Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs 2 hasn’t been doing as well as the first game. While the jury is still out on US sales, UK sales were estimated to be 80 percent lower than first week sales for the original game on release. Coupled with Ubisoft itself stating that pre-orders were lower than expected and it does seem like the open world title wasn’t going to aspire to much.
Addressing the lower sales, Ubisoft issued a statement to GameSpot and noted that, “We’re incredibly happy with critics’ and players’ very positive reception of Watch Dogs 2, which should bolster support for the long-term success of the game. It is true that first-day and first-week sales for a number of big games, including Watch Dogs 2 and titles from our competitors, are comparatively lower than previous versions in previous years.”
“However, we expect both week-two and week-three sales to be above traditional sales patterns. There is a trend toward games, especially high-quality games, having stronger and longer ‘tails’ as favorable reviews and word of mouth spread. Watch Dogs 2 is already considered a tremendous addition to the open-world action adventure series and we’re confident that millions of players are going to love it.”
This trend isn’t too different from Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, which sold fairly low on release and picked up slowly thereafter. Can Watch Dogs 2 improve its sales overtime? We’ll find out in the coming months.