Ubisoft's Skull and Bones delayed past the holiday 2022 season

Ubisoft announced one more Skull and Bones delay, pushing the long-awaited pirate game out from its original Nov. 8, 2022, release date. The new anticipated launch is Mar. 9, 2023, barring any further development difficulties that might prompt another delay, and Ubisoft promised an open beta test period at some point before release.

“Our team is hard at work polishing and balancing the experience ahead of the worldwide launch,” Ubisoft wrote in an announcement. “As a result, we’ve made the tough decision to move our release date to March 9, 2023. We’re very eager for you all to get your hands on Skull and Bones and dive in headfirst to the dangerous and exciting world of building your own pirate empire. To give you the best possible experience we’ve decided to take a little more time to make sure we can deliver exactly that.”

Ubisoft provided no specific details about what issues warranted yet another delay, but sources familiar with the game’s development told Kotaku the team has concerns over “shallow” player progression.

Similar to Rare’s Sea of Thieves, Skull and Bones sets players loose in a pirate fantasy, encouraging them to explore the high seas, build and customize their ships, and, if they so desire, challenge other players to exhilarating naval combat.

Ubisoft has remained quiet about what else players can expect, including any kind of story or quest structure. Kotaku’s sources also said one challenge keeping the team from building a narrative or anything graphically demanding is that the game constantly has to render the ocean, which uses most of its resources and makes creating cutscenes or other demanding segments difficult.

Still, when we had the chance to go hands-on with Skull and Bones earlier in 2022, we came away impressed with its exciting naval antics.

Written by Josh Broadwell on behalf of GLHF