It’s the most wonderful time of the year. Well, in a sense. Now is when all the companies release their third quarter financial results, in case you haven’t noticed, and they do include Holiday 2009 numbers, so it’s really two-fold. Except one of those folds happens four times a year. Anyway.

Ubisoft did have a slight dip in sales (2.7% drop in year-over-year sales), but compared to the first half of the year, when they had a dip of about 20 times that, I think they’re golden, and they have Assassin’s Creed II to thank for that particular recovery.

They must realize it too, since the fourth quarter will see an Assassin’s Creed II Director’s Cut for PC. We’ll also see the release of Red Steel 2 for Wii and The Settlers 7 and Silent Hunter 5 for PC. As far as PC titles go, Ubisoft says that online services for these games both enhance gamers’ experiences and provide a good way to prevent piracy. The games that use more online services will be released in the coming months.

Ubisoft says their plan for the next year involves mainly sticking to franchise titles and hoping for stable back catalog sales. Ubisoft also plans to have several games available for the Xbox and PS3 motion control systems. Whether or not that means they’ll be available on their respective launch days, we do not yet know.

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