Splinter Cell and Rayman Legends underperform

Delays to Watch Dogs and The Crew also means financial targets revised.

During an investor's call earlier today, Ubisoft confirmed that two of this year's major releases, Splinter Cell: Blacklist and Rayman Legends, have not performed as expected, leading them to revise their financial forecasts for the year.

"As we have said we have experienced lower sales than we anticipated when we gave our targets," Ubisoft CFO Alain Martinez admitted. "Already released games such as Splinter Cell, Rayman and others."

The revised financials have also been impacted by the recently announced delays to Watch Dogs and The Crew, both of which have now slipped back into 2014.

As reported by CVG, Ubisoft attributes the below-par sales to consumer reluctance to purchase new titles in the run-up to the launch of the next-gen consoles by Microsoft and Sony. Whether or not this factor contributed to the delay of Watch Dogs and The Crew is not clear.

Initial forecasts for the 2013 fiscal year stood at $1.94 billion (£1.21 billion), but have now been revised to $1.38 billion (£862 million), with expected profit of $236 million (£147 million) now likely to end up being an $88 million (£55 million) loss.

During the investor's call Guillemot said: "The tough decisions we are taking today to fully realise the major potential of our new creations have an impact on our short-term performance. We are convinced that, longer term, they will prove to be the right decisions both in terms of satisfaction for our fans and in terms of value creation for our shareholders."