It has been two years since 2K began the shift of industry-standard pricing for triple-A video games. Various studios have followed suit since, and now Ubisoft has confirmed it won't be holding out any longer. Skull & Bones will be $70 when it launches later this year, and from then on that will be the standard price for Ubisoft's big games.
It had already been confirmed that Ubisoft's on-again, off-again pirate game would cost more than the studio's previous titles. However, it wasn't until this week that Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot confirmed to Axios (via VGC) that the higher price point will be the studio's standard moving forward. “Some of the games will come at the same price as the competition. The big triple-A games will come at $70,” Guillemot confirmed.
Some of the competition the CEO references have indeed already made the jump to more expensive current-gen games. 2K went first, confirming NBA 2K21 on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S would be the first to sell for $70 before the new consoles had even launched. EA, Square Enix, and Activision are just a few of the studios that have followed in 2K's footsteps in the two years since then.
Confirmation that Ubisoft will now be charging $70 for its triple-A titles comes just a few days after it unveiled its extensive plans for the future of Assassin's Creed. Next on the AC slate will be Mirage, and despite it launching in 2023 after Skull & Bones, it'll actually cost less than it and the industry standard at just $50. That's because the AC game with a Baghdad backdrop will be smaller in scale than a typical Assassin's Creed game.
Upping the industry standard for current-gen games by $10 has been a point of contention for the past two years. Ubisoft admitted in February 2021 that it was undecided on whether it should make the leap or not, and held out for a lot longer than most likely expected. The Last Of Us Part 1 recently added a new spin to the price increase discourse as players questioned whether a remake of a game less than ten years old, which has already been remastered, could ever really be worth $70.