As XDefiant dies, its director blames lack of marketing and Ubisoft "tech debt"

Ubisoft multiplayer FPS XDefiant, a cross-brand fusion featuring characters from Tom Clancy games, Assassin's Creed, Far Cry, and others, is no more. The Call of Duty rival has now shut its servers down, and game director Mark Rubin confirms that he's stepping away from game development to spend time with his family. In a goodbye post, the former CoD producer, whose past work includes the early Modern Warfare games that redefined the competitive shooter space, points to a lack of marketing and resources as a key reason for XDefiant's failure.

"It's a sad day for fans of XDefiant and for all of the passionate devs that worked so hard on this game," Rubin begins. Our own Jamie wrote a warm-hearted goodbye to XDefiant earlier in the week and, while I didn't play quite as much as he did, I certainly share a lot of the sentiment. At its core, Rubin's team built a satisfying multiplayer game that, when it clicked, harkened back to those glory days of old-school Call of Duty. Unfortunately, in a crowded modern market and with Black Ops 6 proving a strong entry, that wasn't enough to cling on.

"Something remarkable happened with this game in that, although we had very little marketing, we still had the fastest acquisition of players in the first few weeks for a Ubisoft title, just from you guys all talking about and promoting the game," Rubin notes. "But unfortunately, with little to no marketing, especially after launch, we weren't acquiring new players after the initial launch."

He also discusses some of the other issues faced by the studio, including "crippling tech debt using an engine that wasn't designed for what we were doing," stating that "we didn't have the engineering resources to ever correct that." This led to problems such as the unreliable netcode that would struggle on any internet connection with even a small amount of instability. Rubin says he believes in-house engines are a less valuable investment nowadays, "doomed to fall behind big engines like Unreal."

"What we saw in Season 3 wasn't even enough content in my mind for launch," Rubin adds, explaining that XDefiant struggled owing to issues with "having the right resources to make content for the game." Rubin says that features that were planned to arrive in Seasons 4 and 5 "would have completed the game in a way that I felt it should have been for launch.

"I can say everyone's heart was in the right place but we just didn't have the gas to go the distance for a free-to-play game," Rubin continues. Responding to a comment about the broken ranked mode, he simply says, "We know but didn't have the people to fix it."

Rubin delivers a heartfelt thank you to his fellow developers: "The team behind XDefiant was all let go at the end of last year and I know many people have moved on to other studios, which is great, and I hope that for all of those still looking, that they find something quickly." In particular, he praises the game's level designs, calling them "some of the best maps ever made for an arcade shooter," a sentiment I'll heartily second. If XDefiant had an ace up its sleeve, the remarkable quality and consistency among its pool of arenas was it.

In closing, Rubin says that he is leaving the industry for now in order to spend more time with his family. "I do care passionately about the shooter space and hope that someone else can pick up the flag that I was trying to carry and make games again that care about the players, treat them with respect, and listen to what they have to say. Thank you again to everyone who had so much passion for XDefiant."

Looking for something to fill the gap? Take a look through the best FPS games right now, or perhaps the best free PC games instead.

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