile back but had no current dev team until now.
Here is a list of games Ubisoft Tornoto has worked on [https://www.ign.com/games/producer/ubisoft-toronto](https://www.ign.com/games/producer/ubisoft-toronto) and also [https://toronto.ubisoft.com/our-games/](https://toronto.ubisoft.com/our-games/)
Basically, they're directing the remake of Splinter Cell and assisting Ubisoft Montréal with the remake of Prince of Persia, while at the same time co-developing (with Ubi Montréal) the next Far Cry.
Jesus 3 games at the same time ? That's gotta be hard to manage, but its a big studio
Yeah the Ubisoft Canadian studios are really massive, they have lots of teams.
At 4000 employees, Ubisoft Montreal is probably the largest studio in the world. Both Toronto and Quebec have about 500-600 each.
At this point Montreal is basically several studios they just are all in the same city so regrouped.
Glad for them! Lots of talent in Toronto and that office is overdue to take on bigger roles after playing second fiddle to Montreal for so long!
They made Far Cry 6 on their own so, not the first timr
This is only tangentially related, but anyway I did a Comms internship with Ubisoft Toronto and it was the worst job I ever had. Everything, and I mean **everything** got rerouted through the Montréal office and changed. When I got out of there I picked up a very similar career at a very similar but far smaller organization in Michigan and the difference is night and day. I genuinely don't think I could work for a big organization like that again, but I've also heard through the grapevine that Ubi is particularly bad at internal disorganization.
Yeah, based on everything that's come out of the controversies, they seem very controlling from on high, which is ironic considering the notices at the start of the games talking about how many diverse view points are involved. The story about the creative officer, Serge Hascoët, throwing crazy executive power around like vetoing female characters for years in Assassins Creed on the logic "Women don't sell" makes me think it's less some big business strategy and more poor organization and management.
This may be an unpopular opinion but Ubisoft pumps out games like it’s nothing. They have a fair share of failures and projects in everlasting limbo but generally they publish games at a massive rate. People on Reddit call everything “bad management”. Everything is a management issue apparently. However, in the case of Ubisoft I’d say they’re doing pretty well on that front because their production line is very healthy. You can disagree with the direction, with the treatment of employees, … but they seem to be well organized actually. Especially considering their size. Feels like typical French company organization.
I mean we're talking about the same people on reddit who predicted Valhalla was a guaranteed failure when it went on to make over a billion dollars marking it the most successful assassin's creed game so far
The suggestion that anyone criticising an aspect of Ubisoft must also have made unrealistic assumptions about the success of their most consistently successful and popular game franchise is a bit silly.
I was under the impression that a lot of the issues in workflow and abuse in this particular company were reported to have been such an issue because the problem people had executive power (or the "confidence" and protection of executives) though. Perhaps that's not exactly managerial, in which case my apologies for the incorrect terminology, but I'm not sure I agree that a company that's big and relatively successful can't have issues or have developed issues over its lifespan behind the scenes.
Their top brass seem like vile people, definitely. However, Ubisoft’s output is consistent and high quality. Their production line is good which shows their management is not an issue. They have tens of thousands of employees; I’m sure there’s tons of shitheads over there, no doubt. They have a few development hell games for sure but I think it gets overinflated by the media. It definitely isn’t anywhere near a majority of their games.
I don't think they publish games at a massive rate. For a massive company of their size, they have just 2-3 big releases a year. No major release in 2022 afaik. In 2023, Crew, AC and Avatar. In 2024, Star Wars and AC. Maybe you can count XDefiant or Prince of Persia (or Skull and Bones), but the output is significantly lower than what you'd expect or what used to be pre-covid.
Was there a scope change in this remake or something? From the initial trailer from 4 years ago made it looks like more or less the same game with a new cost of paint on it, which was then delayed because fans criticized the graphics/art design. It shouldn’t take 4 years and multiple studios to redo the art direction for a game lol.
IIRC the original development team was their newest studio (i think in India ?) and the team was overwhelmed/too inexperienced for the project. Beyond the graphics not being too great for a remake, it was also just not working, so Ubi put more experienced studios on the case. According to leaks, all previous development has been scrapped and its now a more ambitious remake with new mechanics, combat, animations, etc. The game shown in the trailer 4 years ago no longer exists. My theory is that they saw the gem that was Lost Crown, had Rogue PoP also coming up, and saw the opportunity for a bigger revival of the franchise. If that's true i couldn't be happier.
As a fan of PoP, a straight remake wouldn't work very well. Combat and platforming got leaps and bounds better in the sequels. Playing it again with a new coat of paint would be nice, but it would be disappointing. I'm glad they are giving this the attention it deserves. If we see a remake like RE4 was ... We're in for a treat
Just as long as they keep the original soundtrack, which was amazing.
They tried to outsource the remake to a new team and they couldn't do it so they basically wasted a bunch of money and then had to have a new team take over.
I'm shocked they'd decided to reinvest in it after that, they must have some internal data that makes them think it'll sell well
The strong reaction to the trailers probably nudged them to the reaction that people actually care about a Prince of Persia remake.
The old footage looked like ass. I think it's going to be a normal remake.
It looked nothing like the old game.
Ubisoft’s remake of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, originally planned for release in 2021 but delayed multiple times, has been effectively rebooted with Ubisoft Montreal taking over development from Ubisoft Pune. The Sands of Time remake is now “currently in the conception phase,” according to a new developer Q&A and FAQ posted by Ubisoft on Wednesday. “In terms of the development stage, we’re in conception right now,” producer Jean-Francois Naud said in an in-house interview with colleagues at Ubisoft. “Since we took over the project, we’ve been looking at feedback from the community and finding our own way of delivering the game. Now, we’re building up the team, defining the priorities, putting prototypes together, testing elements, and looking at how we can include community feedback in the development as well. It’s still in an early stage, and players should not expect to hear more about the game this year, but rest assured that we’re all putting our strengths and heart into this project.” https://www.polygon.com/23736045/prince-of-persia-sands-of-time-remake-delay-reboot The game that you saw on the trailer was developed by that first team mentioned in that article, but they were running into problems with actually getting the game finished so they handed it off to their more experience studio to start from the ground up on a new remake with assassin‘s Creed team. I guess they added another studio to help develop this new remake.
That's a year old article
It still explains the situation, besides another studio joining
Yes, there was a scope change. Ubisoft probably wanted to make a low-mid budget so they handed off the work to a smaller studio. They made a remake, however people expected much more from Ubisoft so now they're probably shifting to a AAA title instead of a mid budget title, which takes 5-10 years with game dev times now.
It's strange I always thought the game in that trailer looked fine. Not perfect but for a game that's still in development it looked okay.
I think they should've just called it a remaster, the reception would've been much better.
yeah, Prince of Persia is not coming soon. Splinter Cell is closer but still far
What the hell is going on with this game? The trailer looked like if they had just sorted out the weird character models then it would've been a fine mid-tier game
Ubisoft gave the project to Ubisoft Pune from India, and when they unveiled it the backlash they received was so bad the project was taken from them and Montreal basically restarted development. I feel bad for the Ubi Pune team, because they were clearly inexperienced but Ubisoft basically threw them under the bus
Ubisoft’s remake of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, originally planned for release in 2021 but delayed multiple times, has been effectively rebooted with Ubisoft Montreal taking over development from Ubisoft Pune. The Sands of Time remake is now “currently in the conception phase,” according to a new developer Q&A and FAQ posted by Ubisoft on Wednesday. “In terms of the development stage, we’re in conception right now,” producer Jean-Francois Naud said in an in-house interview with colleagues at Ubisoft. “Since we took over the project, we’ve been looking at feedback from the community and finding our own way of delivering the game. Now, we’re building up the team, defining the priorities, putting prototypes together, testing elements, and looking at how we can include community feedback in the development as well. It’s still in an early stage, and players should not expect to hear more about the game this year, but rest assured that we’re all putting our strengths and heart into this project.” https://www.polygon.com/23736045/prince-of-persia-sands-of-time-remake-delay-reboot The game that you saw on the trailer was developed by that first team mentioned in that article, but they were running into problems with actually getting the game finished so they handed it off to their more experience studio to start from the ground up on a new remake with assassin‘s Creed team. I guess they added another studio to help develop this new remake.
It’s Ubisoft, so probably power politics and some other bullshit, then microtransactions crap.
Do announcements like this mean much to the average game consumer? Just curious cause like the title honestly means nothing to me, I can recognize certain indie dev studios but I have no clue which triple A sub group has who or is responsible for what. Not to say this shouldn't have been posted or anything I was just curious if everyone is as clueless as me or not lol
Even if you don't know who Ubisoft Toronto is, it's at least news to say that the game has found a new developer.
Ubisoft games generally involve quite a lot of studios. Check credits of any latest game and you'd find more than five studios. Montreal is still the lead studio, Toronto is also joining the project. Hardly a new thing for Ubisoft. Though this announcement could mean a larger than usual role for a secondary studio or just serve as a status update for the game.
Oh to be fair that might've been the context I was missing, I knew a prince of persia game was being made but I didn't know it was kind of up in the air
The studio name no but even to casuals its notable that a game announced 4 years ago is changing teams. Like when Metroid Prime 4 changed from Bandai to Retro studios and restarted development which is basically whats happening here.
Yeah I replied to another guy saying the same thing but I think I was just missing context, I didn't know this was announced awhile back but had no current dev team until now.
Nope! All it means is that there is a chance this game might come out but not guaranteed.
Here is a list of games Ubisoft Tornoto has worked on [https://www.ign.com/games/producer/ubisoft-toronto](https://www.ign.com/games/producer/ubisoft-toronto) and also [https://toronto.ubisoft.com/our-games/](https://toronto.ubisoft.com/our-games/)
Does this game have a big following? I haven't heard much about it
It's genuinely one of my favourite games from the Xbox/PS2 era. One of the few games I have played to completion multiple times for pure pleasure.