Yves Guillemot wrote a letter to Ubisoft employees shortly after the company announced XDefiant’s shutdown, as well as layoffs in Osaka, Sydney, and San Francisco, because of this shutdown. Insider Gaming has leaked the letter, and it paints a stunning picture of where the conglomerate is behind the scenes.
We won’t share the whole letter here, as you can just read it on Insider Gaming’s site. But we want to focus on some specific excerpts and provide our commentary on them.
Guillemot starts off by addressing the shutdown itself, calling it “among the difficult decisions I’ve had to make.” He then addresses the people he’s just laid off, saying:
“To everyone leaving Ubisoft, I want to express my deepest gratitude for the work you have accomplished and the contributions you have made. We will do everything possible to provide you with the best support during this transition phase.”
Guillemot then candidly shared his assessment of the industry at large:
“The entire industry is facing similar difficult decisions, yet often the scale of the impact is much larger. Our organization has allowed us to limit the impact of these kinds of decisions and make more targeted restructurings, and all our efforts are focused on trying to maintain this course and philosophy. We will continue working on evolving our organization to adapt it to market changes, and with a long-term perspective in mind.”
One certainly cannot dispute Guillemot’s accounting of things. Sony and Microsoft, alongside every big AAA game developer in the West, had layoffs in the past two years. For many smaller companies, they have simply been closing on their own, amid struggles to succeed in selling games and acquiring capital for new projects.
Guillemot then brings up an interesting internal initiative, called the Ubisoft XP 2024 survey. This sounds like it was just the company’s annual employee survey, and it would be mundane if the company wasn’t under such a crisis. Guillemot revealed that they got an 86 % response rate this year, with over 55,000 comments.
If you’ve never been in a full employment position where you regularly had surveys like this, you should realize that these employee surveys, and similar activities like townhall meetings, get high response and participation rates when the company and/or its management is in trouble.
Guillemot thanked Ubisoft for this feedback, saying:
“I would like to sincerely thank you for your commitment, the quality of your feedback, and your collective intelligence. It’s very impressive. We are compelled to take your critiques to heart, live up to your expectations, and be accountable to you and your needs.”
Guillemot ends his letter with a sentiment that is sobering, and frankly, devastating:
“I want you to know that all my energy is focused on finding the means to guide Ubisoft through these turbulent times. I am working tirelessly with my team to identify the best solutions so we can maintain control of our destiny.
This company – the incredible gem we’ve built together over the past 38 years – means everything to me. It’s a part of who I am, it’s in my core.”
We will reiterate here that the allegations that the Guillemots and Ubisoft’s management have been facing in the past few years are serious, and we do not think this statement changes that. But the tenor and candor that Guillemot shares with his employees implies something that many of us have been speculating on for months now.
The Guillemots really could be losing control of their company, and they fear that Ubisoft itself, a 36 year old game company with over 18,000 employees around the world, could itself go away.
And whatever fumbles Ubisoft has made in the production of their games, and whatever their management needs to be held accountable for, we need to recognize that this is not where we want all of this to end. This is about the years of games that fans have created memories with. And it’s also about all those hardworking developers trying to create new memories for new and returning players.
So if you’re one of those fans who played and loved an Ubisoft game in the last 40 years, you need to take a few minutes to think about this right now. XDefiant was a terrible decision that led to thousands losing their jobs, and it might not be enough to save Ubisoft. With circumstances as uncertain as this, we can only hope that Ubisoft can find their way back to becoming what we knew them to be.
