The decision to make Splinter Cell Conviction a 360/PC exclusive was made years ago, according to Ubisoft, who don’t seem bothered by the idea that they might be missing out on a large percentage of potential customers by making their game Microsoft-only.
When it launches later this year, Splinter Cell Conviction will be one of the rare third-party games these days that doesn’t make its way to every platform around. Ubisoft explained last week that the decision to go 360/PC only was because the series has been “historically linked with Microsoft platforms,” which was reasoning that smelled a bit fishy (if fish smelled like money).
According to Ubisoft, however, the decision to go MS-exclusive wasn’t something the company did without careful consideration. If Microsoft did buy Splinter Cell Conviction‘s exclusivity, they must have done it a long time ago. “It was a decision that we took many years ago,” Ubisoft’s Alain Corre said. “It’s been an ongoing process. For us when we decided to do that many years ago it was a logical step.”
A logical step? Maybe in the sense that it’s easier to develop a game for a single platform without a reputation for being difficult to work on, but maybe not in terms of spending tons of money making a game and then limiting your potential consumer base. Ubisoft, however, doesn’t see this as a problem. “There are also a lot of hardcore gamers who have ownership of both consoles,” Corre said. “And everyone has a PC at home. To a certain extent if players want the next Splinter Cell game they will find a way.”
Everyone does have a PC at home, but not everyone has one that can run Splinter Cell Conviction. And yes, plenty of people have both consoles, but plenty of people don’t, and I’m not sure Conviction is a system seller, impressive as it looks. Well, if you’re a PS3 owner who’s trying to “find a way” to play Conviction, the only way might be to hope and wait.
[Via GI.biz]
