This week on Player Driven Live, we dug into three conversations that kept pulling us in different directions — Ubisoft's remake strategy and what it means for one of gaming's biggest franchises, whether Xbox should build an ad-supported free tier, and a May the 4th-inspired ranking of the best Star Wars games in history. We also talked indie games, Subnautica 2's questionable launch window, and why someone grinding on a souls-like after their day job reminded us both of something important about how games actually get made.
Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resync and Ubisoft's Capcom Playbook
Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resync got a release date this week — July 2026 — and Colan came in with a thesis. Ubisoft has been explicit about their strategy: they want to do what Capcom did. Go back to the catalog. Remake the classics. Rebuild gamer trust one title at a time.
The data backs it up. Assassin's Creed Valhalla sits at roughly 25 million units sold, making it the best-selling Assassin's Creed title of all time. The original Black Flag is number two. So starting the remake cycle there makes sense from a pure business standpoint.
The demand trajectory for Black Flag Resync is already outpacing both Assassin's Creed Shadows and Assassin's Creed Mirage. Colan expects it to become the most successful Assassin's Creed launch of the last five years outside of Valhalla.
Where it gets interesting is what comes next. Colan's argument: the Ezio trilogy is the obvious next move. Assassin's Creed 2, Brotherhood, and Revelations — potentially with an AC1 remake woven in to tell the full Altair-to-Ezio narrative arc. The logic is simple — the best game in the franchise is Black Flag, but the best character is Ezio. There's a lot of meat on the bone if Ubisoft commits to alternating remakes with new entries, the same way Capcom has been cycling between Resident Evil remakes and new installments.
We also talked about the July release window. Most publishers avoid summer launches, but Colan sees that as an advantage — Ubisoft has the runway to own the month with almost no major competition.
The bigger question we kept circling back to: Ubisoft has 18,000 employees globally. Something has to give. Can a remake-driven trust rebuild actually change the trajectory of a company that size, or is it a band-aid on a structural problem?
Should Xbox Build a Free Ad-Supported Tier?
This was a continuation of a conversation we started last week with Justin Maurice. Colan's position has gotten sharper — Xbox should build a free, ad-supported gaming tier, and the new CEO's background at Instacart might be exactly why she was hired to do it.
The core argument is that every major media platform that has introduced a free ad tier is now making more money per user on that tier than on their paid subscriptions. Netflix has said this publicly. Spotify operates the same way — they monetize free users better than subscribers, which is why subscription prices keep going up. The business model incentivizes pushing users toward the free tier where ad revenue exceeds subscription revenue.
Microsoft already has the infrastructure. They own a massive game catalog through Xbox Game Studios and Bethesda. They have the cloud computing backbone through Azure. And unlike Sony, Nintendo, or Valve — all of whom make money selling games and have no incentive to disrupt their own model — Xbox is in a position where the traditional approach isn't working. Hardware sales are declining. Game Pass growth has plateaued in certain markets. Something has to change.
Colan drew a direct parallel to Meta's ad business. Meta didn't become an ad powerhouse overnight. The first ads were terrible. Targeting was bad. But they kept swinging, and over time the targeting improved until Meta could serve hyper-specific ads to the long tail of small businesses — the shelf maker in South Dakota who can put a few thousand dollars into ads and see a measurable return.
Xbox would go through the same growing pains. The first ads would be poorly targeted. There would be think pieces about how bad the experience is. But the path from bad to good is well-documented across every ad-supported platform that exists today.
The counterargument we discussed: does introducing ads tarnish the Xbox brand at a time when they need to be rebuilding trust with gamers? Sony doesn't do ads. Nintendo doesn't do ads. Valve actively punishes developers who try to put ads in Steam games. Is Xbox willing to be the platform that trades prestige for reach?
Indie Spotlight: Max Mraz, Tombwater, and Midwest Games
Before we got into the bigger topics, we spent time on this week's podcast guest — Max Mraz, an engineer who signed with Midwest Games and just launched his debut title, Tombwater, on Steam.
Max's story is one we keep hearing variations of, but it doesn't get old. Full-time job during the day. Coding until three in the morning. No kids, no distractions, just building a souls-like game from scratch with his coworker. And it's getting real traction on Steam.
It reminded both of us of a familiar grind — Colan goes home and builds his newsletter, Patch Notes. Max goes home and builds a game. Different output, same energy.
We also gave a shout-out to Midwest Games and their mission of bringing game development jobs to parts of the country outside the coasts. They have roots in the Midway Games legacy and backing that includes connections to the Green Bay Packers organization. For an industry that keeps consolidating on the coasts, publishers like Midwest Games represent something worth watching.
Subnautica 2 Early Access and the May Release Window
Subnautica 2 announced early access starting May 12, dropping right into what Colan has been calling a trap set by GTA 6. The May-June window is already stacked — Forza, Bond 007, Lego Batman, and now Subnautica competing for attention in a compressed launch calendar.
We talked about whether early access gives Subnautica 2 some cover — it's technically not a full launch, which lowers the stakes. But the Crafton drama around the studio, including reports about the CEO using ChatGPT for legal arguments, adds noise to what should be a straightforward release.
The consensus: Subnautica has a dedicated fanbase and doesn't need to sell 30 million copies to be profitable. But someone in that May window is getting added to the backlog, and Lego Batman's marketing is doing it no favors.
Star Wars Gaming: A May the 4th Tier List
Since we won't be live on May the 4th, we celebrated early with a Star Wars games tier list. Greg pulled footage from eight classic titles and had Colan identify and rank each one.
The highlights from the ranking:
S-Tier: Knights of the Old Republic took the top spot without debate. Colan called it the best Star Wars game ever made, citing Revan as possibly the most beloved character in gaming who hasn't been pulled into current Star Wars canon. The RPG mechanics, the moral choice system, and the decision to set the story thousands of years before the movies gave BioWare creative freedom that no other Star Wars game has matched.
Rogue Squadron on N64 was the other clear S-tier pick. Colan put 500 hours into it as a kid. The third-person perspective — flying the ship rather than sitting in the cockpit — made it feel like playing with the toy rather than being inside the toy. That design choice separated it from the X-Wing and TIE Fighter simulator games.
A-Tier: Dark Forces 2 and TIE Fighter both landed here. Dark Forces introduced Kyle Katarn, a character who started as an imperial, became a bounty hunter, and eventually became a Jedi — all through a series of games that created lore now considered part of Star Wars' expanded universe. TIE Fighter earned its spot as one of the best flight simulators of the LucasArts era.
Jedi: Fallen Order got a modern-era shout-out as the best Star Wars game EA has produced. The introduction of BD-1 as a companion droid — one that feels original rather than an R2-D2 clone — was called out as a key reason the game works.
Notable mentions: Battlefront 2 (2005) was praised for nailing the power fantasy of being a Jedi mowing through armies. The 2017 EA version got downgraded — beautiful graphics, weaker game. Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga was flagged as the best entry point for kids getting into the franchise.
The conversation ended with what Star Wars game Colan would build if given the chance: a deep narrative-driven RPG set outside the Skywalker timeline, or a Mandalorian bounty hunter game with a skill tree built around jetpacks, flamethrowers, and wrist rockets. The fact that neither of these exists yet remains a mystery.
One thread that ran through the entire Star Wars discussion: without LucasArts and Star Wars games, the gaming industry wouldn't be where it is today. That era of game development was foundational to genres that still define how we play.
Episode One Pod Racer and the New Star Wars Racer
We also touched on the announcement of a new Star Wars racing game — Star Wars Galactic Racer — which is clearly inspired by the original Episode One Pod Racer. That N64 classic made the pod racing sequence the best thing to come out of The Phantom Menace, and the new game appears to be leaning into that legacy. Both of us are watching this one closely.
Fortnite x Star Wars: Clone Wars Content
Epic announced three new Star Wars experiences within Fortnite, including Clone Wars-themed content. For Clone Wars fans like Colan, it's a welcome addition — though he noted the lack of Clone Wars TV show merchandise remains a missed opportunity for Lucasfilm.
Player Driven Live streams every Thursday on YouTube. Join the conversation in the Player Driven Discord, and subscribe to the newsletter for weekly industry insights.
Guest: Colan Neese — Co-host of Player Driven Live, founder of Patch Notes newsletter, MindGame Data
Topics covered: Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resync, Ubisoft remake strategy, Capcom playbook, Ezio trilogy, Xbox ad-supported tier, Game Pass, free-to-play gaming, ad targeting, Meta ads, Netflix free tier, Spotify, Subnautica 2 early access, Crafton, GTA 6 release window, Midwest Games, indie game development, Tombwater, Star Wars games, Knights of the Old Republic, KOTOR, Rogue Squadron, TIE Fighter, Dark Forces, Battlefront, Jedi Fallen Order, Lego Star Wars, Pod Racer, Star Wars Galactic Racer, Fortnite Star Wars, May the 4th, LucasArts
