Skull and Bones, Ubisoft’s upcoming game centered around piracy on the open seas, has been delayed again. This marks the seventh time the game’s release date has been pushed, though we’re now missing an actual date, throwing extra speculation on the game’s actual status.
It would be easy to forgive ignorance about this particular game, since the last time we had much solid information about it was last year, in 2022. Towards the end of 2022, we got a deluge of Skull and Bones content, including an open beta, a gameplay reveal, system requirements, and feature sets for specific consoles. Really, the odds seemed good then that the game would be releasing that year. So it was a surprise when Ubisoft pushed the release date from November 9, 2022, to March 9, 2023. That clearly didn’t happen, and we didn’t hear much about it, until Ubisoft made it known that the release window (not date) is now "early 2024" — so anytime between January and the end of March, most likely.
To say Skull and Bones has been a millstone around Ubisoft’s neck is understating it a little. The game first surfaced at E3 in 2017. The first delay for the game took it from 2018 to sometime in 2019, with rumors saying development had been "rebooted". Delays took it from 2020, to 2021, 2022, and then to March 2023. Now, with a tentative 2024 release window, Skull and Bones’ future is looking as uncertain as it ever was.
Perhaps the worst part of all of this is how the game is looking rather, as the kids would put it, "mid". The open beta and gameplay reveal didn’t paint the game in the best light, with the game seeming quite unremarkable, all things considered. It’s also extra odd when you consider Ubisoft has since greenlit a remake of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, the gameplay of which was the spiritual basis for Skull and Bones. With Sea of Thieves having been around for quite some time now, you have to ask yourself how many pirate games the market actually needs.
Skull and Bones, if it ever releases, is due to land on PC, Playstation 5, and Xbox Series X. PS4, and Xbox One support was dropped to focus on newer platforms, and it’s entirely possible new consoles may be out by the time Ubisoft actually pushes this game out.