Turning Ghost Recon, a supposedly tactical shooter franchise, into a free-to-play battle royale may not have been a good idea.

We’re not kidding when we say that Ghost Recon fans have taken kindly to the French publisher’s plan. The announcement trailer uploaded to YouTube has around 4900 likes, which is already low by default, especially compared to 17,000 dislikes. There has also been outrage on social media because Ghost Recon is not a battle royale that comes to mind.

No wonder what Ubisoft announced yesterday on Twitter came without surprise: “We have decided it is best to postpone the Closed Test for Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Frontline. The development team is dedicated to creating the best experience possible. We’ll share details on the new date for the Closed Test as soon as we can. Thank you for your ongoing support”, and then curtains down.

In this case, it is perhaps not too critical to think that there was not much interest in the game. The like-dislike ratio already showed that the reception was… quite hostile, and the number of sign-ups was not what Yves Guillemot would have expected, and instead, Ubisoft decided to go “to hell with it all”. (There have been examples of this before: the original version of Splinter Cell: Conviction, leaked in 2006 and released in 2007, had a kind of homeless look for Sam Fisher, and then the 2010 version didn’t have it anymore.)

What can be said after that? Maybe that Ubisoft didn’t realize what the fans wanted. Splinter Cell already had Sam Fisher appear… but as a mobile game, even though the Guillemot has been saying for years that they haven’t forgotten about good old Sam. Perhaps that Ubisoft doesn’t realize what the real need is.

Source: WCCFTech