XDefiant’s launch seemed to be off to a rough start, but Ubisoft’s free-to-play game ultimately had a particularly successful launch.
After a difficult first day due to unruly servers, XDefiant seems to have recovered very well. Many players have already tried this new free game from Ubisoft. It even seems that the result exceeds the expectations of the French giant.
A visibly paid launch for the free-to-play XDefiant
XDefiant was released on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series on May 21st, and got off to an explosive start in more ways than one. 1 million players flocked to Ubisoft’s new free-to-play game. The problem is that the servers were obviously not very cooperative, and empty lobbies caused chaos and confusion. Fortunately, the situation quickly stabilized, and player numbers have skyrocketed since then.
A week after its release, XDefiant would have reached 8 million unique players. This means that every player has downloaded and launched the game at least once. This nice figure would have definitely exceeded the expectations of Ubisoft, which expected 5 million players in the first month after the release of its new free FPS. However, such a figure does not mean much in itself. On the other hand, it was noted that the number of players simultaneously connected to XDefiant reached a peak of around 700,000 on May 27th.
It now remains to be seen whether Ubisoft San Francisco will manage to maintain player interest over time. The basic proposal is certainly convincing, despite numerous problems such as matchmaking, latency or netcode. The studio will therefore have to refine these elements via future patches and think about the rest of the program to motivate the troops for its new free game, including the regular infusion of new content. In any case, Xdefiant has come a long way after repeated delays and obviously numerous internal conflicts. Let’s hope that the future of this promising title, but still lacking in luster, is brighter.
