Summary
FormerXDefiantexecutive producer Mark Rubin has announced he will be permanently stepping away from video game development after the first-person shooter was shut down this week. Rubin has become a household name in the gaming community after working on numerousCall of Dutytitles, but the developer says fans won’t be hearing about him making another video game again after Ubisoft opted to shut downXDefiantjust a year after its launch.
After working as an executive producer at Infinity Ward, developing variousCall of Dutytitles such as the originalModern Warfareand its 2009 sequel, Rubin joined Ubisoft in 2019 as an executive game director and producer forXDefiant.The free-to-play first-person shooter was quickly dubbed by fans as a “Call of Dutykiller,” due to its lack of skill-based matchmaking, fast gameplay, and well-thought-out map design. Unfortunately, a little over six months after its release in May 2024, Ubisoft announced that the title would be shut down. The studio continued to release its Season 3 update, butXDefiant’s servers were sadly shut down on June 4.
Mark Rubin Says Farewell to the Gaming Industry
XDefiantnow joins many other live-service titles to come and go in a flash, such asthe controversial PS5 exclusiveConcord, which shut down in September after just two weeks. Unfortunately, many of these shutdowns also come with studio closures and layoffs, which have been no different in the case ofXDefiant. The entire team behind the shooter was let go last year, but the game’s executive producer Mark Rubin says he won’t be returning to the industry. In a lengthy post on Twitter, Rubin said he hopes his ex-colleagues find new positions quickly, but then revealed that he has decided to spend more time with his family. “Unfortunately, you won’t be hearing about me making another game,” Rubin said.
The former developer also touched upon whyXDefiantturned into another failure for Ubisoft, stating that the shooter had “little to no marketing, especially after launch.” Rubin went on to explain how the studio also “had crippling tech debt using an engine that wasn’t designed for what we were doing,” which resulted in “dreaded netcode issues” that the studio could not solve due to the architecture it was working with. However, the executive producer believes that the shooter “made a decent impact in the space,” as there were lots of reactions from other games within the genre that saw whatXDefiantwas doing. Although Rubin didn’t specify, one thingXDefiantwas heavily praised for was its lack of skill-based matchmaking in casual modes, somethingCall of Dutyfans have often begged for.
Despite the impending shutdown,XDefiantstill launched its Season 3 updatein December 2024, which came with a metric ton of new multiplayer maps, factions, and more. But despite the fact that the new season was filled with content for players to check out, Rubin says it wasn’t enough. He went on to explain that the studio had “some really cool features” in the pipeline for Season 4 or 5 that “would have completed the game” in a way that it “should have been for launch.” Rubin ended his post by stating that he “cares passionately” about the shooter space and hopes that somebody else will one day pick up the flag that he was trying to carry and “make games again that care about the players, treat them with respect, and listen to what they have to say.”
