Ubisoft confirms Project Q cancelled

Ubisoft has confirmed the cancellation of Project Q, the company's mysterious upcoming PVP battle arena game it teased last year.

Last week, Ubisoft announced it had cancelled three "unannounced" titles and delayed its vapourware pirate ship game Skull and Bones yet again, on top of the four projects it previously abandoned last summer.

Now, Eurogamer can confirm that Project Q was one of the games that Ubisoft most recently ditched.

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"We can confirm we will no longer support the development of Project Q in order to focus on priority projects, to which our teams are being reallocated," a Ubisoft spokesperson told me this morning.

While technically announced by Ubisoft in April last year, little was known publicly of Project Q. Eurogamer understands it had gone through several rounds of closed testing over the course of 2022, with plans for more in the near future.

Ubisoft only mentioned Project Q last April via Twitter as footage of the game leaked online from one of these tests.

The company shared a colourful piece of concept art and simply stated the project was "not a battle royale" and would instead "feature a variety of PVP modes". Ubisoft followed that up by confirming it didn't "have plans to add NFTs", which was nice.

‍Introducing codename “Project Q”, a team battle arena letting players truly own the experience! The game is in early development and we will keep testing, so for now all you can do is register for upcoming tests: https://t.co/TMRKwiUzbJ pic.twitter.com/hZ40OkPdum — Ubisoft (@Ubisoft) April 23, 2022 To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Manage cookie settings

Today's statement from Ubisoft chimes with last week's disappointing financial results, and the company's nervous-sounding comment it was currently facing "major challenges as the industry continues to shift towards mega-brands and long-lasting titles", compounded by the underperformance of recent launches including Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope and Just Dance 2023.

Project Q's cancellation - alongside two other unnamed projects - was sparked by Ubisoft's need for "increased cautiousness over the coming years", it said.

There's no word today on which Ubisoft games and franchises the Project Q team will now be reassigned to.

It's been a tough start to the year for Ubisoft and employees, with the situation not helped by controversial comments by the company's CEO Yves Guillemot, who reportedly told staff "the ball was in their court" to deliver games "on time and at the expected level of quality" and turn the company around.

Guillemot walked back those comments last night, it was reported, following union calls for Ubisoft Paris workers to go on strike.