Ubisoft may be bringing its games back to Steam

[Daniel Sims]

Something to look forward to: Ubisoft has been one of the biggest PC game companies to withhold titles from Steam over the last few years. If the studio reverses the policy, it would continue an industry-wide swing back toward Steam among publishers after Epic Games and others challenged its dominance.

Recently leaked code indicates Ubisoft may be preparing Steam versions of games it has neglected to release on the service. It wouldn't be the first hint that the company is considering ending its three-year spat with the largest PC gaming storefront.

The leak comes from YoobieRE, a GitHub project aiming to reverse engineer the Ubisoft Connect launcher. This week it scraped code referencing Steam versions of Assassin's Creed Valhalla and Roller Champions.

Since 2019, Ubisoft has only released PC games on Ubisoft Connect and the Epic Games Store. The company told The New York Times it considered Steam's 30 percent revenue cut "unrealistic." Valve has since rewarded successful Steam releases by lowering its commission to 20 percent, but Epic only takes 12 percent.

Ubisoft's last major title on Steam was 2019's Far Cry: New Dawn. Since then, the company has released games like Valhalla, Far Cry 6, Rainbow Six Extraction, Watch Dogs: Legion, Anno 1800, Ghost Recon Breakpoint, and The Division 2 on the other storefronts.

There were a couple of signs last year suggesting Ubisoft was open to returning to Steam. That July, Ubisoft's CEO said they might resume releasing games on Valve's client if the Steam Deck became successful. Valve's handheld is doing well, but it isn't clear how big Ubisoft expects it to get. The following November, code referencing Ubisoft Connect appeared on SteamDB, suggesting Ubisoft might release games on Steam that connect to its launcher.

The company's games on the Epic Games Store require Ubisoft Connect integration, so any Steam releases probably would as well. EA is another big publisher that left Steam for its own launcher, only to return and release Steam games that incorporate its client.

Microsoft is another big company to start supporting Steam (thankfully without forcing its Windows Store app on Steam users). While Bethesda never totally left Steam, it tried to promote its Bethesda.net launcher before eventually closing it and providing Steam keys for its purchased games. Call of Duty's return to Steam after a five-year absence contributed to the franchise's biggest-ever launch this year.

If Ubisoft ends its Steam hiatus, it could also bring its Ubisoft+ subscription service to the platform like EA did with EA Play. Valve wants Microsoft to bring Game Pass to Steam, too.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/96608-ubisoft-could-planning-bring-games-back-steam.html

 

[trparky]

Who would have thought that people wouldn't like to have multiple places to get their games? Oh... just about everyone?

Now if only EA would get rid of their Origin crap and put their stuff back on Steam and gamers would rejoice.

 

[Gars]

I cant wait to see The Settlers Online on Steam, and the reviews for how good it performs with the Unity engine
/s

 

[defaultluser]

If you still ned to have their game manager running in he background, then it a worthless gesture

 

[SG736F6]

Here's hoping they get rid of that awful launcher. Same with Origin and all the others. It's one thing to have their own launcher on their own platform, but forcing it on top of Steam is ridiculous. I stopped buying any game on Steam with an additional launcher a long time ago.

 

[psycros]

Here's hoping they get rid of that awful launcher. Same with Origin and all the others. It's one thing to have their own launcher on their own platform, but forcing it on top of Steam is ridiculous. I stopped buying any game on Steam with an additional launcher a long time ago.

Really? That takes commitment since about 80% of all AAA games released now have launchers.

 

[defaultluser]

Really? That takes commitment since about 80% of all AAA games released now have launchers.

well yes, but you can just buy it direct

im still waiting fo ea to gut origin, but until that day I will never again buy a game o team that requires origin

 

[vicsrealms]

Might be more interested in they would remove the DRM and U(Don't)Play.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Really? That takes commitment since about 80% of all AAA games released now have launchers.

Yeah but 80% of AAA games are garbage, so...

 

[Neatfeatguy]

Pay Valve for the game (Ubisoft gets some of the money, but Valve also gets some). Then launch the game in Steam only to have it require you to log into the Uplay platform so the game can launch and connect to the Ubisoft servers.....that's just stupid.

Just buy a Ubisoft game off their platform and bypass giving Valve money and having to use Steam as a middle man.

I recall sometimes having issues getting a game to launch that's Ubisoft when I purchased it through Steam years ago. Sometimes the game wouldn't launch and I'd have to try a few times, it was irritating. After that point it was just easier to use Uplay and buy through that platform and not have to worry about if Steam will launch Uplay and then Uplay will launch the game without some kind of hiccup.

 

[ghosty]

Pay Valve for the game (Ubisoft gets some of the money, but Valve also gets some). Then launch the game in Steam only to have it require you to log into the Uplay platform so the game can launch and connect to the Ubisoft servers.....that's just stupid.

Just buy a Ubisoft game off their platform and bypass giving Valve money and having to use Steam as a middle man.

I recall sometimes having issues getting a game to launch that's Ubisoft when I purchased it through Steam years ago. Sometimes the game wouldn't launch and I'd have to try a few times, it was irritating. After that point it was just easier to use Uplay and buy through that platform and not have to worry about if Steam will launch Uplay and then Uplay will launch the game without some kind of hiccup.

Never had that issue myself with Steam... but I've had nothing but issues with Ubi's client. It keeps disconnecting me, fails to sync the cloud saves, and then *overwrites* the older cloud saves over my more recent local saves, ruining hours of playing. And their customer service has been utterly useless throughout the whole ordeal.

 

[messy]

Sorry Ubi, I'll pass

 

[Neatfeatguy]

Never had that issue myself with Steam... but I've had nothing but issues with Ubi's client. It keeps disconnecting me, fails to sync the cloud saves, and then *overwrites* the older cloud saves over my more recent local saves, ruining hours of playing. And their customer service has been utterly useless throughout the whole ordeal.

The point is, even if you buy the Ubisoft game on Steam, Steam launches Uplay and the game loads through Uplay. Steam is just a middle man for the sale.

If you're planning on buying a Ubisoft game, just get it through their digital store.

 

[Avro Arrow]

It won't make any difference to me because with one exception, I only buy Ubisoft games from Uplay. That exception was accidental (I got Far Cry 5 from Steam).

I always prefer to get my games from their originators, be it Origin, Epic or Uplay. Everything that DOESN'T come from them I get from Steam.

 

[Bamda]

Well of course they are losing money, think of all those unsold games to Steam customers. I seriously doubt that they are making as much revenue on the Epic store as they would have on Steam. Since Ubisoft left Steam I haven't purchased one Ubisoft game, not on Steam. And with the pandemic driving people to stay home and Steam Deck being released, Steam is as hot as ever. They are constantly setting all-time records for people using the platform.

 

[Faelan]

Really? That takes commitment since about 80% of all AAA games released now have launchers.

Commitment? Lol - that would be such an easy commitment for me to make if I decided to go there. The only AAA game I’ve bought outside of Steam during the last 2 years that I don’t feel was a complete waste of money is AC Valhalla. 109 hours in total according to Ubisoft Connect. That’s OK value and I’m not done with it. On the other hand, I have 226 hours in Satisfactory which launched on Steam about a year or so after it launched on Epic. That didn’t cost me anywhere near as much as AC Valhalla (I believe I picked it up during a Steam sale).

The thing is, if you aren’t fond of shooters, sports games, closed world games, anything competitive online or anything that forces micro transactions/loot boxes (AC Valhalla just about pushes it to my personal limit), then there’s frankly not a whole lot left in the AAA genre. Total War Warhammer 3 is the only AAA title this year I would miss had it not released on Steam. But that’s okay, because I’m frankly not lacking games competing for my time. Plenty of games in my Steam library that I still need to look at, but today I’ll be looking at Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 update 11 and have some fun with helicopters, gliders and more, assuming the servers don’t blow up lol.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Commitment? Lol - that would be such an easy commitment for me to make if I decided to go there. The only AAA game I’ve bought outside of Steam during the last 2 years that I don’t feel was a complete waste of money is AC Valhalla. 109 hours in total according to Ubisoft Connect. That’s OK value and I’m not done with it. On the other hand, I have 226 hours in Satisfactory which launched on Steam about a year or so after it launched on Epic. That didn’t cost me anywhere near as much as AC Valhalla (I believe I picked it up during a Steam sale).

The thing is, if you aren’t fond of shooters, sports games, closed world games, anything competitive online or anything that forces micro transactions/loot boxes (AC Valhalla just about pushes it to my personal limit), then there’s frankly not a whole lot left in the AAA genre. Total War Warhammer 3 is the only AAA title this year I would miss had it not released on Steam. But that’s okay, because I’m frankly not lacking games competing for my time. Plenty of games in my Steam library that I still need to look at, but today I’ll be looking at Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 update 11 and have some fun with helicopters, gliders and more, assuming the servers don’t blow up lol.

If you haven't tried AC: Odyssey, I would highly recommend it. I personally rank it up there with Skyrim and The Witcher III. If you have, well, then you know.

 

[Ravey]

I remember the days when it was irritating to scroll through my gaming folder for the games I wanted to play. It was genius when Valve created the steam platform to help organise games and keep them updated, not to mention creating public servers for a huge chunk of multiplayer games for players to come together and play.

Now with the all the different gaming clients available, I feel like I'm ion the same boat, all my games spread across my pc and the pain of switching between them to find a game I want to play.

If steam can incorporate all the multiple clients into one platform, id be happy with that

 

[Neatfeatguy]

I remember the days when it was irritating to scroll through my gaming folder for the games I wanted to play. It was genius when Valve created the steam platform to help organise games and keep them updated, not to mention creating public servers for a huge chunk of multiplayer games for players to come together and play.

Now with the all the different gaming clients available, I feel like I'm ion the same boat, all my games spread across my pc and the pain of switching between them to find a game I want to play.

If steam can incorporate all the multiple clients into one platform, id be happy with that

You can manually add your games to GoG Galaxy and Steam clients.

I know with GoG Galaxy you can link other clients (Steam, Ubisoft, EGS and Origin....and I think even Xbox pass???). This way you have all your games across multiple platforms showing up in one spot. I haven't done anything with Steam in the past 3 years so I don't know if they've added any kind feature like that, but I do know you can manually link games to Steam.