You guys need to hear this because it's one of those stories that just keeps going in my head — Assassin's Creed Black Flag was already legendary at launch. This isn't just another title; it was arguably Ubisoft's best game of the whole 2013 era, a massive crossover hit with rave reviews and even Grammy-nominated soundtrack work that most remasters can only dream of. Then things got complicated behind the scenes during recent corporate restructuring when the original was sold to Ubisoft Motion Pictures, which legally forced them to rename it "Black Flag Resync" instead of just releasing an honest remaster. So before anyone even played it, you already knew something wasn't right with how they were marketing this thing — rebranding a game is never the same as selling it fresh.
The day-one DLC bundle alone tells a whole story if you look closely at what was actually included in this repackaged edition. You had the Sea Shroud outfit set and Pirateeders legendary ship skin, plus Captain Nemo themed gear including a literal sea monster helmet that's hilarious on its own, all bundled with the original Season Pass content folded back in — and they added some new exclusive skins to make it feel "fresh." But here's where it gets wild: those sales figures came out as roughly $1 million from day one across Steam. Compared to the original 2013 run which did over $35 million on Steam by itself, that means the remake sold for about less than three percent of what the old game moved in its first days. We're talking a drop off of around $97 per copy just for repackaging and retooling it — they essentially tried to sell 2013 as brand new and everyone smelled the difference immediately.
And if you want to know why this tanked, look at what was happening at Ubisoft while they were shipping it instead of launching a fresh IP. They recently axed roughly 600 people at their Montreal studio and another 140 in Quebec — nearly 750 layoffs in total during one stretch - and then announced a new Assassin's Creed spin-off set in 19th-century San Francisco rather than committing to any real AC content. Plus they didn't even create new music; the Grammy-nominated soundtrack was just repackaged into "Black Flag Vol. II" for this version, which tells you everything about how much of a cash grab this rebranding exercise actually was at its core. So yeah $1 million isn't nothing — it still paid for someone's yacht somewhere - but when you compare the original monster to this resynced edition you see exactly what happens when a publisher tries to resell old greatness under new branding instead of building something fresh.
Source: https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/that-annoying-day-one-dlc-in-assassins-creed-black-flag-resynced-was-less-than-3-percent-of-its-initial-steam-sales-but-hey-usd1-million-is-usd1-million/
The day-one DLC bundle alone tells a whole story if you look closely at what was actually included in this repackaged edition. You had the Sea Shroud outfit set and Pirateeders legendary ship skin, plus Captain Nemo themed gear including a literal sea monster helmet that's hilarious on its own, all bundled with the original Season Pass content folded back in — and they added some new exclusive skins to make it feel "fresh." But here's where it gets wild: those sales figures came out as roughly $1 million from day one across Steam. Compared to the original 2013 run which did over $35 million on Steam by itself, that means the remake sold for about less than three percent of what the old game moved in its first days. We're talking a drop off of around $97 per copy just for repackaging and retooling it — they essentially tried to sell 2013 as brand new and everyone smelled the difference immediately.
And if you want to know why this tanked, look at what was happening at Ubisoft while they were shipping it instead of launching a fresh IP. They recently axed roughly 600 people at their Montreal studio and another 140 in Quebec — nearly 750 layoffs in total during one stretch - and then announced a new Assassin's Creed spin-off set in 19th-century San Francisco rather than committing to any real AC content. Plus they didn't even create new music; the Grammy-nominated soundtrack was just repackaged into "Black Flag Vol. II" for this version, which tells you everything about how much of a cash grab this rebranding exercise actually was at its core. So yeah $1 million isn't nothing — it still paid for someone's yacht somewhere - but when you compare the original monster to this resynced edition you see exactly what happens when a publisher tries to resell old greatness under new branding instead of building something fresh.
Source: https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/that-annoying-day-one-dlc-in-assassins-creed-black-flag-resynced-was-less-than-3-percent-of-its-initial-steam-sales-but-hey-usd1-million-is-usd1-million/