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Davide Soliani, who spearheaded the successful Mario + Rabbids series of games, has left Ubisoft after 25 years.
In a social media post, the former Ubisoft Milan creative director said he had left the company “to embark on a new adventure,” but failed to say what’s next.
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle is an enormously successful Nintendo Switch exclusive that fused Nintendo's Mario and Ubisoft's Rabbids franchises in turn-based tactics gameplay. The 2017 game would eventually be played by over 10 million people, Ubisoft said.
Kingdom Battle’s successor, fellow Switch exclusive Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope, performed less well upon its 2022 launch. Ubisoft boss Yves Guillemot later revealed his regret at launching the game on the Switch instead of holding it back for the console’s successor, saying Sparks of Hope would have likely performed better if it had not released on the same platform as the first game, given they offer similar gameplay experiences.
"We had already released a Mario Rabbids game [on Switch], so by doing another we had two similar experiences on one machine," Guillemot told GI.biz.
"On Nintendo, games like this never die. There are 25 Mario games on Switch. Nintendo [has advised] that it's better to do one iteration on each machine," Guillemot continued. "We were a bit too early, we should have waited for [the next console].
"Because you could play a great game. And we think it will last for 10 years, because we will update it for the new machine that will come in the future."
Ubisoft Milan, which is currently supporting the development of other Ubisoft games, such as Massive Entertainment’s Star Wars: Outlaws, waved goodbye to Soliani in a series of tweets.
Source - IGN & Twitter.
In a social media post, the former Ubisoft Milan creative director said he had left the company “to embark on a new adventure,” but failed to say what’s next.
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle is an enormously successful Nintendo Switch exclusive that fused Nintendo's Mario and Ubisoft's Rabbids franchises in turn-based tactics gameplay. The 2017 game would eventually be played by over 10 million people, Ubisoft said.
Kingdom Battle’s successor, fellow Switch exclusive Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope, performed less well upon its 2022 launch. Ubisoft boss Yves Guillemot later revealed his regret at launching the game on the Switch instead of holding it back for the console’s successor, saying Sparks of Hope would have likely performed better if it had not released on the same platform as the first game, given they offer similar gameplay experiences.
"We had already released a Mario Rabbids game [on Switch], so by doing another we had two similar experiences on one machine," Guillemot told GI.biz.
"On Nintendo, games like this never die. There are 25 Mario games on Switch. Nintendo [has advised] that it's better to do one iteration on each machine," Guillemot continued. "We were a bit too early, we should have waited for [the next console].
"Because you could play a great game. And we think it will last for 10 years, because we will update it for the new machine that will come in the future."
Ubisoft Milan, which is currently supporting the development of other Ubisoft games, such as Massive Entertainment’s Star Wars: Outlaws, waved goodbye to Soliani in a series of tweets.
Source - IGN & Twitter.
