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Sacred Symbols+, Episode 441 | Ubisoft vs. Its Customers, Kotick vs. Kotaku, and SAG-AFTRA vs. AI (Patreon)

Published:
2025-03-22 16:00:15
Edited:
2025-03-25 16:23:44
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

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Content

Please give a warm welcome to returning guest Rick Hoeg, friend-of-the-show and lawyer extraordinaire. I (Colin) invited Hoeg back to Sacred+ for yet another chat about a series of legal and business happenings that concern our industry. For starters: What's going on with reporting around Ubisoft and Assassin's Creed Shadows, particularly in regard to protecting devs from abusive speech? Is this a way for the publisher to quell legitimate criticism, or are they pursuing a righteous path by chasing their detractors? Then: A new report indicates that Ex-Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has filed suit against gaming website Kotaku, as well as its sister property Gizmodo, with claims of defamation. Does he have any chance of winning in a court of law, or is he another example of a financial titan using his resources to crush dissent? Finally: Behemoth entertainment union SAF-AFTRA released a statement on behalf of their games clientele, noting that they're seemingly no closer to a deal with many publishers and developers on a series of AI-related issues that seriously affect voice and motion capture. Will this ever get resolved? And could an all-new multinational and multidiscipline union recently launched during GDC help ameliorate incessant labor issues?

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Comments

Tony Upstairs Lazzaro

Sweet. Always love seeing the ole ambulance chaser, hoagie boy on an episode of LSM content.

BigYoshi

Any episode with Hoeg is an instant listen

Dante B

Probably my favorite guest, great episode

Maxx Lazos

hell yeah jj barea reference. absolute Dallas Mav legend. didn’t know he and colin share an alma mater

PairOfShuse

Wouldn’t Assassins Creed Shadows need to sell like 7-8 million copies at full price to break even? I thought I heard it cost like 300 million to make and I’m not sure if that includes marketing. If that’s the case, that’s a huge uphill battle to even make somewhat of a profit. On top of that you have this whole 2 million players being announced. So tired of these numbers that mean absolutely nothing. Didn’t Veilguard use the same language and actually sold less than a million?

Connor

It definitely seems like Ubisoft is trying to do damage control with these numbers to make it seem more successful than it really is. We’ll see the actual sales is a few months

PairOfShuse

Definitely so. I honestly think the whole subscription model for gaming has done horrible damage to game sales as well as trying to find out how successful a release actually is. Frustrating coming from someone who’s followed the industry for a little more than 2 decades

Jordan Falduto

Colin, we're a public union family and pay $70 in dues, then $360 in pension contributions PER CHECK. Not all pension and union support comes from taxes. Tbh I would LOVE for you to sit down with a member of our teacher union for a Fireside Chat to just talk process and common misconceptions. I really don't think you're anti-public union. You say it all the time, a rising tide lifts all boats. It's about banding together and giving the everyman a support system to succeed. You talk class war. These unions fight to keep families in the middle class. One of your core tenants is loyalty and what you do to show that- by standing in support of and fairly financially compensating. My brother, you would be a great union rep.

Casey Cieslikowski

Why are they double dipping? Either stop taking my tax dollars or stop taking from you?

Breno Bezerra Bluhm

Veilguard used 1.4 millions players 2 months after it’s release if I remember it correctly. AC Shadows got 2 million players in 2 days. So not the same thing I guess (Ubi is probably fucked regardless tho)

PairOfShuse

This is true too. It definitely reached numbers faster than Veilguard. I wonder though if that takes into account if there are more of the Ubisoft+ accounts than EA. Granted Assassins Creed is also a bigger franchise than Dragon Age. Agreed. Most likely they are screwed. Granted I don’t really feel bad - they pretty much have done it to themselves whether it’s stagnation, going after fans, poor business decisions, or overly relying on DEI stuff. All of these most likely played a role

PairOfShuse

I just saw where you can sign up for Ubisoft+ for 15 dollars and cancel afterwards. Kinda like what Dustin did for a few game pass games

Wesali

Colin, the AC shadows reviews probably come down the the fact that Ubisoft doesn't really innovate. They make the same game over and over again ported to a different map. People are just very sick of the lack of innovation. Graphically looks amazing though, those weather effects 👀

thesonofit

@Chat: STAR WARS OUTLAWS is very good. THE DIVISION 1+2 are excellent. The SPLINTER CELL series and most of GHOST RECON are excellent. Ubi isn't all just Assassin's Creed, friends.

Michael Thew

Well that’s what unions do, they take and take and take. We got the dumbest fucking generation that we’ve had in a long time. We got kids that can’t read, write or do math. These unions protect these crap teachers that care about everything except the kids. I like how the leave no child behind rule became a parked car and because people have varying intelligence and heaven forbid we tell children the truth that some people are just better equipped for life and some aren’t. That why the 18-30 year olds can’t keep a job because this is the first time they’ve been told they are wrong and are not the smartest person in the room.

Michael Thew

Shows your ignorance, I had 3 kids finish up with school in the last 5 years, so I got about 15 years with working with you tards. Then you got the fact I graduated in 2000s before you and shit teachers like you, who cares more about getting boner pills for free than teaching these kids. We had the years where the choir sang not one Christmas song during Christmas, the Covid years where your safety, or laziness, was chosen over the wellbeing of our children. What is your experience? Oh yeah you gotta kiss that union ring, so you can work that part time job and take your summers off and every federal holiday. Keep throwing your nose up at people, all you’re doing is losing support. We got a handful of you bad actors canned and most of the school board fired, it’s just a shame that my kids had to put up with it. If the election was any indication, it’s about 15 million people that can’t stand yeah. So I hope your enjoying your week off, I gotta go some of us have to work for a living

Glen Yelenovic

It is always a pleasure to hear Hoeg!

Jordan Falduto

Your comments may have been removed but I still have them in email. I look forward to the Code of Conduct banning you.

Michael Thew

lol whatever dude, I erased it and shit ain’t happening to me because it didn’t say anything I didn’t say before. You lie to your students like you do here? Wouldn’t surprise me. I’ve said worse to people far more important than you on here. This ain’t grade school, no wonder kids don’t respect todays teachers

Michael Thew

One last thing, have the balls to tag me in your messages instead of yourself, so I don’t need to keep coming back to this tread to make sure you don’t say something stupid

Eli Aboukassam

Sports talk is always welcome, Hoeg! And I'm not just saying that because my Senators keep beating your Wings 😄

Jordan Falduto

@mudder, yes $360 pretax dollars biweekly. we're paying into a pension for the currently retired members that we'll later retrieve ourselves. you can't control how much or how little you contribute either, it's a fixed percentage. plus the $70 in dues to go to all the other costs of the union.