It hasn’t been a great year for Ubisoft, which is to say, Ubisoft hasn’t had a great run of being open and honest with their customers. The entire launch of Assassin’s Creed: Unity has been an unmitigated PR disaster amidst the hardcore crowd, and with Forbes articles entitled “Congratuations Ubisoft, You’re The New EA” coming out along with news of not-so-good financial developments, they’re definitely looking to come out of this year with a black eye.

Far Cry 4, set to be released in mere days, has been arguably their last hope at some kind of redemption. That’s a tall order for a market that, traditionally, rarely forgives (if ever), and has been spurned multiple times this year. There have already been complaints and fears, many revolving around the idea that Far Cry 4 simply doesn’t look like an entirely new game and has yet to show it’s any more of a next creative step than just some add-on DLC.

When a Playstation 4 user went live with the game (they have since been banned, as one would assume), viewers got their first look at the game in action. Opinions on the actual gameplay appeared relatively positive in the NeoGAF discussion thread about the game, but after the stream went down one user brought up something very concerning:

The game’s map editor was seen in the stream, and while the editor itself impressed some viewers, one noticed that none of the game modes are multiplayer.

If this is true, that means that the map editor will only work for PvE gameplay. While this is certainly entertaining enough on its own, PvE-only maps would mark a step back for the editor throughout the series. More concerningly, this would only pile on to an increasingly long list of things Ubisoft PR has conveniently swept under the rug pre-release.

A snapshot from a pre-release Twitch stream hardly counts as final confirmation of all game features, but it’s unfortunately easy to believe this one given the year Ubisoft has had so far. Here’s hoping we’ll be pleasantly surprised once the game hits next Tuesday.

Comments

  • Moom Avatar
    Moom
    9 years, 5 months ago

    I know many have been saying this for years now but increasingly almost all things AAA have been less than stupendous in regards to the "promises" (hype trains) publishers roll out. I get thats their job but I feel its become more egregious. Maybe its just me really seeing it or maybe marketing trains are better at showing people what they want when its not really there or maybe devs just suffer Icarus syndrome. While I like me some AAA games & Indies over the past year any dev that weren't specifically those seemed to disappear. With the critical success of games like Wolfenstein and even South Park & The Stick of Truth it could bring up a resurgence of more AA/mid tier/Contractor devs like Obsidian or Avalanche getting funding from bigger publishers and personally bring out their own community hype rather than a massive marketing machines.

  • theottomatic91 Avatar
    theottomatic91
    9 years, 5 months ago

    Man the site is so dead, is there really not enough people to help build with the new one. I would help if I could but I know little to something about developing a website

  • Iki_Iki_Tchikiriupow Avatar
    Iki_Iki_Tchikiriupow
    9 years, 5 months ago

    To be honest, Ubisoft has been the "new EA" for quite a while now. I'm hoping their hype train finally derails, crashes and burns. The main reason they're doing what they do is indeed because they can, but mostly because we let them do it. If their wallets burning to ashes is the only way they're going to reevaluate (and hopefully correct) their ways, so be it. I don't have any mercy available for them. Sadly, there is no shortage of people blindly throwing money like trying to make it rain in a strip club.

    It's like an abusive relationship. You can say you're all pretty and awesome all you want, but at the end of the day, we all know you for the women beater that you are (or customer beater). No relationship is better (and healthier) than a bad relationship. No business with you, mister "I dance in the gray zone of false/misleading advertising and PR bullshit like Gene Kelly dances in the rain".

  • Fuzzydude64 Avatar
    Fuzzydude64
    9 years, 5 months ago

    I have no hope for Ubisoft anymore. They lost me with Far Cry 3 as it was a severe disappointment. I have never bought Far Cry games for the single-player (which is always fairly fun at best, garbage at worst) but for the multiplayer. Specifically the Map Editor in conjunction with the multiplayer. The crazy custom maps found in abundance in Far Cry and Far Cry 2 are what made me love the series and Far Cry 3 squashed that by banning all the fun new things made in the Editor and an abysmal lobby making custom maps impossible to play on, let alone find. Fuck Ubi and fuck Far Cry 4, I'm not buying it because I have little doubt that they're going to make it worse. For me, it's like buying a Call of Duty game only to find out that there's no multiplayer, only a shitty 6 hour campaign. Feel me?