Ubisoft Q3 Sales Top $650 Million

Despite the rough world economy and word of layoffs and restructuring from different game companies, it looks like not everyone has been hurting after all. Reporting to investors on its third quarter earnings, Ubisoft announced that its earnings have actually gone up by about 13 percent over the same quarter last year, raking in a total of about $658 million USD in sales .

Talking to MCV about the news, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot said, “I think everyone was holding their breath a little going into the holiday season but in the end the video game industry did well, showing software sales growth in the UK of 23 per cent and consoles sales growth of 14 per cent and that is good news. At Ubisoft, we were confident that we had a line-up that offered games of quality to a diverse audience.”

The company’s solid performance was primarily credited to the success of new additions to the company’s different franchises, such as Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party, Far Cry 2, and Prince of Persia. Also, Ubi announced that Shaun White Snowboarding was the number two sports game in the United States for the quarter, with 2.3 million units selling worldwide.

The Rundown: Jan. 15, 2009

 Today we tell you about a brand new Naruto game, new DLC for Shaun White’s favorite video game, a Dakota Fanning story, Puzzle Quest’s invasion of the iPhone and some new Legends of Norrath Cards. These stories and more await in the latest edition of The Rundown.

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The Rundown: Jan. 8, 2009

EA announces a stand-alone expansion to RA3, City of Heroes is available for Mac gamers, Nyko shows off at CES, EVE Online expands, SmackDown vs. RAW 09 gets some DLC and much, much more in today’s Rundown. Right after the jump…

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Shaun White Snowboarding Gold

Shaun White Snowboarding has gone gold and will be released on multiple platforms Nov. 16, according to publisher Ubisoft. The PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Shaun White’s latest game use the Assassin’s Creed engine to provide the right balance of slick visuals and physics necessary to deliver a next-generation action sports game. Whether or not this game delivers such an experience is another matter. The new Shaun White Wii game, Shaun White Snowboarding: Road Trip, was developed from the ground up for the Wii, offering support for the Wii Balance Board to provide gamers with a more interactive snowboarding experience.

The rest of the new Shaun White games (DS, PSP, PS2) are pretty straightforward action sports offerings that don’t rely too much on technology or gimmicky peripherals… Shaun White Snowboarding for the Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, Nintendo DS, PSP, and the PlayStation 2 will be available on Nov 16.