Analytic Dreamz: Notorious Mass Effect - "UBISOFT HAS BEEN HIT WITH LAYOFFS AMIDST A MAJOR RESTRUCTURE; WILL ANNOUNCE ADDITIONAL LAYOFFS FEBRUARY 12"

Episode Date: February 1, 2026

Linktree: ⁠https://linktr.ee/Analytic⁠Join The Normandy For Additional Bonus Audio And Visual Content For All Things Nme+! Join Here: ⁠https://ow.ly/msoH50WCu0K⁠In this segment of Notorious Mass Effect, Analytic Dreamz breaks down Ubisoft's 2026 major reset—a sweeping organizational, operational, and portfolio overhaul announced to reclaim creative leadership and restore sustainable growth under CEO Yves Guillemot.Ubisoft has restructured into five decentralized Creative Houses, each with full ownership over specific genres and brands: Vantage Studios (CH1) scales AAA franchises like Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Rainbow Six; CH2 focuses on competitive/co-op shooters including The Division, Ghost Recon, and Splinter Cell; CH3 handles live-service titles such as For Honor, The Crew, Riders Republic, Brawlhalla, and Skull & Bones; CH4 drives immersive fantasy and narrative games with Anno, Might & Magic, Rayman, Prince of Persia, and Beyond Good & Evil; CH5 targets casual/family-friendly experiences like Just Dance, mobile hits, and licensed titles.This shift addresses escalating AAA costs, market competition, and trends toward mobile and Games-as-a-Service, prioritizing open-world adventures and GaaS-native experiences while investing in player-facing generative AI.The reset includes significant cuts: employee count reduced to 17,097 (from 20,729 in 2022, a net loss of 3,633), selective studio closures (including Halifax and Stockholm), and a "final" €200 million savings push, with €234 million more planned over two years. Six games canceled (including Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time remake and unannounced titles), seven delayed (potentially impacting Assassin’s Creed projects and Beyond Good & Evil 2), and four new IPs in development (including March of Giants).Financially, expect short-term hits in FY2026-2027: €386 million gross margin reduction, €650 million R&D depreciation, and €350 million net bookings drop. A mandatory five-day in-office policy has sparked internal unrest and backlash against leadership.Analytic Dreamz explores the implications for Ubisoft's future, from agile decision-making and long-term sustainability to employee sentiment and investor reactions in this in-depth analysis.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Now, ladies and gentlemen, we are here to talk about Expedition 33. Well, sort of. Shepard, just look at the state of gaming. Like, what is going on? As when it comes to the most successful ex-Ubysoft developed game, we already know clear or obscure Expedition 33 is one of the most successful games, not from an objective metric, but from a critical metric of all time, especially the way it broke the record for the amount of wins at the game awards this past year.

Now, of course, with that out the way, time to get into the sad topic that's reoccurring in the past two years, which is layoff talk. You guys, see, that's the problem. As, you know, Ubisoft gets the brunt because, of course, they made the headlines. But as of right now, in 2026, Amazon has laid off 16,000 people. meta has laid off 1.5,000 people. Microsoft has laid off 6,000. But of course, in the gaming universe, when you look at Warner Bros.

laying off 600 plus since 2023, those are like multiple years. Ubisoft is leading the gaming pack as of right now in 2026 because currently they have just laid off, I think, around 400 total. But they plan six cancellations, including the Prince of Persia remake. Sad day in history, man.

Shepard. Sad day. Just look at the state of gaming. I'm looking at it. What is going on? And the reason why they're doing this for those who's wondering is because they want to drive revenue, right? $360 million was driven by partnerships and back catalog. But now, when you look at the CEO, which is Yves-Gulamont, hopefully I'm saying it right, is YVE,

and then Goulmont, Goulamont, hopefully I'm pronouncing it right. Anyways, so they generated a lot of revenue. As of right now, to this day, not to sound like Deonti Wilder, but Apex Legends is definitely the magnum opus for Ubisoft in the past two to three to four years.

I mean, yeah, because Apex Legends came out of 2019, so even more than that. Basically, what I'm saying is, Ubisoft, I'm not saying they're struggling, but the amount of dead games that they put out and put a lot of money into to perform well and they didn't is leaving Ubisoft in a tough

situation so now they've laid off a bunch of people focusing on efficiency sustainability and creative focus but the biggest thing I saw is them wanting to shift towards open world adventures and games as a service

which you already know Apex Legends is already a games as a service so safe to say I don't know if Ubisoft and I'm not trying to hate I'm just saying Apex Legends is such a outlier. I don't know if that's an acquireable goal as of right now, especially with the way that Arc Raiders is consistently bringing in players as far as it's live service. Usually you have two to three, four max.

An arc rater seemingly is now about to be a part of that rotation. So I think that's a far-fetched goal. But hey, Ubisoft thinks they could do it because, you know, they do have Apex Legends. So at the very least, we should at least give them some leeway to try to create that. But anyways, getting back into the layoffs, specifically, they are down to 17,000 employees. Well, 17,97, down from 20,729 and 2022. So, of course, when you look overall as far as the past three years, it's safe to say, it's been 3,633. So now, especially in the gaming field, a lot of people say it to themselves,

Hold up now. If you're laying off all these people y'all better come with some bangers because these are hardworking individuals that no longer has a job. Sad day and history. You guys. See, that's the problem. And of course, with these layoffs and closures, the studios are not exempt, right? Studios as a whole, like Halifax, which is a mobile development company, Stockholm and other selective closures are ongoing. So we technically don't. don't know the brunt completely of these layoffs we just know those specific development studios are closed as far as the cost saving obviously that's the main thing they want to do as they already have 360 million dollars driven by partnerships and bad catalogs so you know they probably like hey we don't care we have 300 million plus in the bank we want more more more more you know it's

like capitalism all over again so anyways um as far as what they're trying to do They're trying to save costs. So basically the goal of saving is $240 million. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it's pretty egregious, but that's what they're trying to do. And as far as the final cut, an additional $500 million is already saved from prior reductions. So they thought to themselves, well, we save so much money from previous layoffs,

why not keep laying off more people until you realize my brother, where is your morale system? Guess what? If we was in Massifay, you'd be complete. not even renegade you would be even worse than renegade all I got to say is y'all are not putting the people's mindset and mental health in question in the overall equation of you laying them off which is sad because of course people at the higher up position are just looking at the bottom line the the actual workers that are getting laid off are looking at their family looking at the option

to putting food on the table like it gets very much really serious and it becomes a dire situation while the higher ups are just like you know what we just trying to save at least 500 million like what like come on now you you would think they were struggling the way they're laying off people left and right so with that being said um there was a lot of internet backlash of course it made a plethora of headlines and of course um when you look at the goulmont brothers oh i guess it's brothers i only said one of them Yvesse Gouemont, I only say his name, but apparently he has another brother. So when it comes to the Gourmet brothers, they're getting a lot of backlash on the internet.

And employees are quote-unquote slagging off management on internal chat systems. I don't know what slagging off means, but that's a quote. So that must have came some type of insider. But, you know, of course, what are the employees going to say when you lay off a lot of the coworkers? They're not going to be like, oh, man, I'm happy. Everybody got laid off. You know what I'm saying? another day at work when half of my coworkers got laid out like no they're going to be talking bad

about you so of course that's to be expected and the shift to mandatory five day in office work with limited annual um oh no i don't know what this means let me do some nicky research right quick i don't know what w f h means oh i didn't even have to look at it i told it popped in my brain as soon as i hit and enter anyways it's saying some work from home i know i know you guys that's on me that's on me I had to do Mickey research to look that up. So I shift a mandatory five day in the office work with limited annual work from home allowance. So now they're allowing you to work from home. Now, you know, COVID messed up a lot of things.

And the developers are not having it anymore, basically. So I already got to the specific numbers of the layoffs and the cost goal. It's another, the savings goal for Ubisoft. But the main thing you need to know is that when you look at it from a fiscal perspective, as far as in 2026. The gross margin reduction was $386 million. The depreciation of capitalized R&D, which is research and development, I believe, was $650 million. And the net bookings reduction was $350 million.

A lot of money being thrown around. And their solution was just to lay more people off, which is why a lot of people are upset. So the main upsetting factor. is the Prince of Persia game because that game in my opinion I thought it was pretty solid I never played it from watching from seeing all the masses talk about it seems like the Prince of Persia hive was very well pleased with that specific game and then guess what they basically canceled that game and um when you look at the remake you would think it was on the top of the totem pole because of the last Prince of Persia doing phenomenal but guess what they canceled it

and they was like hey whoop-de-do like we don't care what you guys say about Prince of Persia were canceling it and it reminds me of when another game came out and it was like a musical game i think it was called high-fi rush and apparently um that studio got closed like a month after it came out i'm like bro what type of unrealistic expectations are they setting on these development studios i thought the expectation was only to make a good game and if it doesn't sell well well because you made a good game let's try to put you on other popular IP projects but they just disband the the studio entirely and didn't let them work on anything else so what that means that as far as delay games i don't think i have any other specific let me see they have likely affected projects but i don't have any like

like in set in stone and concrete details as far as uh delay games so i'm gonna wait on that one but ubysop did come out and say that there's going to be four new ips including march of giants acquired from amazon so if you're interested in that project well that's that's to update on that there's four new IPs including marsha giants acquired from amazon and as far as a triple a and games as a service uh prioritized i think that's what every studio is trying to do every studio is trying to create another fortnight they're trying to create another arc creators uh apex ledgers i mean you name it these live service games that are already popular i don't know what it is about the developments or the developers out there but they look at that and they think they could do the

same exact thing with no type of struggles or obstacles because there's a reason why there's max three to four live service games is popular even with marvel rivals they just put out deadpool and i thought it had a phenomenal uh it was phenomenally received right by gamers and i don't see it in the top 10 at all and top 10 isn't everything well actually it's number nine for playstation top 10 isn't everything but especially when you just put out a phenomenal product and you keep updating it it does not guaranteed sales that's why when i cover the charts especially on the gaming and music side i have to reiterate that just because you sell the most does not mean you make the best product and just because you don't sell at all does not mean you're making the worst thing imaginable

the two do not correlate sometimes it does but it's not a direct correlation so anyways but it is great to make a good product because you know at the end of day you want to say at least i put my all into it and make a it made something i'm proud of um so to finish us off all you need know is that Ubisoft is undergoing a third major reconstructing since 2022 and creative houses will replace the global cold development model six games were canceled seven delayed and four new IPs on development as far as the three the 3600 layoffs it includes the studio closures and the cost reduction as far as how much they saved due to these layoffs was two hundred and thirty million dollars over the past two years and all I got to say I feel like the in the infinity word. I just want to say that Ubisoft. Was it worth it? You guys.

See, that's the problem. I think that was basically it. So, yeah, Ubisoft still has a mammoth of amount of money coming in right now. I mean, you look at EA, they're definitely the Don Daughter. They got the most with $38 billion. But of course, Ubisoft, they're no slouch as they're around $1 billion, I believe. Take two is around $27 billion. If you was wanting to know the mammoth.

in the gaming industry. Sony is around 150 billion. Um, and what else? Microsoft. So yeah, I guess you know, compared to the gaming field, Ubisoft is not really, uh, yeah, they're not really doing the greatest, but hey, you know, they still have Apex Legends, you know what I'm saying? So, uh, hopefully this actually leads into more creative games, but um, I doubt it. I can never, especially as a consumer myself, I know I do this for a living as far as covering the gaming and music industry, but as far as a consumer, I can't preach anti-consumer rhetoric. So the main thing I want to let them know is the layoffs are terrible. Do not add on to the layoffs by putting out some atrociously bad games, right? You have to at least,

I mean, look at this game right here. I mean, didn't it Dillon from RDC say he'll play this off stream? All right, my fault. Wildside tension, my fault. As far as Ubisoft, you have to put out a banger or else people are going to look at you in the light that they already do because of all these significant layoffs and say why did you do it if you was just going to continue to put out bad games so what that means said click my link to your in my bio let me know one of my social medias what do you think about ubyself their 2026 and really has been going on for two years but their major reset laying off 3,600 employees and at the end of the day what do you think will become of youbyself do you think they'll flourish because of these layoffs or what is the main reason you think

they will basically crumble and fall as a gaming development studio.