@hralex1951

Good luck with that trend,F2P
Check eFootball 22 from konami
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1665460/eFootball_2022/

https://www.archyde.com/why-the-launch-of-the-new-pes-now-efootball-turned-into-a-fiasco/: (https://archyde.com/why-the-launch-of-the-new-pes-now-efootball-turned-into-a-fiasco)
https://www.ign.com/articles/konami-efootball-launch-tragedy


Once is done you will be left with NFT's situation. Those "investors" are not long term investors nor have any clue of gaming market. They usually have their founds managed by HM and IB's who look for quick bucks but lead them ashtray with dumb decisions and they don't care because they make money out of fees. If you want to go for short term, look at other companies.

@kean_1 The thing that all these reports are getting wrong though, is that we just started the 2023 Fiscal Year, last week. Based on previous financial disclosures from Ubi, they start their fiscal year on April 1st. So their fiscal year looks something like this.

FY2020 = Apr 1st 2019 - Mar 31st 2020
FY2021 = Apr 1st 2020 - Mar 31st 2021
FY2022 = Apr 1st 2021 - Mar 31st 2022
FY2023 = Apr 1st 2022 - Mar 31st 2023

So that means that the new Ghost Recon game could release within the next 12 months. Which is extremely plausible, since there was only 2 1/2 yrs between Wildlands and Breakpoint, and it's already been 2 1/2 yrs since Breakpoint released. Plus there was only 5 months between the reveal and launching the game, so it's possible there could be a reveal in the next few months, with a release around October - November. Personally though, I can see them delaying the release until March or April, since Avatar is likely going to be their big holiday release. And other than Avatar, Ubi doesn't have any other AAA franchise, that could even possibly release in the next year.

Yeah, I actually posted the link simply for the fact that it talks about a new, "mainline", GR game in development. That was my main point of interest. As for release dates, etc., that's anyone's guess as there isn't even an official announcement that the game is being developed.

Having said that, I noticed Ubi seems to typically refer to their FY's with the calendar years that are affected. For instance, last years fiscal period (CY Apr 2021 - end of Mar 2022) is often referred to as FY2021 - FY2022 in their reports.

"Paris, February 17, 2022 – Today, Ubisoft released its sales figures for the third quarter of fiscal 2021-
22, i.e. the three months ended December 31, 2021."

https://staticctf.akamaized.net/8aefmxkxpxwl/4ZA5JuOKbheerHwUS1ugBQ/aa27c309863ce1b4ef7abbae6c631739/Ubisoft_FY22_Q3_sales_PR_English_vf.pdf: (https://staticctf.akamaized.net/8aefmxkxpxwl/4ZA5JuOKbheerHwUS1ugBQ/aa27c309863ce1b4ef7abbae6c631739/Ubisoft_FY22_Q3_sales_PR_English_vf.pdf)

Kinda confusing. The company I worked for (before I retired after 30 years) had the same fiscal period (Apr- Mar) but we would refer to the current fiscal year as FY2022. .....not FY2023 or FY22 / 23. Even so, I found myself on more than one occasion clarifying the actual calendar dates with some people in reports, etc. when referring to FY periods (e.g. FY21Q4). ....bleh.

@bigrexxx Wildlands took 5 years because it was their first open world game, and they were also trying to accurately reproduce the life, history and folklore of Bolivia.

And yet, it made tons of money for them but up to date, it is still a very good shooter but NOT a Ghost Recon game because the shooting mechanisms and gunplay is still lacking in a big way... and so are the enemy behavior and the teammates.

Fast forward to Breakpoint and their 2 years because they had 1000+ people working on it and well... why waste time talking about the shortcoming of the game.

@bigrexxx And if it release next Spring, it will have been in development for 3 1/2 yrs.

Ok, I was very good at Math but as one gets older one starts to lose faculties so lets see. Article just came out 1 day ago (04/06/2022 and it says that game has been in development for 1 year (04/06/2021) and it will be launch next year so... (04/06/2021to 04/06/2023) that is 2 years or 2 1/2 years if we want to be generous, where did you find the extra year? and believe me, I am not trying to be my normal self, I genuinely want to know because I may have done the math wrong.

@bigrexxx Even Breakpoint could have ended up completely different if it had the benefit of an extra year of development.

Well, this is really a moot point because there is just no way ok knowing if it would have been or not given the multiple variations. I say this because if the game, for a Miracle reason, would have made the money they were forecasting, I highly doubt it there would have been an "Immersive Experience" let alone a FREE "Motherland DLC". I could bet that instead, we would have had more Raids and even more Gear
Score assets implemented.

I could be wrong but I could be right as well. If there was no Shellacking, God only knows what the end disaster would be now.

@bigrexxx As for the tone of the game, that depends on the creative director. If they say that the game should be more grounded in reality, it will be.

I really, really don't mean to insult you but I highly believe you are being nothing if not naive (or you just like to have the opposite/different opinion of mine) because, well, there is nothing (so far) to give you that idea (because they have not said such a thing) but there is plenty to give you the opposite idea and I am just going to leave it like that because I can't be bothered to go look for those facts and possibly I won't find it now that the old forum has been shut down.

@bigrexxx And Ubi has more than enough resources to hire military consultants, just like they do for movies and TV, in conjunction with the community feedback that we've been providing for the last several years, to produce an incredible game.

As opposed to not have a single one for Breakpoint? or having them but not listen to them?

In conjunction with the community feedback? Same feedback that has been given for what, 10 to 15 to 20 years and barely using it or only when they HAVE to and mostly comes after the pitches and forks and the shellacking given by the same community and even most FOLLOWERS?

But you know what... I will concede that we will always agree to disagree just like most of what Blue and I go through. Being positive is one thing and given eloquent feedback is another but this is just masochism (in my part of course!).

But hey, I am always willing to entertain a discussion.

@fcac-no-moe I will agree that we definitely see things from different points of view. But I will note that the article actually said that the game has been in development for more than a year. So how long that actually is, is anyone's guess, but Breakpoint was likely already in very early development (storyboards, concept art, etc), at the time Wildlands released, or shortly after.

@fcac-no-moe from a technical of point of view, making a map is actually pretty simple.

Unreal Engine 4 and 5, for example, already have map generators and map sculpting tools. Then there are several add ons you could add to the base Engines, assets made by 3 artists and if you're into it, the possibility to re-write parts of codes to implement whatever you want. This makes me believe that the problem doesn't resides in a technical issue.

If we compare GRW and GRBP maps The latter one is all in all fairly uniform and lifeless compared to GRW, where eventhough large areas of the map were "liveless" (hint in the name Wildlands), we still had a civil population with the imitation of bio rythem (eat, work, sleep and else). This is one element.

Something else that could pile on that is the scale of infrastructures. To explain a bit more: both GRW and GRBP we have airports. At the very limit, I could see GRW airports used for regional flights that partially could explain their sizes, on the other hands, Auroa international airport is a joke. The same goes for other infrastructures (harbors, freight yards, train stations). I'm conscious that this last point is more a detail than something utterly important, but it has bothered me for a while.

Rather than simply the map, there is also another aspect: why would sentinel bother guard and defend dump stations? This is more of an example than anything else. The apparent coherence of ressource allocation from the OPFOR, their locations, their bases, their equipment, etc...

In a nutshell, making big maps isn't that difficult (even without any slim idea lf coding). The problem is more in what to do with it? A smaller surface allows maybe more details, like in drawing or painting, but I'm deeply partial on the matter.

As I wrote somewhere else, I'm restarted playing Just Cause 4 and the game world made by that studio is more alive than GRBP and they give you an idea of scale. Other games can come up to mind when talking about how to implement life in a game world and GRBP suffers the comparison.

@bigrexxx But I will note that the article actually said that the game has been in development for more than a year. So how long that actually is, is anyone's guess, but Breakpoint was likely already in very early development (storyboards, concept art, etc), at the time Wildlands released, or shortly after.

Exactly, hence why I was being generous with 1/2 a year but 3 1/2 ???

At any rate, it does not really matter because 2 1/2 or 3 1/2 won't be enough time to make a decent, let alone a proper " AI " and if all they will do is increase the barren world, then it will suck even more for me.

@Mars388502 While I appreciate the explanation how an open world is made, I really don't know why the explanation came about as I have mentioned it many a times, personally speaking I hate Open Worlds because CLEARLY, the Studio CAN'T be bothered to make a decent, let alone a proper " AI " copy/paste intended. Now, I would be more than OK to entertain the idea of another new open World GR if they were to make the decent and proper attempt, effort, money and manpower in creating said decent and proper AI but, since you and I know that won't happen (sure it can but it won't, just like the little tweaks that WL needed but never came to fruition).

I hate repeating this again and again but it seems that either people misunderstand what I am saying or forget it so here it is again.

I will agree that we definitely see things from different points of view. But I will note that the article actually said that the game has been in development for more than a year. So how long that actually is, is anyone's guess, but Breakpoint was likely already in very early development (storyboards, concept art, etc), at the time Wildlands released, or shortly after.

Yeah I think Breakpoint was in the works before Wildlands was released, but was accelerated after the commercial success Wildlands had. Much to its detriment in my view. A big chunk of the Wildlands development time was the reworking of the engine after Future Soldier, whereas Breakpoint was a re-optimisation of the same engine and restructuring the server and client data architecture. My personal view is that Breakpoint started off as a DLC concept, but grew into a full game at some point and was being worked on for more than 2 years, but as a full game for 2.

As for the article, it's speculation and we can't assume it's accuracy.

Of course, I will likely buy any future GR game, how much I play it will depend on what they do.

• If it's not open world, it will have very limited replay value for me.
• If it doesn't have an authentic, realistic, modern setting and premise, it will have very limited replay value for me.
• If it doesn't have challenging enemy AI, it will have very limited replay value for me
• If the campaign is limited and there's not much to do, it will have limited replay value.

So the best GR game for me is...

• Open world
• Authentic setting/premise
• Challenging AI
• Lots of mission/activity content

That is all.

ps. Ubisoft... review the charter often!

@virtual-chris It does not to be open world, a new Ghost Recon should be more like big levels/maps on Sandbox style, with plenty of replayability and variations to maps, including but not limited to day/night, weather cycles, enemies rotations, NPCs that actually matter...

@fcac-no-moe I think we are saying the same thing: making an open world isn't that hard, our main concern is with the AI population of the game world.

@killorio you have undelined something very particular about the relevance of NPCs or rather civilians. In GRW their relevance was all relative, but helped bring life to the game world, in GRBP not so much.

A while back, when I had that strange idea for a SAS game, I wondered on how civilian population could impact gameplay and I thought about different situations or scenarii involving them.

-wearing full tac gear should frighten any civil population, their behaviour should reflect that (should it be by flight response, exclamations or freezing totally).
-navigating among a crowed should be an obstacle and a "push" mechanic should be implemented (something similar to the first Assassin's creed).
-depending on you location, civilians could either be considered as friendlies or hostile populations. This is quiet difficult to implement in my opinion, but nevertheless this parameter has an influence on the outcome of a mission. If you're perceived by the indigenous population as a threat, they will report you to their authorities. On the opposite if it's indeed a "liber de oppresso" thing, they might help you somehow.

Furthermore, as said here above, NPCs help selling the impression of life of a game world, especially if the idea is to simulate a real world one. But this, as said earlier, needs work, dedication, research, will and the allocation of ressources to achieve this particular aspect (like @FcAc-No-Moe underlined here before).

Maybe this could be an argument for smaller AO maps, that will have different NPCs populations behaviours particular to their locations.

For larger maps, a region/province behaviour could be dictated by achiving certain objectives and "move" a behavioural cursor, perhaps.

Very schematicly:

-If the region is totally under the enemy's control, civvies will report you, if spotted, sometimes under certain conditions, they could turn into mobs.
-If you lead a few missions to win "hearts and minds" (50% just to give an idea) some civvies may help you, feeding you intell on enemy presence, become sources or what not.
-When the province/region is "liberated" (100% free of enemy presence) they wouldn't throw you rocks, turn into mobs or report you to their authorities.

Once again this is bare bone and schematic. It represent only an idea or a way to improve the value of NPCs who will improve the "life" in a game world.

@virtual-chris I'm wondering about the definition you give to "authentic setting"? A really country? Real events? or would you settle for something fictious?

Lets discuss these for a couple of lines.

-Years ago, in the immediate following events in GRW I imagined something about Peru with El renacimiento Cartel. But, the studio may/would have ran in the same problems they encountered with GRW and Bolivia.
-Setting a new GR game in Irak. This could be interesting, eventhough I'm not totally sold on it. The country isn't that stable after all and one can imagine a few catastrophic scenarii: the legal seize of power by an extremist, anti-american group (from here everything is possible).
-Afghanistan, this is a really difficult one though, because history is too recent to imagine anything, at least for me. @KUZMITCHS may have some ideas.
-Europe and neighbouring countries... to say the least, there is several difficulties. But could potentially work, if we push the scenario to the extreme limits of possibilites.

So, existing locations/settings/events are in my opinion fairly difficult to use for several reasons.

On the other hand, we could imagine fictious countries at the limit of other existing ones (that's the way CoD went with the reboot of Modern Warfare).

Instead of Peru: La republica bolivariana indipendiente. Instead of Irak/Syria: the islamic califat of Syrak, and so on. Which could be a partial solution to the problem briefly exposed before. But, even if we go that way, it can't be totally irrealistic and based on real world international relations (you can't invade a country unilateraly without consequences and recent events tends to demonstrate so), that's one of the points that greatly exasperated me with GRBP. This must be the sine qua none condition.

Furthermore, the deployment of a GST detachement must have a reason. In other words: the continuation of policy by other means, or put in Thomas Hobbes words: the pursuit of national interests or the fulfillment of international obligation (military assistance for example).

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@mars388502

Good discussion on what is an "authentic setting/premise"...

For me, the actual country we're operating in doesn't need to be real, but it should be inspired by a real conflict zone or potential hot spot for conflict... The Middle-east, Africa, South America, North Korea, anywhere in the "Stans". Breakpoint failed this test for me because it was a fantasy island in a part of the world that really doesn't have any reason for conflict.

What's perhaps more important is that the premise be realistic... terrorism, piracy, smuggling, drugs, kidnapping, etc. Not some Wonderland drone fetish fantasy scenario as in Breakpoint.

Wildlands nailed this perfectly. The choice of Boliva was brilliant as it offered a huge diversity of biomes, a struggling rural population, and an authentic set of antagonists. They could have avoided using the name "Bolivia" and created a fictitious country name inspired by a central South American nation and that would have been equally cool with me. I'm not sure why Boliva took offence to being in the game... everyone knows it's a work of fiction. It actually dramatically increased my interest in Boliva which I had never really paid any attention to, and I would actually like to visit there now as it's natural beauty is something I'd like to see.

My preference for the next game would be something inspired by Afghanistan - call it "Uberstan" for all I care. But it's not too soon to have a game based on conflict there at all. In fact it's the most relevant setting to host an authentic tactical shooter if you ask me.

@mars388502

Finally. It is a good thing they finally said it out loud. Breakpoint is dead, and has been for a good while now.

I still have some vague, fanboyish hopes they actually learned from this entire ordeal and that possibly could reflect on a future GR title in a positive way, but after all past developments it might be just the best possible outcome that this franchise has finally come to a very unflattering end.

Rest in peace.

@virtual-chris and the spawning mechanism needs to change.

When I do a map check and nothing is coming, walk out to a road and suddenly a convoy is in my face.. Will Smith comes to mind

No more carpet of enemies with no reason for being where they are. An airplane stranded on a mountain side? 2 Guys working on a motorbike in a swamp. At least the heavies aren't out there now.

I'm with @AI-BLUEFOX I don't need a enormous open world map so that Ubi can tell me to go plant a tree. Take any province, make it highly detailed with a mission or two on it. Don't go generic building types stamped everywhere. And yes to your point give me a location that feels authentic. One map could literally just be Karachi and could have a half dozen different missions. Wildlands was a good open world map, but it did not need to be one big contiguous map. This isn't Skyrim. It is a mission oriented tier one operative world.

@steven527 I understand your point about "small v.s. large" maps. I slightly disagree on "mission oriented" though (in my Mother tongue, we call this "enculage de mouche", I invite you to put it in Google trad). In GRW, the GST detachment was part of an Operation Kingslayer and as the name indicates it's an operation with the objective to dismantle an organisation (which is the strategical goal). But this could be regarded as a detail.

I'm not against smaller maps, but they need to be part of an operation with a clearly identified objective to reach. Here the narrative comes into play.

We were sent to Auroa because no one did his work in the first place (CIA, defense dep, State dept and so on). The insertion from the get go is a total fiasco and costs several millions, everything was monitored and recoded by satellite, but for some reason nothing is done. Once on the ground, nobody told you there was a local population (Homestaders) that were "friendly". And the list goes on.

From the very begining the narrative doesn't work and breaks any impression of being part of the 1st military in the world.

If the studio takes the "small maps" road, each missions needs, a particular objective with a specific narrative to link it to a borader operation with a clearly identified objective.

For the sake of the example, lets take counter proliferation as a political and strategical objective. The new gvt in Kabul wants to acquire nuclear power, but legaly can't for several reasons, they would turn to other means to do so. The CIA gets such intell and will recommend a certain course of actions. They sketch a plan involving the GST.

You would start on map 1 where your objective is to obtain intelligence on the principle smuggling organisation that may have the means to transport nuclear materials. This would lead you to Pakistan, map 2, where they stock the nuclear weapons on an air base (since the country's nuclear weapons are essentially gravity bombs it makes sense). For some reasons, the smuggling pass' throught the former autonomous regions, map 3, before crossing the frontier, map 1 or 4. Your mission is to avoid that the nuclear warheads/material becomes transportable and "neutralize" everyone involved in this operation.

This example shows a few things:

1. The narrative is based upon real world policies and international relations (counter proliferation is one the main objective for a certain number of intelligence services).
2. The illegal acquisition of nuclear power from an "adversary" of the US is indeed a real threat.
3. Every map has an identified mission objective part of a larger operation (or at least I tried to illustrate so in the example)

The more I write on this topic, the more I get the impression that "small v.s. large" would cover 2 types of different narratives.

-Smaller maps implies a connective narrative (different maps, different objective linked to a greater operation).
-Larger maps, would concentrate the narrative on something very specific to the location, like the total eradication of an organization for example.

Mars, my issues with Big Open Maps is that (and I can't believe I am saying it for the 9th time if not more) according to those in the know, the proper coding and programming of the AI would require a lot of time, money and effort (which is not a big deal or even unheard off) but guess who doesn't want to do ANY of that? (and this is a fact going by History alone) I will give you 3 guesses and the first 2 don't count. I will also give you a hint, it starts with U and ends with Bisoft (and also by a not well known studio that we have finally discovered is in Paris... sssshhhh).

This is why I much prefer small sandboxes maps where they can code and programmed a better AI and create more grounded and mature missions and not copy/paste all of them with different backgrounds and call it the Next-Gen Ghost Recon:Over because it sure will be Over!

I don't have desire to make a big fuzz, more so because we have spoken in lengths (well, those with more eloquent vocabulary have anyways) about how and what the community wants out of the next GR and every time people seem to think that if the game doesn't have a Huge Open World Map that the game will be linear???? I don't understand why that is but clearly Open Worlds and Ghost Recon do not agree or go hand in hand.

Now, before you all come at me with the same forks and pitches, YES! Wildlands was a good shooter, habit forming and all but C'mon, do I need to regurgitate why it wasn't a decent, let alone a proper, Ghost Recon game? a few clues & hints... invisible Teammates when pair with enemy, give orders all hell breaks loose. No individual commands. Flower Pot teammates?

OK, I'm done. It doesn't mean we can not continue having a discussion though. LOL

@fcac-no-moe I personnally like large open world/sandbox games than linear games, so I'm particularly biaised when it comes to Ghost Recon. Since Wildlands, it showed the way to something more than what was already on the market.

I remember Mercenaries 2 (some people prefered the 1st) that was an open world/sandbox game, I think it might have been the first time I came in contact with this type of game. So I'm deeply biaised, and I will naturally lean to an open world approach.

You have abundantly made your point about the studio. I WISH to believe that GRBP was a bad experience for Ubisoft and that they may have learnt something from it. Nourredine Abbaoud is no longer in charge and has changed studio, Laura Cordrey no longer is at Ubisoft at all, I believe Émile Daubon is still at the Ubisoft and I have no clue about Éric Couzian. Let's hope that the new team in charge does a better work, or that at least they learnt something from their predecessors experience.

It is probably wishful thinking, but that's what I hope for and keeps me writting and discussing around here. Also, because I think it's the only place I can exchange on this subject without bothering anyone to death.

It's also very enriching because none of us has a strict shared vision for Ghost Recon and it's always intersting to share and confront them.