Ubisoft Executive to Angry Gamers:”NFTs are good for you”

During an interview with the Australian website Finder, Ubisoft executive Nicolas Pouard stated that people upset with the company’s current NFT push “don’t get it.”

Ubisoft announced immediate NFT integration back in December with their Ubisoft Quartz program. They continue to claim the technology is “energy-efficient,” even dismissively stating that “gamers really believe it’s first destroying the planet, and second just a tool for speculation.”

Pouard is adamant that everything Ubisoft is doing in the NFT space is “for them [gamers]” because the “end game is about giving players the opportunity to resell their items once they’re finished with them or they’re finished playing the game itself.” It’s a monetary game to Ubisoft, one built around investing in a new, volatile market that has drastic environmental impacts.

Pouard and Ubisoft claim the backlash from fans was “a reaction we were expecting” but they’re still “a bit frustrated.” When the interviewer mentions the upcoming (but delayed) STALKER 2: Heart of Chernobyl, who canceled their planned NFT integration. after facing massive fan backlash, Pouard waxes that “it’s saddening to see there’s still some resistance based on misunderstanding.”

Ubisoft, who are rapidly losing staff and still face accusations of workplace misconduct (among other issues), are dead set on iterating and integrating their “Digit” NFTs into their games. When asked if gamers are right or wrong about NFTs being new loot boxes or microtransactions, Pouard states that “players are always right. Because they are our players, and we love them.”