Ubisoft revealed during its Q1 2022 earnings call that it’s cancelling a number of titles in the pipeline, including Splinter Cell VR.

The company says it’s stopped development on Splinter Cell VR, Ghost Recon Frontline, and two unannounced titles.

Ubisoft says the cancellations come as a cost-savings response to an “uncertain economic environment.”

The company announced back at Facebook Connect in late 2020 that both the Assassin’s Creed and Splinter Cell franchises were getting Meta platform exclusives. The company was still hiring for its Splinter Cell VR team in January 2021, with a specific position suggesting the game would also have a multiplayer mode.

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During the earnings call yesterday, the company said it would “reveal the future of the Assassin’s Creed brand in September.” Previous leaks showed some progress on the Assassin’s Creed VR game however, which included footage of the game’s starting menu and some written impressions of a level, so it’s possible the Assassin’s Creed VR game is still in the works.

To boot, Ubisoft credits its recent “slightly better than expected performance” this past quarter mostly to its Assassin’s Creed brand and Rainbow Six Siege.

The Montreuil, France-based company has been one of the earliest ‘AAA’ studios to delve into VR games, with titles including Eagle Flight (2016), Werewolves Within (2016), Star Trek Bridge Crew (2017), Transference (2018), Space Junkies (2019), and AGOS – A Game of Space (2020). 

It’s clear however none of these titles became the hits Ubisoft was hoping for, so it appears the company is minimizing future risk by leaning on its most successful brand.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • Tommy

    Well damn. I was only looking forward to three games on Quest 2. Assassin’s Creed, Splinter Cell, and NFL Pro Era. That sucks.

  • Andrew Jakobs

    But was Splinter Cell VR a game for consumer headsets or like the previous, big title, games for location based VR?

    • Ben Lang

      It was confirmed as a Quest title

      • ViRGiN

        where was it confirmed?

        • Wasabi

          It was a Quest exclusive lol
          Just look it up yourself

          • ViRGiN

            Just look it up yourself? you can say that about everything LOL!
            You are wrong. Just look it up yourself.

          • Wasabi

            “Splinter Cell VR will be made from the ground up exclusively for Oculus VR platforms.” – IGN

            “When it was first announced in September 2020, it wasn’t certain which specific platform the game would target; the company simply said it was bringing both Splinter Cell and Assassin’s Creed exclusively to “Oculus VR.”” – RoadtoVR

            from the FIRST TWO articles I clicked on! Are you that much in denial you didn’t even want to look it up yourself in case you proved yourself wrong?
            Everyone knew that Splinter Cell VR was going to be an exclusive.

          • ViRGiN

            So, not a single mention of Quest exclusivity, and literally speaking in plural about platform*s*?

          • Wasabi

            There is only one Oculus platform: the Quest 2. The quest 3 is not coming any time soon. And the Cambria is not a gaming device, so of course they’re not going to be developing it for that! It’s simple logic.
            I’m not going to sit here and argue semantics with you.

          • ViRGiN

            So, once again… not a Quest exclusive.
            On official Oculus Store you’ve got 4 platforms. Quest, Rift, Go, Gear VR.
            Go and Gear VR are officialy retired and have legacy support; Quest and Rift are both supported and worked on. Rift store continues to get PCVR exclusive games.
            It’s not semantics. It was never “confirmed” to be Quest exclusive. I’ve asked for evidence, and yet you were not able to provide it.

          • Wasabi

            They announced it 2 years ago, and a full month before the Quest 2 even released, so yeah they said platforms since the Rift and Quest 1 might’ve been viable options back then.

  • MasterElwood

    I hope GTA is still on track. The silence is killing me!

    Maybe Meta is going to do it like with VADER: announcement at connect – and then a “you can download it RIGHT NOW!

  • Damn, this hurts

  • NL_VR

    The growth maybe not as big/fast as some may have thought by now.
    But go down as 3dtv i think it will not do, its past that state.
    We often se this VR and 3dtv comparison but i think its a totally wrong comparison.

  • wheeler

    “3DTV” failed because it doesn’t have enough fundamental value and it would have made no difference if megacorps were willing to lose 10s of billions on it, whereas VR clearly has fundamental value. Whether or not the hype and subsidy induced race to the bottom actually pans out for VR, I think it’s here to stay. But impatient silicon valley and investor types may not find the pace of progress and the sustainable levels of market penetration palatable.

    • ViRGiN

      3dtv failed because there was almost no real content, most movies were post-process and not real 3D, so it made it appear like gimmick. it’s exactly like PCVR. no content, and what’s there is rather gimmicky

      • You should change that to “little new content”, as there are already a whole host of amazing PCVR games out right now.

        Or maybe “little new AAA content”, as new indie titles on PCVR pop up like daisies.

        It helps that engines like the Unreal Engine allow you to easily compile a game for both ARM and x86 CPU’s from the same code base. I was able to use the EXACT same code for both native Quest and PCVR versions of several of my games, with only a few code switches during start up to turn on/off extended shaders and switch to lower-poly models.

  • david vincent

    Well, there have been “real VR développement news” recently but it was for mobile VR and PSVR2…

  • mirak

    not really

  • Bumpy

    More proof VR is dying, it maybe a very slow death but its certainly heading in that direction.

    Facebook is the only one still trying to push VR forward.

    Our only hope is if Apple comes out with something.

    • NL_VR

      Whats the other proofs?

    • affe

      What the poeple always talking lol… Just because one player is canceling a VR project means nothing. They are also canceling 3 flatgames, so the flat gaming market is dying too? That is nonsense. And PSVR2 is coming soon and also Meta is pushing new games and Hardware, same like Pico etc. So just to say something is dying without reflecting the real situation is just irrelevant talk… If you don’t know anything about the topic, please stop talking about it and give baseless comments.

    • ViRGiN

      VR isn’t dying, it’s just the PCVR.

    • Perhaps you should check the VR sales before you slam forward such a baseless statement. VR continues to go at a steady rate.

  • Noooooooo!!! I mean, I *HATE* Ubisoft with a glowing, white hot passion. I hate all of their vile software they make you install to do ANYTHING. And even that said, I was still going to jump through their hoops for Splinter Cell VR.

  • johann jensson

    Nothing lost. Downgraded Quest 2 games, who needs that?

    For my part, i decided to sell my HMD and will wait for better hardware and proper games. If, and only if, VR gets better after a couple of years, i’d consider coming back.

  • pasfish111

    :D …A mobile VR Game less, is a good day for VR Gaming! :-) …mobile VR Gaming has no future without VR Cloudcomputing.