Prototype via Ubisoft

During its quarterly earnings call held Thursday, Ubisoft confirmed it plans to launch Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, likewise every bit the long-in-development pirate game Skull & Basic, all before the end of its 2023 fiscal year, which will wrap upwards in April 2023. Journalist and games media personality Geoff Keighley attended the phone call and shared a partial transcript of it on Twitter.

During the call, the company also stated that it would continue to cover gratis-to-play titles "beyond all geographies and platforms." Ubisoft has previously experimented with costless-to-play games such equally the shortly-to-be-sunset Hyper Scape. The company too has several free-to-play titles in development, such as Tom Clancy's XDefiant, and Ghost Recon Frontline.

Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Promise and Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora were both announced in 2022 with expected 2022 release windows. It's more shocking to see Skull & Bones appear in Ubisoft's planned pipeline of upcoming games. The pirate-themed championship started evolution in 2022 — nearly 10 years ago — and has seen numerous delays reportedly brought on by ever-changing visions for what kind of game it should be. During the telephone call, the company stated that the title would feature both a "multiplayer-get-go" focus and an open-world structure.

No update was provided on Beyond Good & Evil 2, another Ubisoft title that has allegedly experienced a similarly rough multi-year development. In tardily 2022, it was reported that the game was undergoing a "evolution crisis" exacerbated by the departure of director Michel Ancel.