Three of Ubisoft’s major brands—Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six—managed to individually generate a combined €300 million (about $315 million) in net bookings during fiscal year 2021 – 2022. That combined amount is roughly 42 percent of the €2.1 billion in net bookings it earned in that period, which for Ubisoft is a “first” in its company history.
This info comes from Ubisoft’s full-year financial results for 2021-2022, which are otherwise relatively quiet, following a slow year for the company. IFRS 15 sales declined 4.4 percent to €2.1 billion, and total net bookings dipped 5 percent to €2.1288 billion.
Non-IFRS operating income (Ubisoft’s profits) clocked in at €407.6, about 14 percent lower than its 2020-2021 profits. But to be fair, this time period was a slower year for Ubisoft as COVID-19 driven production delays and executive shuffles driven by allegations of sexual harassment and abuse at the company impacted release dates.
Switching back to those three franchises (Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six), each of them raked in those net bookings for a number of different reasons. The performance of Assassin’s Creed is notable given that this was a release-free year for the series, meaning that all of that revenue came from in-game spending on its more recent titles. Ubisoft said that 2021’s Assassin’s Creed Valhalla had a “stellar” performance, and saw more unique players in 2021-2022 than the prior year.
The success of Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six appears to be a good sign for how Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Extraction is performing. The PvE spinoff of Rainbow Six Siege debuted earlier this year, and both games seem to be performing well.
No details were given for Far Cry’s performance, only the information that it was the “best year ever” for the brand.
The strong performance of these games still didn’t help the company to hit profit expectations for the year, which the company previously stated would be between €420 – €500 million. It was a slight miss for Ubisoft, but a miss nevertheless.