Details first emerged courtesy of former employee Michael Anthony on LinkedIn, who said, “I hear that a lot of previous Deviation Games employees have set up their own studio at Sony working on an undisclosed new IP.

“All the people I see working there that have signed up are top-class developers and hope that you can create a top-class new IP with your studio that hopefully gives you all the time you need to create a quality product and not have to deal with red tape from previous projects.”

It’s worth noting that another former employee, JC Farmer, tweeted last December about becoming a Junior Game Designer at PlayStation Studios while working for Blundell. Note that this doesn’t necessarily indicate the same studio Anthony has described (but it’s far from a coincidence). The date of its establishment is unknown, but its new IP could be in the early stages of development.

A potential reveal anytime soon, like the PlayStation Showcase rumored for this month, is thus unlikely. Deviation’s last project was exclusive to PlayStation, and while details are scant, Blundell’s experience on the Call of Duty franchise suggests a shooter. Whether the new project follows that same direction remains to be seen, so stay tuned for more updates in the future.

https://twitter.com/JCbackfire/status/1736852589927702938

At the time of writing, senior character artist Alec Hunstad and lead user interface engineer Andrew Carrol at Deviation Games have revealed that they are currently looking for other employment opportunities owing to the closure of the studio.

“After the closure of Deviation Games last Friday, I’m actively seeking Senior Character Artist roles,” wrote Hunstad on LinkedIn. “Looking forward to landing somewhere awesome.”

“After the closure of Deviation Games last Friday, I find myself open to new opportunities again,” wrote Carroll. “I am especially sad as I had just joined the team and they are a fantastic group of individuals. Our time together was far too short.”

Deviation Games has seen quite a tumultuous time since it was originally unveiled back in 2021. Among other things, co-founder of the studio, Jason Blundell, left back in 2022. Reports from May 2023, however, went on to indicate that the studio’s major title—a live service title being developed for the PS5—had been cancelled.

The studio has also seen other problems, including layoffs last year.

Now, it’s also been claimed that the developer’s debut PS5 title has been cancelled. On his Sacred Symbols podcast, journalist Colin Moriarty said that he’d heard about the layoffs at Deviation Games before information on the same became public, and that according to the same source, the developer’s PS5 game has also been cancelled. This aligns with what recent leaks have claimed as well.

Moriarty says that though it’s possible Deviation manages to survive and moves on to a second project, the funding agreement and partnership with PlayStation seems to no longer be on the table.

In January last year, Deviation Games announced that it had opened a second studio in Canada as it looked to ramp up production on its debut project. Later in the year, however, it was claimed the co-founder Jason Blundell had departed from the company.

As spotted by @bogorad222 on Twitter, the LinkedIn profile of Shaun Edwardes – who was Chief Operation Officer at Deviation Games from 2019 to 2021 – claims that the studio’s PS5 title had a budget of over $50 million. Of course, while that does seem fairly modest in comparison to the exorbitant money that gets spent on AAA development these days, it’s still a sizeable figure.

Interestingly, bogorad222 also claims that the project has been cancelled altogether, saying in a follow-up tweet that an unnamed Deviation employee accidentally let slip to him that Sony had cancelled the project “probably” due to “cost cutting”. While that’s best taken with a grain of salt until official details emerge, it’s worth noting that Deviation Games was recently with layoffs.

Deviation Games was one of several independent AAA studios that have partnered with Sony in recent years to work on PS5-exclusive live service titles, alongside the likes of Haven Studios and Firewalk. Unlike Deviation, however, the latter two have both been acquired by Sony.

In January last year, Deviation Games confirmed that it had opened a second studio in Canada. Later in the year, it was announced that co-founder Jason Blundell, who was also directing the developer’s debut project, had left the company.

Budget in excess of $50 million for the Deviation Games game? pic.twitter.com/BgSsJSeyJ1

— Timur222 (@bogorad222) May 13, 2023

He confirmed it by accident
Question: Do you know why Sony canceled your project?
Answer:I’m really not sure, other than probably cost cutting.

— Timur222 (@bogorad222) May 13, 2023

Deviation Games was originally unveiled back in 2021. Founded by former Treyarch developers Dave Anthony and Jason Blundell, the studio is said to be working on a new game in a partnership with PlayStation. Deviation Games hasn’t made any statements regarding the layoffs at the time of publishing.

In the midst of its development of a still-unannounced game, Deviation Games had opened a new studio back in 2022. Later that year, however, the studio had announced that one of its founding members—Jason Blundell—had left Deviation Games, with Dave Anthony taking the reins as the game director for its debut project, alongside leading the studio as its CEO.

Deviation Games is yet to make any announcement about its upcoming project as of yet, but considering the studio’s partnership with PlayStation, it is likely that its debut release will be coming to the PS5 on launch.

Taking to Twitter, Deviation Games recently announced that with Blundell’s departure, Anthony will continue to lead the studio as its CEO, while he has “also assumed the role of Game Director this past year” for the developer’s debut project.

Meanwhile, Deviation Games has also made a few key recruitments in several areas, including Westwood Studios co-founder Louis Castle, who joins as the Senior Vice President of Development. Meanwhile, God of War developers Jonathan Hawkins and Dean Rymer and Call of Duty: Black Ops developer Tony Flame have also joined the team.

Deviation Games has partnered with PlayStation Studios and is currently working on a new AAA IP, which will release exclusively for PS5. Details on the game have remained scant, but reports have suggested that it’ll be a multiplayer title with live service elements.

Earlier this year, Deviation Games opened a second studio in Canada. Read more on that through here.

pic.twitter.com/b8YPAzY13V

— Deviation Games (@DeviationGames) September 8, 2022

Recently, Deviation Games announced over on LinkedIn that it had opened up a second studio. The new studio, based in Canada, is apparently an initiative that the developer has been working on “for several months” now, and is hiring in a number of positions.

When Deviation Games was first unveiled last year, it was confirmed that the studio would be working on a new AAA first person shooter IP exclusively for the PS5, in partnership with PlayStation. Last month, co-founder Jason Blundell said that the game would enter full production in 2022. Read more on that through here.

In a video recently uploaded on Deviation Games’ official YouTube channel, the aforementioned Jason Blundell provided an update on the state of the studio and what lies ahead for it. With the studio now employing over 100 people and having been in pre-production for a while, Blundell confirms that the project will enter full production in 2022. With this game, which is seemingly going to be a first person shooter, Deviation Games seems to be focusing a lot on innovation and on finding “the marriage between game design and storytelling.”

Given the fact that the game’s only going to enter full production in the near future, we can probably assume that it’s still a ways off yet, which means it’s going to be a while before we get any concrete details about it. That said, hopefully Deviation Games will provide another similar update in the future to talk more about the project and how it’s shaping up.

While details on what the game is going to be scarce right now, the team of over 100 developers certainly has lofty ambitions.

“While I can confirm development is already underway, it’s really early for us to be going into specific details,” writes Blundell in an update on the PlayStation Blog. “We’re drawing on what we’ve learned over our collective decades making games, but we’re also out to make something fresh and brimming with innovation like you’ve never experienced before. We’re not afraid to say that our ambitions are super high: we’re setting out to make a huge, content-rich game with a focus on a lot of action and a lot of energy, but let’s leave it at that for now and hopefully it won’t be long before we can share more.”

This has certainly become a recent trend with PlayStation- Deviation Games is not the first newly established independent developer to have partnered with PlayStation on a new AAA IP. Haven Studios and Firewalk Studios have also been confirmed to be working with Sony.

All in all, PlayStation is currently working on over 25 games, nearly half of which are new IPs.