Get ready for the dawn of AAAA gaming. For years big-name publishers have proudly touted their AAA titles, but recently the use of the term "AAAA" has started to creep in. Microsoft has said their new studio The Initiative is specifically designed for AAAA development, and it seems Ubisoft has started using the term internally as well. Evidence of this comes courtesy of the LinkedIn pages of a couple Ubisoft devs, which specifically reference AAAA projects.

　　The first of these belongs to Beyond Good and Evil 2 technical art director Cyril Masquilliere, who describes the long-in-development project as a next-gen, AAAA, open universe game (thanks to Twitter user Timur222 for finding these).

　　source:https://t.co/BclnZrdPWS

　　— Timur222 (@bogorad222) September 7, 2020

　　Skull & Bones senior producer Francois Logeais also describes his game as AAAA.

　　source:https://t.co/MNVJwFIrpY

　　— Timur222 (@bogorad222) September 7, 2020

　　There are also unspecified AAAA titles in development at Ubisoft Berlin and Ubisoft Bordeaux.

　　Unsure what this is.

　　unannounced Quadruple A game at Ubisoft Berlin. pic.twitter.com/cmkLRH3r4l

　　— Timur222 (@bogorad222) September 7, 2020

　　Ubisoft Bordeaux is working on an AAAA game. pic.twitter.com/MqLKnKXEat

　　— Timur222 (@bogorad222) September 7, 2020

　　Of course, the question is, will the AAAA designation actually mean anything? Will these games be on another level in terms of scope and complexity? Or is AAAA just a marketing term designed to justify charging more for next-gen games? I’m guessing it’s mostly the latter, but I guess we won’t know until we actually play our first AAAA game. As mentioned, in addition to Ubisoft games like Beyond Good and Evil 2, Microsoft has labeled some of their upcoming titles, including Forza Motorsport 5 and whatever The Initiative is working on (strongly rumored to be a revival of the Perfect Dark franchise) as AAAA. We'll see if any other publishers join in on this.

　　What do you think? Excited about the future of AAAA gaming or is it all a cynical ploy?