Shuhei Yoshida on Indie Devs: Important to Support Them Because “They Make Great, Awesome Games”

SCE Worldwide Studios president Shuhei Yoshida recently answered several questions related to E3, the PlayStation 4 and other developments in the gaming industry on the official PlayStation EU Community. One of the questions inquired as to why it was important to support independent developers.

Yoshida answered it in the most obvious way possible by stating that, “Because independent developers are making great, awesome games! Their passion, creativity and energy are at an all-time high. We expect that to continue, the reason being many indie studios are not brand new to the industry; they are often very experienced and have worked on many, many games over a number of years at larger studios.

“And they might think, ‘I want to make this game, this idea, for me,’ but it can be difficult to achieve within a larger team. Because of the advances in digital platforms, now it’s possible for small teams to create games and make a success of them all over the world. That’s where the energy and some of the most exciting experiments and concepts are. Some of the best examples are last year’s award winners, Journey and The Walking Dead.

“Both were digitally distributed and were made by small development teams. They competed with games with the biggest production values and they won. It’s so important for us to be supportive of that on PS4, PlayStation 3 and PS Vita.”

Sony has been on an indie signing spree in the last few months, and it has been revealed that games like The Witness, Transistor and Oddworld: New ‘N’ Tasty (among others) will be exclusive to the PS4 platform.