What We Want To See From Ubisoft During Not-E3

E3 2022 is not happening this year, but gaming showcases from the biggest companies are still happening. Ubisoft hasn’t announced its plans just yet, but the company is rumored to have a massive showcase on tap to highlight its future games, and there are many in the works.

Here at GameSpot, editors are sounding off on what they want to see at a potential Ubisoft showcase this summer. Read on for more! Check out the full Not E3 schedule to learn more about this summer’s big gaming events.

Immortals 2, now featuring less handholding

Immortals Fenyx Rising felt like a game that came and went without a great deal of fanfare, so reports that a sequel is in the works came as a pleasant surprise to me as someone who enjoyed that first game. But for as much as Ubisoft was able to effectively create its own Zelda: Breath of the Wild-style game, it had a severe shortcoming in replicating that game’s best quality: It could not stop holding your hand. Whereas BOTW excels in letting you explore and find things for yourself, Immortals insisted upon overwhelming you with icons highlighting every little possible discovery, robbing you of the opportunity to find it for yourself. Should Ubisoft decide to show off the sequel already, I’d love to see some indication that those elements will be toned way back in favor of something more in line with the game that so clearly served as inspiration. It could stand to take a page out of Elden Ring’s book in this regard, too. — Chris Pereira

A Far Cry that shakes things up

Far Cry seems to have a great deal of sales success no matter how stale I think each subsequent sequel is, so this might truly be wishful thinking, but I would love to see a radical new take on Far Cry. Far Cry 2 was a brilliant game, and I had a ton of fun with the many changes introduced in Far Cry 3, but each of the sequels and spin-offs post-Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon have felt far too same-y for my tastes, and I’ve long since grown bored of the rote formula no matter who they cast as the villain. No doubt Far Cry 7 is coming eventually, and while Ubisoft might be inclined to maintain the status quo, I’m only going to get excited if there are signs that it’s truly going to do something as fun and different as the second and third entries in the series. — Chris Pereira

A return to form for Tom Clancy games

Ubisoft, frankly, doesn’t seem to know what the hell it wants the Tom Clancy franchise to be in 2022. Aside from the relatively successful The Division 2, its recent games sporting the brand name have been mediocre at best and downright confusing at worst–why did Ghost Recon get turned into an RPG at launch when another Clancy game already served that niche? Why are there aliens in Rainbow Six? What does any of this have to do with Tom Clancy’s techno-thriller style?

We know a remake of the original Splinter Cell is in the works, and given the nearly 10 years since Blacklist launched, Ubisoft can’t afford to mess this one up. It has to both respect the pure stealth roots of the 2002 original while modernizing it when appropriate, and that doesn’t mean unnecessary leveling systems or gear. Likewise, a new Ghost Recon is reportedly in development, and after the fiasco that was Breakpoint’s launch, I just want to see something less ambitious. We don’t need a giant open world for it to be Ghost Recon. In fact, it really just needs classic tactical shooting and customization options for weapon components. Do that, and you’ll have a very happy Gabe. — Gabe Gurwin

Assassin’s Creed Infinity, at least a teaser

Even after switching to a less frequent release schedule, many people are suffering Assassin’s Creed fatigue. Perhaps that’s because the more recent games, though less frequent, are meant to last hundreds of hours if you’d like to see everything. Still, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I was curious to know more about this Assassin’s Creed Infinity project that will purportedly turn the long-running franchise into a live-service game. Assassin’s Creed has always been at its best when delivering lots of disparate types of stories within a recognizable framework, and this could be a great avenue for that. — Steve Watts

Ubisoft’s Star Wars

Ubisoft is developing a new Star Wars game as part of Lucasfilm’s recent push to work with more companies outside of EA after that company’s exclusivity ended, and I am very excited about it. Another studio getting a crack at such an iconic, nostalgic brand like Star Wars is exciting in its own right. But what makes me even more enthusiastic about it is that the developers of The Division are making it. While we still don’t know even what type of game Ubisoft is making, if it’s anything similar to The Division, I am here for it. Here’s to hoping Ubisoft uses part of its annual summer showcase, if it has one, to properly reveal the game. A living, breathing open-world Star Wars game from a team with a track record and proven skills in that space has me very excited and optimistic about the next game in a galaxy far, far away. — Eddie Makuch

Ubisoft getting out of the NFT game

The cryptocurrency markets have suffered huge blows in the last few weeks, but even before the bubble seemed to be bursting, a lot of people took issue with the rise of non-fungible tokens, or NFTs. In the art world, the selling of blockchain tokens that link to JPGs has drawn huge amounts of money and attention, but the whole sector is awash in scams, like those in which NFT creators abscond with money while leaving those who bought in with nothing. But even if you do get the thing you paid for, there’s ample evidence that a lot about the NFT world is a pyramid scheme, with early adopters making out like bandits as late “investors” are left holding the bag.

In the games space, the NFT situation is questionable, albeit in different ways. A lot of the same rampant speculation that drove art NFTs seems to be driving game-related ones, with a similar amount of risk. So when Ubisoft started releasing NFTs for use in Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, the move garnered a lot of criticism. Just two months later, Ubisoft announced that it’s moving on from Breakpoint, instantly showing the weakness of the whole NFT deal–just as with other in-game assets like skins, you run the risk of buying something for a game that will stop being supported by its creators. With NFTs, the cost is often a lot higher, as is the risk.

So even if NFTs in games turn out to be a workable and useful feature in the future that manages to deliver on even some of the hype surrounding it, it’d probably be best for Ubisoft to move away from the space for the time being and to put some more time into baking this idea. Breakpoint NFTs felt like a cash-grab, and they feel like that even moreso now. Ubisoft has the most cogent and together version of an NFT offering among major game companies, and it still seems incredibly half-baked. Especially as the crypto market is cratering, now’s the time for Ubisoft to announce that, at the very least, it’s going to figure out how to do NFTs in games a lot better than it currently is, while it figures out how to create something that doesn’t exploit its customers or immediately leave them holding the bag. — Phil Hornshaw