Ubisoft confirmed earlier this year that its multiplayer shooter XDefiant would be launching sometime this summer, and last month, executive producer Mark Rubin said that the game was on track to hit that launch window. However, the title has hit a bit of a snag behind the scenes – specifically, with its certification process with PlayStation and Xbox – which could result in a slight delay.
In an update published on Ubisoft’s official website, Rubin has revealed that though XDefiant was submitted for certification in late July, but was sent back as a “Not Pass” by Sony and Microsoft about a month ago. According to Rubin, that was because of compliance bugs, which he describes as bugs that “relate to the systems and overall experience that the first parties expect from games on their platform”- like, for instance, Trophies or Achievements not being properly tracked.
“At the end of July, we started this process, and we got our first results back by mid-August, which was a Not Pass,” Rubin’s message reads. “We realized then that we had more work related to compliance than we had anticipated. If it HAD passed, then we would have been able to ship at the end of August. But it didn’t and so we have spent the last 3-4 weeks fixing those issues and getting ready to do another submission.”
Rubin says XDefiant will once again be submitted for certification to the platform holders, likely within the next two weeks, and depending on what the results are this time around, the game could launch anywhere between mid-September (which wouldn’t be long from now, obviously) to mid-October.
“We will hopefully be submitting to 1st parties in a little less than 2 weeks,” Rubin says. “If that Passes cleanly, then we could be looking at a mid-to-end of September release. There is, however, a likely scenario where we get a conditional Pass, meaning we have to do a Day 1 patch with some final fixes to ensure compliance. If we do need to do a Day 1 patch, then that pushes our date out to early/mid-October.”
Rubin goes on to acknowledge that not having a firm release date for a game that’s due out in the next few weeks is unusual, before adding that with XDefiant, Ubisoft instead chose to adopt an approach that would allow players more input on the game before it was out, even if it meant not having a concrete release date at this point in the process.
“If we were following the standard rules for game releases, we would have set a date far enough in advance with enough buffer to have a confident release date,” he said. “However, like a lot of things with this game, we have not chosen the typical route. Having millions of people play your game long before it’s ready is not normal. Not being afraid to show an unfinished game to millions of people with all its flaws is not normal. These were real tests and not just marketing events. So, when it comes to when we will release the real answer is ‘as soon as we can.’ And we will continue to update you with more info when we have it.”
When it launches, XDefiant will be available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. PS4 and Xbox One versions are also in development, though there’s no word on when they will be out.
