Thanks to an unbelievable slip-up/not-so-subtle joke from the creative director on the project, it appears a new Splinter Cell may be on its way, with an official announcement at E3 this year.
According to Julian Gerighty, Creative Director at Ubisoft, a new entry in the Splinter Cell franchise is on its way. How was it announced? By a random tweet, of course.
https://twitter.com/jgerighty/status/1128395675329335296
Gerighty then promptly followed this tweet with “Ok – plz don’t retweet. I may be in trouble.”, as well as a direct message from Ubisoft’s marketing director:
https://twitter.com/jgerighty/status/1128408804134195202
In response to the viral tweet, Gerighty also briefly changed his Twitter profile picture to the iconic Sam Fisher NVGs, as well as the Splinter Cell logo for his Twitter banner. That probably didn’t fly so well with Ubisoft, and moments later Gerighty’s Twitter profile and banner images were changed back to logos of The Division 2.
Ubisoft has since put out an official statement disclaiming the tweet as just a joke between Ubisoft’s Creative Directors (Gerighty, Dan Hay and Roman Campos Oriola):
“Julian was obviously joking as Julian likes to do. It looks like our creative directors are having fun right now. We do not have any announcements to make at this time.”
Whether or not this is a joke or a PR play is up for discussion, but to even witness mention of Splinter Cell from Ubisoft at all is a great sign. The last mainline Splinter Cell title came out in 2013 with Splinter Cell: Blacklist. Since then, the series itself has gone relatively quiet.
Despite the franchise’s silence, the iconic Splinter Cell hero “Sam Fisher” has been referenced and made cameos in multiple other Ubisoft games throughout the years since. Most notably, Fisher shows up in a bonus limited-time mission in Ghost Recon Wildlands as an extra character.
Ubisoft has been no stranger to accidental leaks and rumors this year. Numerous rumors and leaks for Ubisoft’s other major franchise, Assassin’s Creed, have come out citing all sorts of setting, plot and gameplay details.
