Ubisoft's answer to CoD, XDefiant, had more than 1 million players take part in its beta
A strong start for the 6v6 shooter.
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It turns out that Ubisoft's next shooter, XDefiant, is doing pretty well, as more than a million players took part in the closed beta.
While the closed beta might be wrapping up today (April 23), it doesn't sound like XDefiant, a shooter previously planned to be a part of the Tom Clancy series, is doing too badly for itself. Earlier this week, the official Twitter account shared that more than one million players had taken part in the closed beta. "Thank you to all that have played the Closed Beta so far!" reads the tweet. "Your feedback is immensely helpful, and we love hearing from our over 1 Million players!"
The player count might be looking for Ubisoft's next shooter, but that doesn't mean it has what it takes to last long term. Kelsey got to go hands on with the game last week, complimenting the gun play, but felt uncertain about why exactly it would be worth going back to the game, writing, "during my time with it, I didn’t find any particular sticking point that saw me eager to return to it. It felt like just another live-service shooter, and while I can admire what Ubisoft has done with this game, I only really find myself thinking that I wish Ubisoft would do something that we haven’t already seen a dozen times before."
Billed as a fast-paced, 6v6 shooter, the game was first revealed back in 2021 following a leak and various teasers. Similarly to games like Overwatch 2 and Team Fortress 2, there are different factions that you can join that have unique skill sets, all inspired by different Ubisoft games (though most of them are still Tom Clancy games). Factions like Phantoms and Cleaners are inspired by titles like Ghost Recon and The Division respectively, but there's also the DedSec faction which quite literally brings over the hackers from Watch Dogs.
XDefiant doesn't currently have a release date, but is planned to release on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.