Ubisoft earnings comes up short thanks to Assassin’s Creed

Ubisoft’s most reliable annual franchise is starting to slip, and the company is looking to shake things up moving forward.

The French publisher generated $638 million (532 million euros) in sales during its fiscal third quarter, which ran through December 31. Those revenues were down from the $681 million (600 million euros) the company was predicting to bring in during that period. Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate, the latest entry in the company’s open-world action-adventure series that has players taking on various roles throughout the history of the world, is the primary reason Ubisoft failed to live up to its expectations. The company, which is only behind Electronic Arts and Activision in the world of third-party game publishing revenues, has relied on Assassin’s Creed to deliver steady access to the console and PC gaming market that are together worth multiple tens of billions of dollars. But now, Ubisoft has confirmed the franchise will skip 2016 in an effort to reset expectations and give the next entry the chance to reignite the passion of fans