Why Ubisoft Had to Kill Assassin‘s Creed Multiplayer – For Now

As a long-time Assassin‘s Creed superfan, I was heartbroken when Unity launched missing one key feature that made the series special for me – stalking human targets in competitive multiplayer. Ubisoft built incredibly innovative online components into Brotherhood, Revelations and III. But why did they have to die? As someone obsessed with tracking XP and leaderboards, I needed answers…

Unity‘s Catastrophic Launch Crippled Multiplayer

Unity was supposed to showcase the power of new consoles with detailed historical recreations and next-gen multiplayer ambition. Instead, we got a bug-laden mess that was borderline unplayable.

Reviewers blasted the game‘s stability at launch:

As you can see above, reviewers hammered Unity across the board. But aggregate rankings don‘t reflect the sheer game-breaking issues plaguing Unity‘s launch:

• Quests impossible to progress due to NPC bugs
• Co-op modes crashing consoles entirely
• Save files being inexplicably deleted

It was a disaster – the moment Assassin‘s Creed‘s reputation vanished in a cloud of smoke bombs. Ubisoft scrambled to issue patches tackling over 300 bugs. Resources that surely could have polished multiplayer were diverted towards getting the core game functional.

Ubisoft producer Vincent Pontbriand reflected in an interview:

"There were so many gaps in quality control and gaps in terms of producing the game. It crisscrossed so many studios that it was difficult to consolidate all that feedback."

I don‘t envy the developers who had to salvage Unity into a playable state. Between overhauling core systems and managing community outrage, I doubt keeping multiplayer servers online was high on their priority list.

Recent AC Games Double-Down on Solo Exploration

While Unity floundered, origins took the series in an entirely new direction. Sprawling ancient Egypt offered over 50 hours of solo RPG adventure – but left multiplayer buried in the desert sands.

Odyssey continued pushing boundaries with player choice driving an Odyssey across war-torn Greece nearly 3x larger than previous entries. Valhalla again expanded the scope, allowing players to slowly conquer England over 60+ hours filled with Viking chaos.

As you can see in the table below, recent Assassin‘s Creed games demand more and more solo adventure time from players:

RPG mechanics allow for greater build customization and playstyle expression than ever before. But these systems are far more complex to balance and bug test. As world sizes bloat, just debugging all possible choices is a logistical nightmare!

With small armies of developers focused on supporting solo sandboxes, I doubt Ubisoft wants to split resources on maintaining multiplayer arena servers. Players have clearly voted by purchasing over 20 million copies of these new RPG-inspired entries.

The Rising Overhead of Multiplayer Support

Look, I loved stalking targets and blending into crowds to score stealthy kills in Brotherhood. But dedicated servers and ongoing maintenance have costs that mono-focused single player experiences avoid.

Analysts estimate Unity‘s initial development budget exceeded $100 million. About 15% of that possibly went towards building online components and assigning server capacity. For a franchise earning over $140 million annually, it wasn‘t a massive barrier.

But the scope of new entries has players demanding more content than ever before. Ubisoft has expanded into 5 massive studios worldwide to churn out new AC releases on an annualized schedule. Support costs per game have ballooned as a result.

Assigning resources to curate multiplayer balances and prevent exploits doesn‘t make fiscal sense anymore. Not when long-tail sales from recurrent solo content updates like Valhalla‘s Ostara Festival or Odyssey‘s Judgement of Atlantis DLC continue driving revenue.

The Future of AC Multiplayer

Obviously I was crushed when Unity closed the book on synchronous assassination. But all hope isn‘t lost! Whispers across the gaming web suggest Ubisoft has a small team prototyping ideas for either incorporating multiplayer into Infinity or as a standalone project.

If they can recapture the cloak and dagger tension of Brotherhood enhanced with new battle royale trends, sign me up! I desperately crave those adrenaline-laced showdowns. And I know millions of AC fans likely feel the same.

For now, we‘ll have to settle for solo raids against Saxons and Athenians. But the Brotherhood shall rise again! It‘s only a matter of time until we revive the most heart-pounding AC experience ever conceived.