NEWS - Wednesday, April 14, 2004
America’s Army Is Coming
San Francisco, CA - April 14, 2004 - Ubisoft, one of the world’s largest video game publishers, and the U.S. Army, the world’s premier land force, announced today that they have entered into a long-term agreement to develop and publish games based on the U.S. Army’s industry leading America’s Army game. This historic agreement marks the first time that the U.S. Army has ever exclusively licensed its brand to a game maker and will dramatically expand the reach of America’s Army to the vast console game market. The partnership gives Ubisoft unprecedented behind-the-scenes access to the vast resources of the U.S. Army, to give console gamers the same realistic, action-packed, military experience players have enjoyed with the award-winning PC game. With this agreement, the Army will also exercise ongoing content review with regard to the same features of realism, character progression, and gameplay motivated by Army values that have made America’s Army one of the most popular online games in the world. "America’s Army is an excellent vehicle through which young adults can discover how Soldiers are developed and employed in the defense of freedom," said Colonel Casey Wardynski, originator and Director of the America’s Army game project. "Ubisoft has extensive experience in producing best-selling military games and we’re looking forward to getting their developers in the field with our Soldiers." "Ubisoft is in the business of delivering what the consumer wants, and consumers want officially licensed games," said Jay Cohen, Vice President of Publishing for Ubisoft Inc. "When you play a sports game you want to play the game from the official league, and now, when you play an Army action game, you’ll be able to play the undisputed leader." This agreement marks the third major announcement from Ubisoft in the past few days and fires off the defining round in the company’s quest to own the military games segment of the video game market. America’s Army, Brothers in Arms(tm) and Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon(tm) 2 are evidence of Ubisoft’s commitment to bring the gamer quality titles from every segment of the military category, from historical to near future, and aggressively position itself in the competitive military games market which accounted for 5 out of the top 10 combat franchises in 2003. PC gamers have virtually experienced life as a U.S. Soldier since July 4, 2002. Now, thanks to this agreement between Ubisoft and the U.S. Army, console gamers will be able to join the experience beginning in summer 2005. The PC version of America’s Army has consistently ranked among the most popular PC action games played online. Since its public release, more than 3.3 million players have joined America’s Army, completing more than 600 million missions logging over 60 million hours of gameplay. America’s Army is rated T for Teen. The Army will continue to develop America’s Army for the PC with free distribution to end users at local Army Recruiting stations, ROTC Detachments and Army events, and free downloaded from various partners listed on the www.americasarmy.com site.Source: http://www.ubisoft.com
