Talking About Indie Games At Shows No Longer Relevant, Says Sony’s Jim Ryan

Back when the PS4 was new on the market, and AAA game support for it was either far on the horizon, thanks to longer development cycles, or floundering (because this generation took a long time to get going), Sony would often trot out smaller games from independent developers during its stage shows and press conferences- the implicit implication was, these games are every bit as important as a major AAA game.

“There was a time and a place, in the early stages of the life of PS4, to make statements,” Ryan said in an interview with GamesIndustry. “It was more about making a statement that we are serious about the indies, and that we are doing this and that with the indies. No Man’s Sky and so on and so forth, which broke out from that and carved its own niche. You know, right now, we have tonnes of indie content on the platform. And the fact that we elected, along with many other things such as Gran Turismo and PlayLink, not to give it its own spot on the stage this week, in no way means it is not important, or it is not there, or we don’t worry about it. It was just good to talk about in 2013/2014. It is less relevant now. We have VR to talk about now, for example.”

He also talked about how indie game montages never actually do those games justice. “One of the things we have realized is that these video collages of ten indie games shown in a minute, is almost meaningless. Nobody can really learn anything about the games in that sort of time. It is almost viewed as wasted time,” he said.

I… don’t think his reasoning is incorrect, but I do think there was a better way to word it. As it is, given his history of poor statements, people are bound to misconstrue what he said, and then jump on it. Regardless, I understand what he is saying, but I think some people will be all too eager to ignore his intended meaning.