Assassin's Creed Valhalla is Ubisoft's Best-Selling PC Title

The great tragedy of capitalism is that success is so often divorced from morality. While it's not strictly true that bad people profit because they're bad, it's frequently the case where bad people profit in spite of their own badness. Such is the case with Ubisoft, a company that's still failed to properly repent for years of systemic abuse and harassment of its own employees, but who still managed to rake in record-breaking sales numbers on their latest Assassin's Creed title, Valhalla.

From a press release:

Today, Ubisoft® announced strong early sales for Assassin’s Creed® Valhalla, one of the highest rated games this season1. Building on favorable review scores and early player response, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla has sold through more units in its first week than any other Assassin’s Creed game sold during the same period. Assassin’s Creed Valhalla has also become the top-selling Ubisoft PC launch ever, driven by all-time record Ubisoft Store sales performance. With strong feedback from players on next-gen consoles, ACV is delivering on its promise to make the most of the new hardware.

“We are truly delighted by the enthusiastic response from players and want to thank the fans for their incredible support. Delivering this game amid a global pandemic was a true tour de force by our teams and it’s fantastic to see players enjoying the game so much,” said Julien Laferrière, producer on Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. “Launch is only the beginning and we have robust content plans for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla that will keep players immersed in their epic Viking saga for a long time to come.”

It's not altogether surprising that Assassin's Creed Valhalla is doing well, and good games deserve their credit, for the sake of everyone who worked on them. It's just unfortunate that Ubisoft's higher-ups, corrupt and complicit as they are, are going to continue getting obscenely wealthy in spite of their obvious moral inadequacies.

But that's capitalism for ya.