This console generation has seen Sony really come into its own with its first party lineup. While PlayStation exclusives have traditionally always been strong, over the last few years, Sony’s first party lineup has found an identity for itself with single player, cinematic, narrative-driven games, which has led to great success for them, both critically and commercially. That has clearly been a conscious decision made by Sony, and it’s one that they’re going to stick with for the foreseeable future, as per PlayStation boss Shawn Layden in an interview with CNET.
When asked about the popularity of battle royale games, and how, in light of that, Sony decides what kinds of games it wants to put out, Layden said that he’s not interested in chasing trends, and that Sony would rather spend more time, money, and resources to make the kind of high quality games they have been doing, even if it leads to a lower output, as has been the case over the last few years.
“I don’t want to get into me-too,” said Layden. “I think the world’s got all the battle royale it needs right now.”
“I think we’ve done a lot over the last three or four years to get us to a place right now where we’re building fewer games per year than ever before, but we’re spending more time, more energy, certainly more money, on making them,” he continued. “So we’re striking on all the beats that we want to, and we’re getting both critical and commercial acclaim. Let’s see now what we might add to our arsenal. I’ve looked at some opportunities in the past, it’s an opportunity to look for the ones that are the best cultural fit.”
It’s hard not to agree with Sony’s mindset with approaching what games to make, especially seeing their recent track record. Over the past few years, games such as Uncharted 4, God of War, Spider-Man, and Horizon: Zero Dawn have shown us, with their critical and commercial success, that this approach is clearly working out for Sony very well, and looking at upcoming games like Death Stranding, The Last of Us: Part 2, and Ghost of Tsushima, it’s clear that this is the direction they’re going to keep heading in.
In the same interview, Layden also talked about how Sony approaches acquisitions of first party studios, as well as their decision to skip E3 this year. Read both stories through the links.
