Ubisoft joins the Ultra blockchain as a corporate block producer 

Blockchain company Ultra has announced that veteran video game publisher Ubisoft will be joining the platform as a corporate block producer during its testnet period.

The Ultra blockchain serves as a game distribution platform which aims to “break the market monopoly” of current game publishing systems. Ultra offers staged software download technology, which has already served over 100 million downloads worldwide.

Ultra needs to find block producers who can meet the technical demands of validating blocks on the network while also providing an ongoing commitment to growing the Ultra ecosystem.

Ubisoft is one of the largest and most well-known video game publishers in the world and is responsible for much-loved gaming franchises such as the Rayman, Assassin’s Creed, and Tom Clancy titles.

Founder and co-CEO of Ultra, Nicolas Gilot, said of the new partnership:

“Since Ubisoft is already a leader in the games industry and shows commitment to probing blockchain as a viable technology for games, we are very excited to be announcing our first cooperation of this kind with them.”

As a block producer, Ubisoft will provide the technical infrastructure required to validate transactions on the Ultra network. These transactions could include ownership transfer of digital collectible or cosmetic items, micropayments, and buying games on the platform.

Ubisoft explores blockchain

The confirmation that Ubisoft has officially entered the blockchain industry comes after months of speculation that the company was open to exploring the new technology.

In June 2019, French media reported that Ubisoft had found a blockchain solution it wanted to “put into practice”, which presumably was a reference to the Ultra blockchain.

A representative for Ubisoft at the time reached out to Coin Rivet, explaining that:

“We are aiming for a step-by-step approach with the ultimate goal to develop solutions that bring added value to players.”

Ubisoft’s partnership with Ultra would indeed bring added value to players through fairer access to in-game items and digital asset ownership.

Nicolas Pouard, blockchain initiative director for Ubisoft, confirmed Ubisoft’s commitment to players, stating:

“Our team at the Strategic Innovation Lab strongly believes that all blockchain use cases that bring value to players are important to support, and Ultra offers a solution that does just that.”

Many distributed ledger technology advocates have previously claimed that the decentralised and immutable nature of blockchain makes it a perfect innovation in the gaming space, which has traditionally faced issues with digital item ownership.