Former XDefiant Producer Denies the Failed Arena Shooter Started as a Splinter Cell Title

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While many of Ubisoft’s online games haven’t lasted, XDefiant was the most recent failure. Although it started out fairly well, the free-to-play shooting game was closed down last June, and the game’s lead producer, Mark Rubin, has since retired.

It’s clear the publisher aimed to rival Call of Duty, but according to a Bloomberg report by Jason Schreier, XDefiant actually started as a different project. Originally, the team, led by Nick Herman (who later co-founded AdHoc Studio and worked on Dispatch), was developing a Splinter Cell game. They tried to shift it into a live-service game, but it didn’t come together, leading them to create XDefiant instead.

Rubin has denied the rumors. He explained that when he joined Ubisoft, the company had already been developing a challenging game for a year, but it wasn’t coming together well. Importantly, he clarified that this game wasn’t a Splinter Cell title. He ultimately canceled that project and encouraged the team to propose new ideas.

Although the team considered a few different ideas, they ultimately decided to create an arena shooter. The game, XDefiant, wasn’t a result of abandoning the Splinter Cell series – we quickly discovered what made XDefiant enjoyable. While discussions about potentially working on Splinter Cell may have happened before I joined the team, it wasn’t a project we actively pursued during my time there. I found that Ubisoft generally supports the creative direction of its studios, which is positive, but I wish we had been able to use game engines from outside the company.

According to Schreier, work on a potential new Splinter Cell game began in 2017, with Rubin joining the team in 2019. However, Rubin clarified that during his time at Ubisoft, the San Francisco team was never developing Splinter Cell, and the project wasn’t canceled to make way for XDefiant. He disputes the implication in a recent article that Splinter Cell was canceled in favor of XDefiant, stating that this is inaccurate, though he acknowledges this may not have been the author’s intention. He simply wants to set the record straight.

It’s possible a new Splinter Cell game was planned but cancelled, while XDefiant was developed as a separate project and received more support. Even if XDefiant borrowed ideas from the cancelled Splinter Cell game, it doesn’t matter now, as that original game is no longer being made.

Ubisoft is working on a remake of the original Splinter Cell, but they haven’t announced when it will be released or shown any footage of how it will play.

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2025-11-16 21:11