Ubisoft brings Playboy to Europe

Ubisoft has signed on with American publisher ARUSH Entertainment to bring Playboy: The Mansion to European PCs and two major consoles (PS2 and Xbox presumably) in autumn 2004.

The game, unveiled last December (Christ, was it really that long ago?) gives gamers a chance to do Hugh Hefner's job, building Playboy Magazine and the associated Mansion into "dynamic cultural icons".

With 15 million readers worldwide, and plenty of those smutty folks located in Europe, Playboy: The Mansion is bound to find a big audience whenever and wherever it appears.

Ubisoft's MD for Europe/Asia Pacific/South America Allain Corre doesn't exactly dwell on the content in his statement, preferring instead to describe Playboy as "a magical icon franchise that tends to put a smile on the face of most of our videogame target audience." Fair enough. Let's hope it fares better than other recent flesh feasts Lula, Beach Life and Dead or Alive Volleyball, all of which tanked badly.