Splinter Cell: Conviction delayed until 2010
Ubisoft has today announced that Splinter Cell: Conviction has been delayed until early 2010. The news comes as a bit of a shock as Sam Fisher’s latest outing was looking in good shape for a 2009 release; only a few days ago a new trailer was released. The game has already had its fair share of delays, it was intially due to be released a year ago as a more action oriented game but Ubisoft rightfully scrapped that design and went back to the games more traditional mechanics. Well let’s hope this delay can only mean good things for the game as its gets a few months extra development time.
It doesn’t end there though as Ubisoft also announced that Red Steel 2, I Am Alive and the new Ghost Recon game have all been delayed. Red Steel 2, like Splinter Cell: Conviction, has slipped into an early 2010 release date whereas the latter two titles will now be out sometime in 2010 or 2011.
All these delays could have something to do with Ubisoft’s sales for the first financial quarter dropping a massive 50%. The publisher blamed this sharp decline on a decrease in sales for DS games, poor sales figures for their back catalogue and piracy.
Considering their decline in sales Ubisoft have probably made the right choice here. They have pushed Splinter Cell: Conviction and Red Steel 2 back to give themselves a chance to maximise sales. You only have to look at last year and the huge amount of quality titles that were released in the same period. Only a few of them managed to sell really well whereas the rest were caught somewhere in the middle, titles such as Mirror’s Edge, Dead Space, Far Cry 2 and Valkyria Chronicles are the best examples of this. Bioshock 2 was the first big title to slip into a 2010 release as most publishers suddenly come to realise that they will struggle to compete with the powerhouse that is Modern Warfare 2 for big sales numbers. I guess this is good news for the “hardcore” gamer though as they have won’t have to take out a second mortgage just to buy some quality games in the lead up to Christmas. It just means you guys have more money to buy us guys at GodisaGeek some nice presents instead. 🙂
