The world in Ghosts of Tsushima is memorizing, full of beauty and wonder. Just how big is the open world going to be?

We can’t talk about numbers. You have a set of expectations about how big the world is, and those will be met. This will be more of a sort of inside-baseball answer: it’s easy to make the game too big. But the real measure of a game world from my point of view isn’t how big it is, how many square kilometers it is, rather how long it takes you to walk across it. When you walk from one end of Tsushima island to the other you’re going to feel like it was epic.

"It’s up to you, really, as a player. It’s an open world game, you can choose your path."

In the trailer we saw Jin Sakai, the main protagonist getting into a brawl with a lot of enemies and then his friend at the end. Then we learned that was only a side mission in the game and not part of the main story line. So besides the main story and side quests what else is there to do?

All kinds of stuff. I think the way to think about that – because I’m not going to answer it, really – is that it’s a game about being a samurai, right? The reason that it is, is that that is such a powerful fantasy that I can tell you, ‘Okay, you’re going to be a samurai,’ and you immediately start thinking of things that you wanted to do.

And if you can think of something that you’d want to be able to do as a samurai, I guarantee you that we’ve tried to figure out how to fit it into the game. And as time goes on we’ll be showing more of that stuff. But we’ve got to keep some secrets, right? You want to be surprised when you play the game. You don’t wanna know everything.

During the demo there was definitely a lot of back and forth between stealth and combat. What exactly is the key for the balance between stealth and combat?

It’s up to you, really, as a player. It’s an open world game, you can choose your path. The game has to work well for people with different play styles. They’re looking for different things in the game, we have to give it to them. There are people that have a pure samurai-style: where you walk into the door and say, “come at me.” And we have people that want to play pure ghost, where they don’t want anyone to see them around.

There are things in the game that happen, situation you find yourself in that really are steering you towards one style or the other. But you definitely have a different balance from player to player. So it’s really up to you.

"When you walk from one end of Tsushima island to the other you’re going to feel like it was epic."

The combat in the demo was brilliant and well designed. It was hard to tell without any sort of HUD on the screen if the game uses buttons commands, or if it’s purely just hack ‘n slash. So how does combat work, exactly? Is it just hack ‘n slash, or do you need a lot of skill?

If it were hack ‘n slash, [the live-demo player] wouldn’t be nervously practicing before every demo,” Zimmerman said. “It’s a brawler. It’s skill [based] in a bunch of different directions. The heart of the game is…[in the demo] you’ve seen three guys, getting into a fight with them, and knowing that you’re in danger, knowing that you have to be on top of your game fighting three guys. It’s really out of the ordinary if you think about it. You have lots of games where fighting one guy is hard, and then you have lots of games where fighting 20 guys is hard. But three ends up being an interesting number, it gives the game sort of a fresh feel.

Which is why this year is so curious for the company- Sony has, apparently, shown us their hand for this E3 entirely. They have very explicitly confirmed that they will be focusing on only four first party games – The Last of Us Part 2, Death Stranding, Ghosts of Tsushima, and Spider-Man– which means that we probably can’t expect a surprise announcement for something like Bloodborne 2 from their show. They have also confirmed that there will be “no new hardware” announcements, so we can’t even count on a PS5 or “PS4 Super Pro” announcement to keep us excited.

"This is a company that has mastered the art of surprising its fans- going all the way back to the shock announcement that the PlayStation will be $299 against an expected $399 price, back in 1994, to now. Surely they will still manage to delight us as they always have, right?"

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So how does Sony surprise us this year? Bear in mind, this is a company that has mastered the art of surprising its fans- going all the way back to the shock announcement that the PlayStation will be $299 against an expected $399 price, back in 1994, to now. Surely they will still manage to delight us as they always have, right?

The good news is, they probably will- and that doesn’t mean that they lied to us. No, it just means we can expect other kinds of surprises. Here are a few ways Sony can pull the rugs from under our collective feet during their E3 show this year.

THIRD PARTY GAMES, OBVIOUSLY

So let’s start with the obvious one- while Sony themselves will be focusing only on the four games named above, they also confirmed that third party and indie games will still get the spotlight at their show. So- new third party game announcements at the Sony E3 show could still be a major source of excitement. Whether it is our first look at the Resident Evil 2 Remake, or maybe Rockstar bringing back, almost a decade after its first announcement, Agent, there are a lot of third party games that could still do the job that Sony’s own first party announcements otherwise would.

"If Red Dead Redemption 2 is to be at E3, it will be at Sony’s show, given Rockstar’s marketing deal- so, again, seeing the world premiere of gameplay footage for that game would probably be enough to win crowds over once and for all."

For instance, there is a large chance that Shadows Die Twice, From Software’s new game, is probably multiplatform- but given the developer’s affinity with Sony, it will probably get a proper reveal at Sony’s show. That in and of itself will be a major source of hype and excitement for many. If Red Dead Redemption 2 is to be at E3, it will be at Sony’s show, given Rockstar’s marketing deal- so, again, seeing the world premiere of gameplay footage for that game would probably be enough to win crowds over once and for all. What I am saying is, third party game announcements and footage can still be plenty exciting- and depending on which ones Sony has on stage for its show, they could still add a dose of unexpected delight to proceedings for them this year.

GAMEPLAY FOOTAGE FOR THEIR OWN GAMES

So, Sony is bringing four games to E3 this year- Ghosts of Tsushima, Spider-Man, The Last of Us Part 2, and Death Stranding. Do you want to know what is interesting about them? Barring Spider-Man, we have not seen a single second of gameplay footage for any of those games. So just seeing how the long awaited sequel to Naughty Dog’s seminal The Last of Us, which is one of the greatest games of all time, might play is going to be extremely exciting- provided the gameplay itself lives up to player expectations, which it likely will. And even more than that? Death Stranding is the first non-Metal Gear game renowned auteur Hideo Kojima has made in a very long time- seeing what he does when he has carte blanche on game budget and resources, and freed from the shackles of that franchise, is plenty exciting in and of itself. That alone would probably get more people hyped than anything most other companies can muster.

"Death Stranding is the first non-Metal Gear game renowned auteur Hideo Kojima has made in a very long time- seeing what he does when he has carte blanche on game budget and resources, and freed from the shackles of that franchise, is plenty exciting in and of itself. That alone would probably get more people hyped than anything most other companies can muster."

Throw in gameplay footage for Ghosts of Tsushima, which is likely to at least be good (when was the last time Sucker Punch made a bad game?) and Spider-Man, which is looking set to be one of the highest selling games of the year, and Sony has plenty of ammo to generate hype even without new announcements.

PS4 PRICE CUT

This one is a pie in the sky sort of dream, but- the PS4 is now in the final stage of its life. It is still selling exceptionally well, far better than consoles do in their fifth year on the market. Wouldn’t it, then, be surprising if Sony were to permanently drop the price of the machine? It currently costs $299- would it not generate a lot of excitement if the console was dropped to $199 by itself, and $249 bundled with a game? Mind you, Sony actually did this for a limited time last year- in November, the price of the PS4 was dropped to $199, causing mass sellouts in the console’s fourth year on the market, and without any major new game release (except Gran Turismo Sport). PS4 ended up running circles around the competition that month- Sony could push the PS4’s sales pace beyond anything seen in the console market before, and also pick up a lot of gamers with a low price like that- hell, they can also use that chance to lower the price of the PS4 Pro, and boost adoption rates for that console, too.

"PS4 currently costs $299- would it not generate a lot of excitement if the console was dropped to $199 by itself, and $249 bundled with a game? "

It is very unlikely that either of this will happen- but if it did, I like to believe it would be the announcement that cements Sony’s domination of the console market for the rest of the year.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to GamingBolt as an organization.

But there is also the consideration of why Sony has chosen to show these four games and not necessarily have any of the kind of megaton announcements that they have come to be known for at this point. There can be several reasons for this. One of the reasons is that, after years of showing games off way too early, leading to long waits for them to come out (such as The Last Guardian and Gran Turismo 5), they have finally take the message to heart and decided to show only games close to release off. Indeed, this is something they explicitly admitted to last year during E3 as well.

The other, and at least equally, if not more so, likely reason is that a lot of Sony’s studios are currently working on games that cannot be revealed- because they are PS5 games, and PS5 itself hasn’t been revealed yet.

"The other, and at least equally, if not more so, likely reason is that a lot of Sony’s studios are currently working on games that cannot be revealed- because they are PS5 games, and PS5 itself hasn’t been revealed yet."

Look, the PS4 is going to be five years old this year, and a PS5 is on the horizon. Even if it is a year and a half or two down the line (which is the latest we can reasonably expect it to come out), games themselves take a very long time to develop now- the development cycle for Horizon and God of War was almost five years each, as an example. This means that as long as Sony wants the early years of the PS5 to have any games at all, their developers need to have started working on them already- or the PS5’s early years will be barer than the PS4’s and PS3’s were.

If most of Sony’s developers and partners are working on PS5 games- the PS5 itself was cleverly alluded to by Sony, when they said they would “not announce any new hardware” this E3- then their games simply cannot be revealed, for multiple reasons. For starters, Sony stands to give away the capabilities of the PS5 by showing off its games before it itself has been revealed. Secondly, it is important to remember that console development itself is always in flux- making any promises about an upcoming, unannounced console, even implied ones, is a very bad idea.

If Sony can’t announce any new games, then, there are little options left for them other than to double down on the games that they have already announced. On that front, Sony’s diligence is beginning to pay off. One of the reasons they have major games coming up for their existing console, even as most of their developers transition to their new one, is because of how many studios Sony has, and how much it invests i first party development- Microsoft, for instance, would have (and has, with Xbox and Xbox 360, both) phased out its support for its existing console entirely in preparation for its upcoming one. Sony, on the other hand, has what might be some of their biggest published games in history – The Last of Us Part 2 and Death Stranding – still due out for the PS4, presumably intended to give the console a nice send off, like how the original Last of Us was used to sunset the PS3.

"It helps that these four games are among the most hyped upcoming ones- The Last of Us 2 is the sequel to one of the most beloved games of all time, Death Stranding is a brand new, no holds barred IP from one of the most respected developers ever, and Spider-Man is going to give us a big budget adaptation of the world’s most beloved superhero."

It helps that these four games are among the most hyped upcoming ones- The Last of Us 2 is the sequel to one of the most beloved games of all time, Death Stranding is a brand new, no holds barred IP from one of the most respected developers ever, and Spider-Man is going to give us a big budget adaptation of the world’s most beloved superhero. Showing these games off for 10-15 minutes each already generates a lot of hype and goodwill. Sony fans needn’t worry, it is clear their E3 this year will be great.

It is also clear that Sony themselves have transitioned into the final part of the PS4’s life now. Presumably, no more major announcements for the console are coming, at least not from Sony themselves. And that’s fine. Between these four games, as well as Days Gone and Dreams, both of which are also major upcoming games for the system, but (likely) neither of which are going to be shown at E3 (maybe being saved for Paris Games Week or PlayStation Experience?), there are enough upcoming major exclusives that even then, Sony will be able to keep the PS4’s relentless lineup of enviable exclusives going, leading right into the PS5.

But all of that happens in the future- for now, we should look forward to the next month, when not only do we get to see more of Spider-Man, but also the first gameplay footage ever for Ghosts of Tsushima, Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding, and of course, The Last of Us Part 2– many would contend that those latter two, alone, would win Sony E3 by themselves. And really, would those people be wrong in claiming so?

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to GamingBolt as an organization.

2018… that’s this year. While it is important and responsible to note that the writer is only speculating when he says it could launch in 2018 (which means you need to separate the speculation from the hard facts in the report, which are likely to be correct—not only do they sound correct, but Semi Accurate has a history of getting this kind of thing right in the past), the question of a 2018 release is fascinating nonetheless. Could Sony be launching their new console this year? Could the next generation truly be upon us already? Is the PS5 literally just around the corner?

Now, the answer to all those questions is—no. The PS5 is undoubtedly coming soon, and a 2019 release doesn’t seem out of the question (in fact, I would put my money on it happening), but a 2018 release seems unlikely for a whole host of reasons. The technology that would be needed for a substantial and appreciable leap over the PS4 and PS4 Pro simply isn’t available at mass market viable prices for now, and you would think that with a new console on the horizon, Sony would want to start drumming up the hype already.

"Now, the answer to all those questions is—no. The PS5 is undoubtedly coming soon, and a 2019 release doesn’t seem out of the question (in fact, I would put my money on it happening), but a 2018 release seems unlikely for a whole host of reasons."

Those are valid reasons to not necessarily believe that a PS5 is coming this year. But there have been additional reasons I have seen people bring up in their dismissal of the notion, which are the ones I want to tackle now. For instance, people argue, why would Sony want to launch a PS5 right now when the PS4 is already doing so well? Why would they want to cap it off when it still has a few years left in it?

I’m not even going to get into the whole business wisdom of cannibalizing your own product before someone else has a chance to, but let me use a simple example from precedence that should be more than enough to respond to this query—the PS2. You see, in 2005, the PS2 was only nearing its fifth anniversary, but it was selling at an unprecedented rate. Its record breaking sales pace was far beyond what Nintendo or Microsoft had been able to manage, Sony had third party support of all kind from around the world locked down, and PS2’s sales seemed unlikely to slow down any time soon. And yet, in 2005, Sony still announced the PS3. Not only did this not hurt the PS2’s sales, but over half of PS2’s lifetime sales came from after this point in time.

That’s important to remember—the extremely long life cycle of last generation consoles, which caused them to stop selling almost immediately after their successors were on the market, seems to have left people with the impression that a system stops selling, or slows down in sales, after its successor is announced or hits the market, when the history of the gaming market has shown us that that is not true. Just an announcement of a PS5 will not cause sales of the PS4 or PS4 Pro to slow down—in fact, presuming backward compatibility with the PS4, game support for the PS4 won’t be slowing down any time soon either, just because a PS5 is on the horizon, especially since it sounds like Sony intends to stick with the x86-64 base for the new console (which means it should be easy to scale software across the PS4 and PS5 with ease, with proper API implementation).

"That’s important to remember—the extremely long life cycle of last generation consoles, which caused them to stop selling almost immediately after their successors were on the market, seems to have left people with the impression that a system stops selling, or slows down in sales, after its successor is announced or hits the market, when the history of the gaming market has shown us that that is not true."

Which brings me to the second argument people often have against the PS5 coming out any time soon—Sony still have games such as The Last of Us, Ghosts of Tsushima, and Death Stranding announced, why would they launch the PS5 before those games are out? That, to a lot of people, makes no sense.

Except, this, again, is something that has happened before, and within the PlayStation family. As a reminder, going into 2013, the PS3 had its strongest lineup of games in years announced for it—God of War Ascension, Rain, Puppetteer, Beyond: Two Souls, Gran Turismo 6, and, of course, The Last of Us. Not only did this not stop Sony from announcing the PS4 in 2013, but they also released it that same year anyway—they even released it before some of the already announced PS3 games, such as Gran Turismo 6, had had the chance to even release.

Sony has also done this with the PS2–third party titles such as Persona 3 and 4, as well as Okami, and first party games as major as God of War II (not counting smaller games like MotorStorm Arctic Edge, Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters, Jack and Daxter: The Lost Frontier, and Secret Agent Clank) were all released well after the PS3 had launched. Support for the PS3 did not stop Sony from continuing to put out PS2 games—in a lot of cases, Sony benefitted from the scalability of PSP and PS2 games to continue supporting the PS2 after the PS3’s launch, just as in this case, Sony would benefit from the presumed scalability of the PS4 and PS5, to continue supporting the PS4 even after the PS5 has launched.

"Sony still have games such as The Last of Us, Ghosts of Tsushima, and Death Stranding announced, why would they launch the PS5 before those games are out? That, to a lot of people, makes no sense. Except, this, again, is something that has happened before, and within the PlayStation family."

All of which is took say—just because Death Stranding and The Last of Us Part 2 are announced for the PS4 is no reason for Sony to not announce or release a PS5 beforehand (especially if PS5 will be backward compatible with the PS4). They could still release after thre PS5 has come out, and later even get remastered versions for the PS5.

Of course, as I stated right upfront, I don’t think the PS5 is actually releasing this year at all—I think that Sony will be looking at getting it out next year, and that next year is also when we will see and get an announcement. But it is important to remember, especially as we go into E3, that the idea of a PS5 being announced or launching this year isn’t quite as preposterous as many like to believe.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to GamingBolt as an organization.

Probably the most anticipated upcoming PlayStation game at the moment is The Last of Us Part 2, Naughty Dog’s follow up to their award winning, paradigm shifting masterpiece The Last of Us. So far, everything we have seen and heard of the game seems to indicate that it is a ways off from release- probably 2019 at the earliest- but now, some new evidence has emerged that indicates it may launch sooner than that.

According to a post on the official PlayStation Sweden FaceBook page, The Last of Us Part 2 is listed for a 2018 release, as is Sucker Punch’s upcoming Ghosts of Tsushima. It is very important to remember that this is in and of itself not any kind of confirmation, and regional social media accounts have previously gotten plenty of things wrong- but it does give a flicker of hope to those who are looking forward to these games.

Assuming they are meant to launch this year, we will hopefully learn more specific release windows at E3.

Sucker Punch, the developers behind Sly Cooper, inFamous, and the upcoming Ghosts of Tsushima, are among the most talented development houses in the industry; working with them on a AAA first party Sony game is also going to give aspiring developers all sorts of exposure and experience that will greatly help them with their career.

So, here you go then- Sucker Punch is currently looking for a Gameplay Programmer. The best part? You don’t actually need prior experience with the video game industry to apply- just three years of programming experience. You also need to be legally eligible to work in the U.S. (they won’t sponsor your visa, it sounds like), and your job will be “collaborative”, requiring you to collaborate as you implement gameplay features in “an upcoming project”- is this referring to Ghosts of Tsushima? Or a game that they have in pre-production beyond that?

Whatever it is, it’s Sucker Punch, so you can be sure it’ll be great.

[Gamasutra Job Board]

Arguably one of the biggest upcoming exclusives on the PS4 side for next year is Ghosts of Tsushima, the new open world action adventure game by Sucker Punch that is set in historical Japan. It looks pretty exciting, and unlike anything else in Sony’s first party portfolio- and it looks like it will end up adding yet another advantage to Sony’s console next year against the competition- right?

Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter doesn’t seem to think so- speaking exclusively to GamingBolt, Pachter said that the game’s innate ‘Japanese-ness’ will hold it back from broad commercial appeal, at least in terms of selling systems.

“I don’t think anything that has that Japanese flavor has broad appeal,” Pachter said. “They’re great games and get high ratings, and the hardcore audiences love them. But, for the average audience, they’re hard games. They’re too hard for most people. I mean, I played Persona 5, one of the highest rated games ever, and I like it, but I can’t believe it went on to sell as many copies as it did. It’s just not the kind of game that seems like it has mass appeal, even though it’s one of the best games ever made, and probably wins Game of the Year. But… going back to Tsushima, no, I don’t think it has broad appeal either.”

Pachter does note the game will probably be great- but in his opinion, it might not be enough for broad appeal. But on the other hand- who knows? Maybe since Tsushima is being developed by a western developer, it will do well. That remains to be seen. Ghosts of Tsushima will launch exclusively on the PS4 some time in 2018.

Sony Interactive Entertainment has announced which panels will be hosted at the PlayStation Experience which will be held on December 9th. The list of panels include The Last of us Part 2, Ghosts of Tsushima and Media Molecule’s Dreams. Additionally, there’ll be a panel for PlayStation VR where future prospects for the technology will be discussed.

Ghosts of Tsushima was announced only a month ago so it’ll be interesting to see what direction the game’s development is headed in. The cast of The Last of Us Part II will be present and they will discuss the cutscene teaser trailer that was revealed recently at Paris Games Week.

Dreams is also very much alive and the team behind  the game will discuss the development process of the game in an depth manner. As it is a project that is very unique in its vision, this is certainly one game you need to watch out for.

Sucker Punch’s new game was announced today at Sony’s Paris Games Week show at last. It’s Ghosts of Tsushima, a brand new ninja themed historical adventure set in Japan. And while we did not get to see much, if any, gameplay footage for the game, we definitely saw a pretty badass trailer- a trailer that, it turns out, was all in engine.

Speaking in an interview with official PlayStation channel, Sucker Punch’s Creative Director Nate Fox and Creative/Art Director Jason Connell confirmed that everything we saw was in engine- it was not CG. That’s pretty impressive, though again, remember, because it was not real time gameplay, it is not necessarily indicative of what the final game may look like.

They also both confirmed that the game has been under development at Sucker Punch for three years now; given that that was when inFamous: Second Son launched for the PS4, that timeline checks out, too.

Ghost of Tsushima is due out exclusively on the PS4; as of right now, we have no release date for the game, but hopefully it can make it some time next year.