It’s been two weeks now since Ubisoft’s “quadruple-A” adventure game first set sail, and we’re already seeing a steady drop off in the number of players unlocking the Skull and Bones achievements. According to our data, the Skull and Bones player count has declined by a third since its early access launch on February 13 — it’s probably safe to say that Skull and Bones won’t be joining our list of the best Xbox games anytime soon. Skull and Bones Xbox player count sinks by 31% after just two weeksAccording to our Xbox Gameplay Chart data, which pulls information from a sample of 2.4 million random Xbox accounts, Skull and Bones had a somewhat strong launch week, ranking at 30th place on the chart (data from week ending February 19). However, since then, it seems players have slowly started abandoning ship. A full week later, we see Skull and Bones starting to take on water, slipping to 37th position in our chart and recording an 8% drop in players. In its second week since launch (which is when Skull and Bones’ first live service season began), the swashbuckling adventure game lost a further 23% of its Xbox players and dropped out of the top 40 of the chart. Since launch, Skull and Bones has seen 31% of its Xbox players turn off from the game. While it’s not uncommon for a game to lose a chunk of its players a week after release, seeing Skull and Bones’ player count drop so drastically in its second week is pretty surprising, especially as it’s a multiplayer live service title that’s playable with a Ubisoft+ subscription and also apparently a “quadruple-A” game. Considering all of this and the fact Ubisoft had an incredible 11 years to get the game right, we would expect Skull and Bones to at least challenge the top 20 of the Xbox Gameplay Chart. We can only speculate as to why so few Xbox players aren’t sticking with Skull and Bones or jumping into it. Perhaps the reason we’ve seen a decline is that players check it out in Ubisoft+ before realizing it’s not for them — we’ve seen plenty of critics and players cite boring and repetitive gameplay in their reviews. As for those unwilling to sign up for a subscription service, Skull and Bones’ $70 price tag is also likely keeping those players firmly away from the high seas.Despite what appears to be a disappointing launch for Skull and Bones, Ubisoft seems happy with the game’s performance so far, at least on the face of it. In a statement that’s likely more PR-speak than anything else, Ubisoft boasted that Skull and Bones “achieved record player engagement, with over four hours of average daily playtime, the second highest ever at Ubisoft.” While that sounds great on paper, Ubisoft hasn’t said anything about player numbers. A recent report from Insider Gaming claims that even with free trial players lumped in, Skull and Bones has less than a million players.While Skull and Bones now sits firmly outside of the top 40 of our Xbox Gameplay Chart, Ubisoft could still turn this ship around. Perhaps if Ubisoft was to slash the price of the game, or maybe even drop it into Xbox Game Pass, we would see those player numbers rise again. That’s if those Xbox players haven’t found their way back to Assassin’s Creed Black Flag.
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