Ubisoft: 2010 will be another transitional year

Alain Corre, Ubisoft's MD for EMEA territories has said that he expects 2010 to be another transition year for the industry in which consumers will continue to be cautious about where they put their money.

But he added that he's confident people will continue to enjoy gaming, and points to the upward growth of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 markets as proof that core gamers will continue to spend money on their hobby.

"We kind of expect 2010 to be another transition year, meaning that we see the market stabilising in this calendar year, with the possibility of growth after that," Corre told GamesIndustry.biz.

The reason for 2009's mixed performance was partly down to the economy, said Corre - "People had less money to invest, especially in the US."

"I'd say it was more, to a certain extent, in the casual segment of the market, especially on the handheld side, where people spent much less on cartridges," he added.

"But on the other side there was also the music game business, which went down quite a lot - and if you combine that with the DS decrease, it's been a big part of the decrease of the market last year.

"However, if you look at what is important for the future, both the PS3 and 360 markets went up, which means that the gamers are still around, they're still enjoying playing and they're still playing more - which is essential for the dynamism of our industry, because these consumers are very vocal, they define trends, so that they're still getting to play great games is a very positive sign."

Corre pointed to the sales performance of Assassin's Creed II - which by the end of December had already sold 40 per cent more units than the original game two years earlier - as proof that high quality, well-known franchises can sell even higher numbers of units, despite the economy.

"That's very positive - but it's a more challenging industry in the sense that, on the gamer's side, only the triple-A-quality games will sell, but these games can sell many more units than they were selling before," he said.

Going forward, Ubisoft has already stated its intention to focus on key franchises, and Corre said that he could also foresee a strategy of combining the talents of different studios to create those key games.

For Assassin's Creed II "our Montreal studio worked with our Singapore studio and the Annecy studio in France to make sure that the game would be a top quality game," said Corre. " And we've been able to make all the talented people - engineers and creatives - at the three studios work together."

"I think in the future we'll see that as very much more the case - a bit like in the movie industry, where talent combines from different parts of the world. For example, our studio Hybride in Canada helped James Cameron to make the film Avatar," he added.

"The same way I think we'll see more and more people from different companies with different talent combine to create the best games on earth."

You can read the full interview with Alain Corre here.