Davide Soliani has just announced his exit from Ubisoft.
On Twitter, he made this statement:
“Hi all folks. After 25 years, 11 of which beautifully spent working with Nintendo on Mario+Rabbids along the company of our incredible community of players, I have decided to leave Ubisoft to embark on a new adventure. I can’t say more now. Thanks a lot for everything, truly.”
Davide Soliani is an industry veteran of over 20 years, who can trace his first game to Rayman for the Game Boy Color. Aside from Rayman, he has worked on the Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six and Just Dance franchises for Ubisoft.
Of course, Soliani is most famous for Rayman spinoff Rabbids, and more specifically, for bringing together the Mario + Rabbids franchise. The first game, Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle, briefly became the best-selling title on the Switch that was not made by Nintendo. As of June 2021, Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle has sold 7.5 million copies.
The most recent game, Mario + Rabbids Sparks Of Hope, does not seem to have been as well regarded in Ubisoft as the first title. Last year, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot told investors that he believed the game was underperforming on Ubisoft’s expectations because of the timing of its release.
As of January of this year, Mario + Rabbids Sparks Of Hope has sold 3 million units. While fans seemed to believe that this was a sign of the title’s success, we have yet to see Ubisoft confirm production of a sequel.
In fact, since Mario + Rabbids Sparks Of Hope’s release in October 2022, Nintendo has arranged for three spinoff Mario RPGs to come the Switch. The Super Mario RPG remake came in November 2023, the Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door remake came just last May, and a new game in the Mario & Luigi franchise, named Mario & Luigi: Brothership, is coming this November 2024.
This is likely a coincidence on Nintendo’s part, since they would have been thinking of lining up more games for the Switch. But on Ubisoft’s end, they may have been discouraged further from making new Mario + Rabbids games, as it appears that Nintendo has filled up the need for turn based Mario games.
A lot of fans were pinning their hopes on more Mario + Rabbids games, and even a possible new Rayman game, on Soliani. But perhaps we can acknowledge now that he wasn’t in the position to be making decisions on Ubisoft’s direction. We wish Soliani the best in his future endeavors. Based on how he has worded it, it doesn’t sound like he will be retiring anytime soon, any more than Hideki Kamiya will.
