DRM News

Ubisoft’s 2009 fiscal results landed yesterday, and they weren’t good. Despite Assassin’s Creed 2 selling 9 million copies across all platforms, the company still saw a drop of 18 percent in their overall sales. As a result, one of the options Ubi is looking it to recoup their losses is charging for DLC content on used games that’s free to buyers of a new copy, similar to what EA has done.

Said Ubisoft CFO Alain Martinez in a Tuesday earnings call :

“Regarding … monetizing used games or downloadable content … most of the games that we will release next year will have downloadable content available from the start.”

He added, “We are looking very carefully at what is being done by EA regarding what we call the ‘$10 solution,’ and we will probably follow that line at sometime in the future.”

Since Ubi has started using more DLC with games, and more download keys with that DLC, this really wouldn’t be a difficult change for them. The question is, will it really help the bottom line?

Ubisoft has already made itself a pariah with the introduction of its ‘always on’ PC DRM system. Do they really want to risk having console users look at them the same way by putting in place paid DLC for used games? Say what you will about such a system and its relative fairness, but it does tend to have mixed opinions about it’s implementation, to say the least.

Beyond that, are they really going to make up an 18 percent drop in sales by charging for DLC content on used games? Perhaps they need to start looking at the bigger picture, and the possibility that people simply aren’t interested in a lot of what they’re putting on the market. That would explain losing a fifth of your sales in a calendar year. Eventually, one of these companies has to stop wearing blinders and start considering whether their games themselves are worth it…right?