It’s no secret that Skull and Bones, Ubisoft Singapore’s pirate ship-focused combat title, has been facing problems. Official delays and high-profile departures aside, there have been reports of mismanagement and reboots. This doesn’t even account for reports of toxicity and discrimination at the studio which led to the removal of the studio’s managing director Hugues Ricour (who still remains an employee at Ubisoft).
Nevertheless, Ubisoft seems confident in launching the title by April 2023. In the publisher’s latest earnings call (transcribed by VGC), CFO Frédérick Duguet said, “It’s a very promising new IP focusing on multiplayer first, so very consistent with our strategy to bring multiplayer competition and co-op first in a big open world, with a great, attractive fantasy.” Skull and Bones was stated to have a single player campaign in 2017 (though that fact was still very much up in the air), but this comment seemingly emphasizes the current live-service focus.
As for development, Duguet said, “That’s of course a longer development time that we’ve had on that game, but we’re very happy with the artistic direction and the progress of the game so far.”
The last major report on the title came from insider Tom Henderson in September 2021 when he discussed progression, ship tiers and so on. He also revealed that despite the game not being “near completion”, it was still in “a decent spot with a lot of good combat.” Perhaps there’s a chance of the title appearing at the next major Ubisoft Forward but we’ll need to wait in the meantime.
Skull and Bones is currently in development for Xbox One, PS4 and PC.
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