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[Faustek]

Come on Ubisoft! Child of light 2, follow up that Reginald comic with a game!!

 

[Walpurgis]

People like to dump on Ubisoft a lot (and they do deserve a bunch of it) but they are definitely better than Take-Poo (lol Evolve's 2 season passes, Levine studio closure, etc.) and Electronic Farts. They are the only ones that make tons of new IPs (or new takes on old IPs), lots of AAA games (albeit, a tad formulaic) and a bunch of smaller, more experimental "indie" games. There is also no large western publisher that supports new platforms as well as Ubisoft. The others were too scared to release a ZombiU for Wii U or an Assassin's Creed: Liberation for the Vita (R*, Kojima, Bethesda, etc. all those devs that promised to develop for the Vita bailed on it).

WB Games is doing really well with AAA games this past year though.

 

[JCX]

Very good of Ubisoft. I hope other big studios follow suit if they don't do this already.

 

[Vagabundo]

And ZombiU2.

I'd say established IP will need to get approval.

 

[thefro]

wait,200/300k?
can you even make a game with that much money?
at best you can make a mobile app,a shitty one

Shovel Knight got about $300k from Kickstarter.

Ubisoft employees wouldn't have to pay backer rewards, taxes, credit card fees out of that money and they already have office space/utilities paid. So even though the Yacht Club Games folks put some of their own money into Shovel Knight the budgets probably would end up being similar in the end.

 

[Banjo-Kazooie]

Awesome news! We need more games like Child of Light and Valiant Hearts.

 

[Trago]

Wow. That is really cool of them. Those are middle market budgets too. I hope we see some cool stuff out of this.

 

[Sinatar]

This is your chance to make Might & Magic XI Limbic, get on it.

 

[SparkTR]

Awesome news! We need more games like Child of Light and Valiant Hearts.

This policy would not be for those games. No way they were developed for less than $5m. The only game to come into existence from this policy is Grow Home, which is great but only around 2 hours long.

 

[sjay1994]

This policy would not be for those games. No way they were developed for less than $5m. The only game to come into existence from this policy is Grow Home, which is great but only around 2 hours long.

8 bucks for 2 hours seems pretty fair.

 

[iNvid02]

This policy would not be for those games. No way they were developed for less than $5m. The only game to come into existence from this policy is Grow Home, which is great but only around 2 hours long.

if he's saying projects that need a couple of million wont need approval either (not just those that are a couple of hundred thousand) then thats good news because child of light was a couple of million (mostly salary) according to its creative director.

 

[Trago]

Let's get Blood Dragon 2 Ubisoft!

 

[Nordicus]

Shovel Knight got about $300k from Kickstarter.

The employees were working for free for 5 months before the game released.

Yahct Club said that without the passionate/desperate indie dev penny-pinching, the Shovel Knight would have cost closer to $1.5 million

 

[Phinor]

This is your chance to make Might & Magic XI Limbic, get on it.

30-50 hour open world RPG is probably the first thing that comes into their mind when given the opportunity to create a small budget game. Ok, I know M&M X was pretty low budget game (and I did really enjoy that game) but I wonder what that means in actual budget dollars, few millions at least?

 

[Circinus]

That's neat.

Haven't played Grow Home though, but that game looks pretty whimsical. ^.^


And it's definitely safe to assume that games like Child of Light and Valiant Hearts don't fall into this category of low-cost <€300 000 games.

 

[AmuroChan]

Interesting concept, though I wonder how it works from a resource allocation standpoint. If a programmer is already stuck on working on AC games, can he/she just bail and go work on an experimental project without exec approval?

 

[ken_matthews]

The employees were working for free for 5 months before the game released.

Yahct Club said that without the passionate/desperate indie dev penny-pinching, the Shovel Knight would have cost closer to $1.5 million

I get why large AAA games cost so much, but I don't understand how a game like Shovel Knight would cost 1.5 mil. I am guessing the majority of that would have gone to paying salaries. How many people worked on the game?

 

[Freedom = $1.05]

That's a smart way of keeping talent happy so that they don't run off and make small games on their own.

 

[_machine]

Shovel Knight got about $300k from Kickstarter.

Ubisoft employees wouldn't have to pay backer rewards, taxes, credit card fees out of that money and they already have office space/utilities paid. So even though the Yacht Club Games folks put some of their own money into Shovel Knight the budgets probably would end up being similar in the end.

They also developed it for 5 months without any pay, worked for free or at half salary for most of it etc. It's original cost estimate was 1.4 million if done as it should be: http://yachtclubgames.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/productionestimate-360x368.png

Not to mention their employer costs would still have been a lot less than a big studio like Ubisoft would have. They really offer some great perks, at least in Europe.

EDIT: Crap I was late with that, I don't know how I missed that post.

I get why large AAA games cost so much, but I don't understand how a game like Shovel Knight would cost 1.5 mil. I am guessing the majority of that would have gone to paying salaries. How many people worked on the game?

Here you go:

and the costs explained:

What does that mean? Essentially, each developer will cost the company 10,000 dollars a month or 120,000 dollars a year. Now, of course, not every developer on the team makes that much money and often, NONE of the developers on the team make that much money.

That&#8217;s because this monthly $10k goes into much more than just paying the salary of the employee. It covers any and all expenses accumulated from having that employee on site. That includes not only individual expenses for the employee like salary, health insurance, etc but also company expenses like rent, electricity, water, food/snacks, conventions, computer and other equipment, software licenses, lawyer fees, taxes, development kit expenses&#8230;the list goes on and on. Given that it encompasses so much, we can use this figure to calculate the cost for the entire game. Also note that some developers may only be on a project for a few months, while others will work for the whole project&#8217;s duration. The man month total number can vary widely for games, but for Shovel Knight, we figured it was something around 144 man months to finish the game.

 

[Wiggy]

As long as they have 'Tom Clancy' in the title

 

[Keio]

This is brilliant on so many levels: talent retention, probably a lot of the effort is put in by passionate people on their own time/downtime, better resource usage... Wow.

I wish more corporations would realise this is the model forward.

 

[Palette Swap]

No? You can make a perfectly good game with 200-300K. That is a team if the salaray is like 60K a year, that will fund up to 6 people for a year. Very reasonable for a small game.

Budgeting doesn't work like that when you're a company like Ubi and not a couple of isolated guys.
You have to take into account a number of payroll taxes and the cost of actually operating the company. This varies depending on where you're operating but it's definitely not as simple as counting x salaries.

Edit: yeah, see _machine's post.

 

[bak4fun]

No? You can make a perfectly good game with 200-300K. That is a team if the salaray is like 60K a year, that will fund up to 6 people for a year. Very reasonable for a small game.

You can't calculate the cost of a project like that. I don't know exactly how it works at Ubisoft, but to give a rough idea, the cost of a man/day is probably around 700&#8364; to 800&#8364; (in France at least), then you could have some other costs like licensing, internal services for projects (ex : internal billing for bug tracking tools, etc...)

So yeah, six mounths for a team of three seems more like the scope of the projects we are talking about. It's still really great

 

[explodet]

As long as they have 'Tom Clancy' in the title

Tom Clancy's Rocksmith
Tom Clancy's Child of Light
Tom Clancy's Mighty Quest for Epic Loot

I like it!

 

[_machine]

No? You can make a perfectly good game with 200-300K. That is a team if the salaray is like 60K a year, that will fund up to 6 people for a year. Very reasonable for a small game.

For a big company like Ubisoft (or well even most decent sized game companies) that 6 manyears would cost at least 500K. You'd probably be looking at least 100K per developer in yearly burnrate.

You can't calculate the cost of a project like that. I don't know exactly how it works at Ubisoft, but to give a rough idea, the cost of a man/day is probably around 700€ to 800€ (in France at least), then you could have a some other costs like licensing, internal services for projects (ex : internal billing for bug tracking tools, etc...)

So yeah, six mounths for a team of three seems more like the scope of the projects we are talking about. It's still really great

Yup, I know a few companies where that's quite a realistic daily burnrate, though it naturally depends a lot on the tools and level of the developer. Still, Ubi is filled with absolutely amazing talents so 3 developers for a year is certainly nothing to scoff at.

 

[Iksenpets]

Beyond Good and Evil 2 to be delivered in one hundred €200K episodes over the course of a decade. Cheat the system, Ancel!

 

[Alo81]

This policy would not be for those games. No way they were developed for less than $5m. The only game to come into existence from this policy is Grow Home, which is great but only around 2 hours long.

2 hours sounds so incredibly off target. When I beat the game it took between 6 and 7 hours (steam play clock says 6 but doesn't show minutes). If you treat the games goal as "Grow the flower" then you can of course complete it in 2 hours but that's missing the forest for the trees. It has a big wonderfully crafted world filled with little secrets to discover and explore. It's like playing Minecraft and making your goal "don't die" It's the central goal but if you treat it as the only goal you're missing the entire point of the game.

 

[Corpsepyre]

Give me a Prince of Persia, and we'll call it square, Ubisoft. Just give me a damn Prince of Persia, even if it's way way cheaper than the previous games and is a 2D game.

 

[mrklaw]

For a big company like Ubisoft (or well even most decent sized game companies) that 6 manyears would cost at least 500K. You'd probably be looking at least 100K per developer in yearly burnrate.


Yup, I know a few companies where that's quite a realistic daily burnrate, though it naturally depends a lot on the tools and level of the developer. Still, Ubi is filled with absolutely amazing talents so 3 developers for a year is certainly nothing to scoff at.

Do Ubisoft have any policies in place that allow developers to work on other projects eg 10-20% of the time? If so that could allow small groups to work on little projects effectively free of labour costs if that is absorbed into their normal role costs.

 

[PeskyToaster]

As long as they have 'Tom Clancy' in the title

Tom Clancy's Child of Light 2, it makes itself.

 

[RPGCrazied]

Make another Prince of Persia game already.

 

[_machine]

Do Ubisoft have any policies in place that allow developers to work on other projects eg 10-20% of the time? If so that could allow small groups to work on little projects effectively free of labour costs if that is absorbed into their normal role costs.

Afaik, it's up the studio to decide, but it most likely wouldn't be a very effective way to work and could be a bit tough to manage with the distributed development model.

As a system I believe it's more aimed towards making project transitions smoother (one thing that they struggle at moments is managing such a huge workforce in-between production and pre-production, and at least Montreal is known to have people not doing anything at times because their skills can't be put to use without disrupting other work) and cultivating talent and unleashing creativity within people.

 

[More_Badass]

I imagine consultation would also be required to utilize existing Ubisoft IP?

It makes sense. It seems to me that it's just Ubisoft opening themselves up to the possibility of a small team of employees making a mobile game that catches on.

Already happened. Rayman Jungle Run & Fiesta Run

 

[More_Badass]

Wait so Ubisoft have been putting out high cost titles? Since when?


Dunno. I can't think of any other "small indie title" from Ubisoft other than Child of Light and Valiant Hearts. Child of Light had terrible DLC and I had to delete friends off my friends list on Xbox One just to unlock an achievement. I didn't play Valiant Hearts but that's only because I gave them £15 for a copy of Tetris that didn't even work. Valiant Hearts I'll happily miss out on. Even with their smaller titles they get it wrong.

What? Valiant Hearts is superb. You're really missing out. There's a reason why it was in the top 5 in Best New IP, Best Downloadable Game, and Best Adventure Game in the GAF GOTY 2014 results

And Grow Home was the best 3D platformer this year so far. Excellent game

 

[GifGafIsTheBestGaf]

Valiant Hearts 2 would be amazing, WWII, Vietnam War, ... I dunno just any war with a new story but the same ambiance and music style as the first one pls. This game was amazing.

'Bon chien'

oh wow, day one. more child of light and valiant hearts please

 

[DedValve]

Beyond Good and Evil 2 to be delivered in one hundred €200K episodes over the course of a decade. Cheat the system, Ancel!

That would be so amazing if he where actually able to pull something like that off.

This policy is exciting! I can't wait to see what Ubisoft comes up with in the coming years.

 

[Deputy Dangle]

Less sequels and more experimental stuff is always good. Grow Home was great.

 

[sjay1994]

Wait so Ubisoft have been putting out high cost titles? Since when?


Dunno. I can't think of any other "small indie title" from Ubisoft other than Child of Light and Valiant Hearts. Child of Light had terrible DLC and I had to delete friends off my friends list on Xbox One just to unlock an achievement. I didn't play Valiant Hearts but that's only because I gave them £15 for a copy of Tetris that didn't even work. Valiant Hearts I'll happily miss out on. Even with their smaller titles they get it wrong.

Well, you are living up to your subtitle.

 

[Mr. Luchador]

This is a great move, and I hope it leads some 'indie-esque' games that normally wouldn't get the time or day. Also Destruction Derby.

 

[FallenGrace]

No? You can make a perfectly good game with 200-300K. That is a team if the salaray is like 60K a year, that will fund up to 6 people for a year. Very reasonable for a small game.

Indeed and if they use an already established engine and can share some assets will really help. I mean Zeboyd is making Cosmic Star Heroine for less than that with only two people and that looks amazing.

If you expect like AAA visuals than no but smaller games that use great gameplay and art (Child of Light, Valiant Hearts etc) should be doable.

 

[Fury451]

ubisoft not being shit? Vive la révolution!

They milk their franchises like any other company would, and they have a tendency to put formulaic gameplay elements into multiple series, but beyond that it's not like they've ever been a bad development company.

Nowhere near what people try to claim with hyperbolic negative statements.

 

[exmachina64]

People like to dump on Ubisoft a lot (and they do deserve a bunch of it) but they are definitely better than Take-Poo (lol Evolve's 2 season passes, Levine studio closure, etc.) and Electronic Farts. They are the only ones that make tons of new IPs (or new takes on old IPs), lots of AAA games (albeit, a tad formulaic) and a bunch of smaller, more experimental "indie" games. There is also no large western publisher that supports new platforms as well as Ubisoft. The others were too scared to release a ZombiU for Wii U or an Assassin's Creed: Liberation for the Vita (R*, Kojima, Bethesda, etc. all those devs that promised to develop for the Vita bailed on it).

WB Games is doing really well with AAA games this past year though.

Grow up and refer to Take-Two and Electronic Arts by their proper names.

 

[Sinatar]

30-50 hour open world RPG is probably the first thing that comes into their mind when given the opportunity to create a small budget game. Ok, I know M&M X was pretty low budget game (and I did really enjoy that game) but I wonder what that means in actual budget dollars, few millions at least?

They're wrapping up HOMM VII which means they have a whole new batch of assets to re-use.

The time is now.

 

[Robert at Zeboyd Games]

Indeed and if they use an already established engine and can share some assets will really help. I mean Zeboyd is making Cosmic Star Heroine for less than that with only two people and that looks amazing.

If you expect like AAA visuals than no but smaller games that use great gameplay and art (Child of Light, Valiant Hearts etc) should be doable.

I'd put our "budget" at over $300k actually. Hyperduck (does the music) gets some money and in any case, $75k/year (we're up to almost 2 years now) doesn't really cut it for me, not with all the self-employment taxes & with a family of 8 in California.

 

[FF Seraphim]

200-300k is plenty to do small "indie" like games. Look at what kickstarter type games provide and you see plenty of awesome games on it for that price range. With Ubisoft Talent I hope we get to see similar games.

 

[Cess007]

Valiant Hearts 2 would be amazing, WWII, Vietnam War, ... I dunno just any war with a new story but the same ambiance and music style as the first one pls. This game was amazing.

'Bon chien'

Somebody port Valiant Hearts to Vita, then. You didn't even have to ask anybody!

Also, make another Valiant Hearts!

The guy who made Valiant Hearts didn't just left Ubisoft? I remember reading something about that.

 

[Delusibeta]

Honestly? Ubisoft's best games in the last few years has been the small, downloadable titles, so more small downloadable Ubisoft games are always welcome.

 

[Ricky_R]

Hopefully they take good advantage of that. Valiant Hearts was a pretty cool game, so it would be nice if they develop more smaller games like that.

 

[Walpurgis]

Grow up and refer to Take-Two and Electronic Arts by their proper names.

LOL

 

[LastOne2100]

Honestly, I am not a big fan of many of Ubisoft's actions lately. They've taken a serious tumble in terms of anti-consumer practices. Even EA seems to be better these days.

However, one part that I'm glad to see is still alive is their willingness to support and allow for development of smaller fringe titles. Child of Light and Valiant Hearts were both excellent games that wouldn't have seen the light from studios under the thumb of the likes of Activision.