Ubisoft has renamed its Creative House 2 division as Massive Entertainment, making the Swedish studio behind The Division and Star Wars Outlaws the umbrella brand for Ghost Recon, Splinter Cell and a new MOBA called March of Giants.
Under the change, teams in Montreal, Paris, Sweden and Toronto that work on those franchises now operate as Massive. According to Kotaku, the group covers most of the Tom Clancy line (The Division, Ghost Recon and Splinter Cell) but not Rainbow Six, which sits with the Tencent-backed subsidiary Vantage Studios alongside Assassin's Creed and Far Cry. Kotaku reports that Massive's remit also includes unannounced projects, likely among them whatever the Malmö team moved on to after Star Wars Outlaws.
Christoph Hartmann, the former 2K co-founder and Amazon Games executive whom Ubisoft appointed to run Creative House 2 earlier this year, is now general manager of Massive Entertainment. Kotaku adds that former Avalanche chief development officer Natalie Francis joined last week as studio manager in Malmö, which now looks like the hub of the network.
In the press release, Hartmann said unifying the teams under one identity would let them pool expertise across the four locations to "shape the next generation of these iconic franchises, create new games and IPs, and push our craft and technology forward."
Rock Paper Shotgun notes that Ubisoft did not announce further job cuts alongside the move, though it remains unclear how the reorganisation will affect staff in the merged teams.
March of Giants and the projects already in the pipeline
March of Giants is the one new game named in the announcement. Rock Paper Shotgun describes it as a 4v4 MOBA set in a dieselpunk, World War-flavoured fantasy, where each player controls a giant leading thousands of computer-controlled creeps into battle. It already has a Steam page and is taking playtest sign-ups. Eurogamer and Rock Paper Shotgun both call it an original game, while Kotaku reports Ubisoft recently bought it from Amazon. Eurogamer says no other details were shared beyond the name.
Other work now under the Massive banner includes Ubisoft Toronto's long-running remake of the first Splinter Cell. Rock Paper Shotgun reports that Ubisoft recently cut 40 people from the Toronto team but says the remake has not been cancelled. Ubisoft also confirmed last July that a new Ghost Recon is in development.
A year of restructuring at Ubisoft
The rename is the latest step in Ubisoft's shift to a set of "creative houses," which began after Tencent invested €1.16 billion, per Eurogamer, to set up Vantage Studios. Eurogamer frames Massive as the second multi-franchise subsidiary inside the company. Kotaku says the remaining houses beyond Vantage still go by placeholder names, Creative Houses 3, 4 and 5.
The reshuffle has come with deep cuts. Eurogamer lists the closure of the Halifax and Stockholm studios in January, along with layoffs at Ubisoft Abu Dhabi, RedLynx and Massive itself. In March, Ubisoft reportedly laid off 105 people at Ghost Recon studio Red Storm Entertainment and turned it into a support studio. In June, it reportedly shut its Winnipeg and Belgrade studios and cut staff at Ubisoft Barcelona, for a total of 380 layoffs. Rock Paper Shotgun notes that Ubisoft staff went on strike earlier this year over the cuts and related return-to-office changes.
Massive itself dates to 1997, when it was founded in Ronneby, Sweden, and made the strategy games Ground Control and World in Conflict before Ubisoft acquired it in 2008, Kotaku recounts.
