Ubisoft insists XDefiant is "absolutely not dying," despite 94% Xbox player count loss

Following reports of low player counts, Ubisoft says its free-to-play first-person shooter XDefiant is "absolutely not dying" and is "doing well."

Sean Carey

Published 18 Sep 2024

People are apparently still gunning down those grindy XDefiant achievements, as developer Ubisoft has denied reports that the XDefiant is dying. In fact, executive producer Mark Rubin says the free Xbox game is "doing well" and that Ubisoft is fully behind the game.

XDefiant is "doing well," says executive producer Mark Rubin

In a blog post detailing XDefiant's Year 1 roadmap, executive Mark Rubin discusses how Ubisoft is working to improve the game's hit registration, which has been an issue since launch, and details what new content is coming to the shooter in upcoming seasons. However, the blog post also goes on to dismiss claims that XDefiant is in trouble. In August, a report from Insider Gaming claimed that XDefiant was on "borrowed time" because the shooter is apparently struggling to obtain 20,000 concurrent players across all platforms. While not specifically addressing the report, Rubin did comment on the state of the game, saying the shooter is doing just fine.

"I just want to quickly address the status of the game. i.e., is the game dying?" Rubin said. "No, the game is absolutely not dying. We know there are things we need to improve like Netcode/Hitreg and adding more content to progression, but the game is doing well."

"We just want it to do better. And we do that by addressing the concerns of our community which has always been the plan. Ubisoft is very much behind us and has allocated more resources to the team in order for us to do that."

While Rubin says XDefiant is "doing well," our Xbox Gameplay Chart data (via Game Insights), which pulls information from a sample of 2.4 million random Xbox accounts, shows that XDefiant has dropped a significant amount of players since its launch in May. In its first week, XDefiant made an impressive Gameplay Chart debut in 5th place and then climbed to 4th position the following week. The first-person shooter then spent 12 weeks slowly slipping its way down the table before exiting the top 40. From that second-week high, the XDefiant Xbox player count has dropped an incredible 94%, and the shooter now sits in 81st place in our latest chart. Nearly all games drop players over time, but the likes of other free-to-play multiplayer titles, such as Apex Legends and Overwatch 2, have managed to retain consistent and significant Xbox player counts, which means they regularly feature in our chart week in, week out. Ubisoft would have definitely wanted the same for XDefiant here.

The blog post details a whole bunch of content coming to XDefiant in upcoming seasons, including multiple new factions, maps, modes, and weapons, so it seems that the shooter has a bright future ahead. With the launch of Season 2, which Ubisoft will reveal soon, hopefully, we'll see XDefiant back in the top 40 of our Gameplay Chart once more.

If you're an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscriber, don't forget you can claim a bunch of XDefiant cosmetics with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Perks.

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Written by Sean Carey

A big fan of Xbox achievements, Sean has committed to playing as many of the best RPGs, racing games, and first-person shooters on and off Xbox Game Pass as possible. Before joining TrueAchievements, Sean earned a degree in journalism from Solent University.