They nailed it with Assassin's Creed. Establish the brand, then work on the game content. A new franchise is a big, expensive risk for them. Planning a franchise doesn't necessarily mean they're being cynical.
I used to work for Ubisoft and this is a long-standing policy. They wouldn't green light a project without some idea/hope that it could be built into a franchise if things went well. The lack of sequel to ZombiU will be because things didn't go according to plan with the sales.
Look at Academy of Champions: Football on Wii. Loads of work went into designing that to support the possibility of sequels, with the "brand" being one of the main design issues (i.e. "being inspired by" another popular brand...), arguably at the expense of more important things.
Comments 2
Re: Ubisoft Will Only Make Games That Can Be Turned Into Franchises
They nailed it with Assassin's Creed. Establish the brand, then work on the game content. A new franchise is a big, expensive risk for them. Planning a franchise doesn't necessarily mean they're being cynical.
Re: Ubisoft Will Only Make Games That Can Be Turned Into Franchises
I used to work for Ubisoft and this is a long-standing policy. They wouldn't green light a project without some idea/hope that it could be built into a franchise if things went well. The lack of sequel to ZombiU will be because things didn't go according to plan with the sales.
Look at Academy of Champions: Football on Wii. Loads of work went into designing that to support the possibility of sequels, with the "brand" being one of the main design issues (i.e. "being inspired by" another popular brand...), arguably at the expense of more important things.