The French video game industry giant Ubsisoft has recently announced its intent to become a force for greening the industry of video games by getting rid of physical manuals for its titles on the Sony Playstation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360 console systems. According to the company, this means that nearly 6 million paper based manuals will not need to be made which works out, by their estimations, to over 2,300 trees not needing to be cut down to manufacture the paper. Since Ubisoft are makers of such smash global hit games as Assassin’s Creed and the series of Tom Clancy games, their impact would be large and they may well trigger a tide of change in the industry, say analysts. The solution is being leveraged for press coverage and good will from gamers, but should also save the company a significant amount of money in the design, manufacturing and shipping weight which raises the price of the games, although the games are not expected to be cheaper at retail due to these cost saving measures Ubisoft is choosing to implement.
Instead, gamers will be offered what Ubisoft is referring to as “in game digital manuals” that resemble those seen on PC games right now. The first title to feature this new type of digital manual will be an upcoming skateboarding game which Ubisoft as created with Shaun White, the Olympic snowboard winner of a gold metal who is also a skateboarding enthusiast. Special light weight packaging for the discs is also set to be tried to see how gamers respond.
