Axios reporter Stephen Totilo recently spoke to Guillemot in Paris. Their conversation covered various topics, including the potential rising price of Ubisoft games. The publisher’s co-founder explained that while not every new release will cost $70, that will be the standard for Ubisoft’s AAA releases. “Some of the games will come at the same price as the competition,” said Guillemot. “The big AAA games will come at $70.”

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“Big AAA games” presumably do not include Assassin’s Creed: Mirage, which will retail for a below-average $50 at launch. It’s also unclear how Ubisoft will price the upcoming games codenamed Assassin’s Creed Red and Assassin’s Creed Hexe. However, given that Red will reportedly be a full-sized open-world game, unlike the smaller 15 to 20-hour Mirage, it’s reasonable to assume that it will be $70 at launch. The $70 price tag will presumably also apply to new installments of Ubisoft’s other big franchises like Far Cry, Ghost Recon, Watch Dogs, and The Division.

As Guillemot implied during the interview, Ubisoft is not the only AAA game publisher raising its prices. Companies like Take-Two, Activision, Sony, EA, and Square Enix have all released games at $70 over the last few years. Notable examples include NBA 2K21, recent Call of Duty games, the Demon’s Souls remake, Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales Ultimate, and the PC version of FF7 Remake Intergrade. Sony executive Jim Ryan defended the $70 price tag, arguing that players get significantly more hours of enjoyment out of AAA games like Demon’s Souls than any other form of media.

Notably, however, this opinion is not universal among gaming executives. In 2020, Microsoft’s Vice-President of Gaming Phil Spencer confirmed that the company didn’t plan to release any games at $70. He cited the high upfront cost of next-gen consoles like the Xbox Series X, raising concerns that a higher price might alienate more casual gamers. This may also represent a decent PR win for Microsoft since it allows the corporation to frame itself as the more consumer-focused publisher.

That will be especially true if $70 becomes the industry standard for next-gen games. And while gamers and developers will no doubt disagree over whether a price increase is reasonable or necessary, that certainly appears to be the way the winds are blowing.

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Source: Axios, VGC