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Does Sony have a long-term software strategy? | Opinion Gamesindustry.biz

Alex Scott

Member

In all the furore over Microsoft's record-breaking acquisition of Activision Blizzard, it's almost been possible to forget that Sony recently had a major acquisition of its own – a far cry from the scale of the Activision deal, certainly, and not even a match for the price tag of Microsoft's earlier Zenimax acquisition, but Sony's $3.6 billion buyout of Bungie was a big step for the company nonetheless.

The acquisition strategy that has built up Sony's studio system had been a relatively cautious process of accretion for the most part. Studios like Insomniac, Naughty Dog, Sucker Punch, and Guerrilla Games were bought out after years of working increasingly closely with Sony, effectively functioning as Sony "second-party" developers for a while before being brought in-house as first-party studios.


The Bungie deal was a departure from that strategy. While PlayStation was a major platform for Destiny and Destiny 2, Bungie acts as a multi-platform publisher of its own games, a status that was promised to continue even after the expensive acquisition was completed.

At the time of the deal, back at the start of 2022, this looked like a fairly major evolution of Sony's software strategy – which had also recently begun to embrace non-PlayStation platforms, with well-received PC releases of major first-party titles. Bungie would bring that a step further, while also bringing live service expertise that would develop this side of the business for Sony as a whole.

Meanwhile, from Bungie's side of things, the focus was on independence and growth; the studio's autonomy would survive the acquisition, while the resulting injection of capital would enable it to grow and achieve its plans much more rapidly.

Nearly two years on, a round of layoffs at Bungie – accompanied by some delays to projects in the pipeline – have brought this deal back into focus, and raised some significant questions about what Sony's strategy actually is here.

Exact numbers haven't been disclosed, but about 100 of the company's roughly 1,200 staff have reportedly been laid off. The next major Destiny 2 expansion has been pushed back a few months to June 2024, while new title Marathon has been pushed to 2025. This all comes on the back of Destiny 2 missing its revenue targets by some 45%, a major dip which suggests that the venerable game (originally released in mid-2017) is sunsetting far more quickly than the company had hoped for.

It's also worth mentioning that layoffs have been happening at Sony-owned Media Molecule and Visual Arts earlier this month as well.


Largely uncommented-upon when Sony's Bungie purchase went through was what a risky investment this was. $3.6 billion is a fair chunk of cash for a company of Sony's size, and while Bungie is a studio with an extraordinary history – creating the Halo and Destiny franchises alone makes it remarkable – it does not own the most valuable IP it created (Halo), and its only game on the market right now, Destiny 2, has gone through some serious ups and downs in terms of commercial success and player sentiment.

Since the acquisition, it has announced one new title, an extraction shooter – a fairly masochistic sub-genre that has yet to yield a genuinely major commercial hit title – based on the Marathon IP. That was an odd choice; most of the potential audience for an extraction shooter weren't born when the last Marathon game came out, and most of the people who remember Marathon fondly despise the notion of the series being exhumed as a live-service online shooter, making one wonder what the point of attaching that IP to this project actually was.

Either way, the response to the one heavily stylised Marathon trailer we've seen was not all positive; a rocky start for the first new project from Sony's most expensive acquisition to date.

In this context, layoffs at Bungie are a concerning sign. We can't know for certain if this decision came from within Bungie – a supposedly highly autonomous business unit – or whether it was demanded by Sony, but reporting on these layoffs has tended to contextualise them alongside a broader cost-cutting effort in Sony's studios.

That cost-cutting itself is a hell of an interesting thing for the company to be doing, given that its studios are essentially the only reason why the much smaller and less wealthy Sony is considered capable of maintaining market leadership in the face of the now-gigantic Xbox division Microsoft has spent most of Sony's market cap assembling.

Whatever your view of the Activision Blizzard acquisition, it is now a done deal, and Sony needs a bold strategy to ensure that it remains competitive not this year or next, but five and ten years down the line. Sending in the MBAs to "find efficiencies" in the world-class studio system it has spent so much time and effort assembling sounds like pretty much the opposite of that.

It's no secret that the industry as a whole is in cost-cutting and layoffs mode this year. Nonetheless, the "everyone else was doing it" excuse will be cold comfort for Sony in a few years' time if penny-pinching leaves its studios unable to maintain their edge over the company's much larger, hungrier, and more aggressive rival.

If your largest rival had just spent over $70 billion buying one of the industry's biggest publishers with the explicit goal of destroying your market-leading position, pulling out all the stops to grow your studio network and build out an even more impressive software pipeline would seem, on the face of it, to be the only appropriate response.

If that's not Sony's strategy, it needs to start answering some pointed questions about what it's going to do instead – and what's going on at Bungie is going to be watched carefully as a bellwether for the company's thinking.

Back when Sony acquired Bungie, the continued independence of the company – which would be free to continue acting both as a developer and as a publisher, releasing its games on non-Sony platforms, and thus playing a role in expanding Sony's software reach beyond PlayStation – was a very big part of the narrative.

It's not clear whether we should therefore treat Bungie's layoffs as the result of a broader cost-cutting directive at Sony, or whether the 45% revenue miss for Destiny 2 is the internal justification that matters. Yet even if it's the latter, there's a contradiction. The $3.6 billion Sony spent buying Bungie was meant to fuel growth for both companies; instead, Bungie is laying off staff (in some cases, it's reported, before some of their shares from the acquisition have even vested).

If the "growing and building" that Jim Ryan and Pete Parsons talked about so enthusiastically back in early 2022 isn't actually happening, that $3.6 billion starts to look awfully mis-spent, and this studio's role in Sony's fairly unclear strategy becomes even more questionable.

Perhaps there are some cold feet within Sony over the Bungie deal – executive toes being chilled by the sharp decline in Destiny 2 revenues, and the arguably quite negative response to the Marathon trailer – that are raising questions over whether this expensively acquired live service game specialist is really a good component for PlayStation's future direction.

That's a fair question, not least since there's some evidence of live service fatigue setting in for players, and definitely a slowing of the growth of this kind of business model. Yet if that's the case, an alternative future direction has failed to emerge or to be articulated.

Back when the Bungie deal closed, Jim Ryan said that Sony had "many more moves to make" when asked about future acquisitions to head off industry consolidation. Nearly two years later, we haven't seen it break out any of those moves; instead we see Bungie trimming headcount amid reports of broader cost-cutting in Sony's studio network.

So far, to be fair, Sony hasn't had to show us any new moves – it continues to have a fantastic software pipeline, at least in the short to medium term. But with the cracks starting to show in its biggest acquisition to date, while its biggest competition has spent the best part of $100 billion catching up with it, treading water is not a long-term option.

The PlayStation brand remains strong – but the plans to fill software pipelines are laid years in advance, and that means that the seeds of possible crises are also planted years in advance.

The risk to PlayStation isn't on a two to three-year horizon, but beyond that. If the company doesn't have a clear strategy for how it will build and grow, not trim and cost-cut, with a view to being a serious competitor in the decade to come, then even its commanding market lead today may not be enough to carry it through tomorrow.
 
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Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
"and the arguably quite negative response to the Marathon trailer"

Wait, what? When did that happen?

Marathon's trailer was one of the biggest successes of the PlayStation Showcase 2023, no?

Edit:

20 million views. 94% likes. 6% dislikes.

paOBSUK.jpg
 
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Would be great if Sony actually announced their plans for 2024 later this month.

We know more about hardware than Sony's first party titles....
Even then the PS5 Pro will probably not be revealed until next year at the least. Sony really want to keep us waiting...
 

Killjoy-NL

Member
Why is it that the more MS is struggling, the more articles about Sony being in trouble pop up?

I hope Sony will stay quiet until a month before release for every game/product they will release for the rest of this gen.

Should make for wonderful drama, despite Sony killing it, just like they did with all previous gens, apart from the first half of the PS3-gen.
 
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gerth666

Member
I think playstation should scrap the bulk of their gaas, double down on the big single player games they're good at, and start to build some smaller teams within their studios to commission some AA games which can be used to fill out gaps between the long Dev times of their bigger games. That way you keep a nice revenue stream coming in, and keep your fan base engaged
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
"and the arguably quite negative response to the Marathon trailer"

Wait, what? When did that happen?

Marathon's trailer was one of the biggest successes of the PlayStation Showcase 2023, no?

More views doesn't mean it's a positive response.

Just look at the GAF topic and see how many users are poo-pooing it.

 

Mibu no ookami

Demoted Member® Pro™
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West, 2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon Zero Dawn, Knack 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy????Shouldn't be hard to beat
20182025
Detroit Become Human, God of War, Spider-Man, ????
20192026
Day's Gone, Death Stranding, MediEvil????
 
Mostly on point with some good questions.

However, most people are pretty excited or at least curious about Marathon (if they play MP games). The negativity seems rather small as a percentage of the overall audience.

I haven't played MP since Killzone 3 on any platform, or no GAAS games once early Destiny 2 but even I'm pretty damn interested in Marathon.
 
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Dr.Morris79

Gold Member
We know more about hardware than Sony's first party titles....
The more Sony veers towards woke guff and shitty Gaas the longer I can wait, personally.

The only two games that got serious time on my PS5 were Demons Souls and The Forest. GT7 had a few hours too.

The rest were ps4 titles. Just a big dust collector in the corner 🤷‍♂️

Oh sorry, Returnal too, that was pretty good.
 

Clear

CliffyB's Cock Holster
For the next 6 months their tentpole is going to be FF7r Part 2, and there's quite a lot of other third-party stuff that's highly likely for 2024.

I can see it being a light year for first-party releases, but I'd be surprised if they didn't announce and/or date a bunch of stuff.

The thing people need to understand is that very few games are made in under 3 years anymore. AA budget does not mean quick, so there's no easy, rapid solution to filling out gaps in the schedule.
 

gerth666

Member
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West, 2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon
Mostly on point with some good questions.

However, most people are pretty excited or at least curious about Marathon (if they play MP games). The negativity seems rather small as a percentage of the overall audience.

I haven't played MP since Killzone 3 on any platform, or no GAAS games once early Destiny 2 but even I'm pretty damn interested in Marathon.
It's a good opinion piece in my view, and it brings up a something I agree with, that is Sony wasted loads of cash on bungie. I think they would be better served on spending that dough on what they are good at. And looking at that release schedule you've shown, the years are comparable, I just hope they've more in the immediate to show because it's not looking great to me
 

SJRB

Gold Member
Marathon trailer was an ultra-stylized CGI / In-Engine rendition of a concept of something that somewhat remotely resembles a videogame, maybe.

There's literally nothing anyone can derive from that trailer about the actual game, its components or gameplay aside from maybe the visual style and art direction they're aiming for.

Saying that the reception of the trailer was negative (which is a highly subjective claim) holds pretty much zero merit in relation to the actual game.
 
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Men_in_Boxes

Snake Oil Salesman
More views doesn't mean it's a positive response.

Just look at the GAF topic and see how many users are poo-pooing it.


The issue is that GAFs response isn't indicative of the wider public. See GAFs response to Fortnite, Roblox, Minecraft etc...

The 62 people complaining online that Marathon isn't single player don't matter, so reporting on the feelings of such a small minority shouldn't either.

GamesIndustry.Biz is doing the clickbait.
 
I'm a bit worried about Sony exclusive first party games...there is nothing new on horizon next 6 months.....my PS5 is dust collector.....
Sure...if you don't enjoy Final Fantasy or Helldivers or any 3rd party game.

Again… media completely not overhyping MS moved and trying to cast FUD on Sony, nope… not at all…
This is one thing i don't get. MS is failing at hardware and no one talks about it. Gamepass doesn't have updated numbers for 2 years and no one talks about it. Since Bethesda was acquired Redfall was mentioned for 2 days, Ghostwire failed, Deathloop failed, Starfield went froma surefire GOTY winner to a game scrapping the 80's on metacritic and no one talks about it.

Yet Sony is failing with record breaking sales at everything. These articles are just supposition at this point.

And selling articles based on layoffs...the entire industry is doing them.
 
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Sony has not said much in terms of new first party titles lately. Very unusual for them. Who knows what they are working on or if they were GAAS rubbish and were mostly scrapped now. 2024 should tell us more or at the very least some actual reveals or info.
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
More views doesn't mean it's a positive response.

Just look at the GAF topic and see how many users are poo-pooing it.

I'm sure GamesIndustry.biz's wouldn't take GAF's opinions over total view count when writing their article 😄

Besides, if total views (engagement) don't matter, what else in this world, right? 😄
 

StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Their current successful strategy has been:

- Release a good system at a good price
- First party games focus on SP narratives
- Third party partnerships for shooters, FIFA, SE etc....

Their new strategy going forward is:

- Assuming still the same good systems at good prices
- Buy Bungie for Destiny and GAAS advice
- Tons of first party GAAS in development
- Third party partnerships with exception Activision partnerships will end soon. I think the Sony/COD,marketing deals end in 2024 or 2025.
 

StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Sony has not said much in terms of new first party titles lately. Very unusual for them. Who knows what they are working on or if they were GAAS rubbish and were mostly scrapped now. 2024 should tell us more or at the very least some actual reveals or info.
Aside from Wolverine coming I think in 2024(?), unless they got secret big budget games coming soon, all their key existing franchises like GOW, Horizon, LOU etc... already have their sequels out the past few years. Those games take a long time to get sequels (~5 years where LOU is even longer).

Sony also showcases their heavy hitters a few years in advance with teaser trailers. So if they arent showing anything, I dont think anything huge is really coming out anytime soon except Wolverine. As per their business slide a year or two ago, the plan is 10 new GAAS games by 2025. Thats their key focus. You might not get a new GOW, Horizon, LOU, GT etc..... until PS6.
 
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West,2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon Zero Dawn, Knack 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy????Shouldn't be hard to beat
20182025
Detroit Become Human, God of War, Spider-Man,????
20192026
Day's Gone, Death Stranding, MediEvil????
2023 first party also did HFW Burning Shores, GT7 VR Mode, MLB The Show, Horizon Call of the Mountain, 2 consoles, 1 vr headset,1 portable device and earbuds.
All that is not nothing, like people like to pretend online.
 
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adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
I'm sure they do have a strategy. It may just be different now than it was 30 days ago.

If they are really going to pivot from the GAAS focus 180* in such a short notice, it's gonna take a while before the change starts to show.
 
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West, 2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon Zero Dawn, Knack 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy????Shouldn't be hard to beat
20182025
Detroit Become Human, God of War, Spider-Man, ????
20192026
Day's Gone, Death Stranding, MediEvil????

I understand that the output is comparable, but for me, I hoped Sony would be able to have a better output with their studios growing in size, with some studios having multiple teams over the past decade
 
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Fbh

Gold Member
The lack of communication from Sony sucks but their strategy largely seems to be:
-Have existing studios mostly continue doing the same thing they were doing last gen
-Get into GAAS primarily through new projects from new studios and acquisitions (Heaven, Firewalk, Bungie, etc)
-Fill the gaps with second party exclusives and third party exclusivity deals (Helldivers 2, FFXVI, FF7 Rebirth, Rise of Ronin, DS2, etc)
 

Dream-Knife

Banned
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West,2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon Zero Dawn, Knack 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy????Shouldn't be hard to beat
20182025
Detroit Become Human, God of War, Spider-Man,????
20192026
Day's Gone, Death Stranding, MediEvil????
I think this really puts things into perspective.

The first party PS4 library wasn't great. As always, third party games carry the system. It's like the opposite of Nintendo.
 
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StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West,2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon Zero Dawn, Knack 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy????Shouldn't be hard to beat
20182025
Detroit Become Human, God of War, Spider-Man,????
20192026
Day's Gone, Death Stranding, MediEvil????
Big difference is there's a lot more unique PS4 games, while the PS5 era column is almost all sequels. All the big budget PS5 games are sequels, where the new IPs are small budget.

You really think 2021 games list is better than 2014?
 
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Mibu no ookami

Demoted Member® Pro™
I understand that the output is comparable, but for me, I hoped Sony would be able to have a better output with their studios growing in size, with some studios having multiple teams over the past decade

I sense that you have an unrealistic expectation given that games take significantly longer to develop now, even with more staff. All of this growth largely just let's you keep up similar output. They'd have to grow significantly faster to increase their output.

Buying a small company like Housemarque isn't going to speed up production much either. They put out Returnal in 2021 and we probably won't see another game from them until 2025 or 2026.
 
The marathon views I believe were manufactured, but this continued narrative is becoming more and more of a FUD campaign to obfuscate from Sony who is about to have a massive holiday result while Microsoft has one of their worst.

For a little bit of perspective; 3 years into the PS4, we hadn't even heard about Ghost of Tsushima yet... The PS4 launched in 2013 and Sony announced Ghost in 2017 and it didn't release until 2020...

20132020Edge
Knack, Killzone Shadow Fall, God of War Ascension, GT6, TLOU, Ratchet in the nexusThe Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Dreams, Sackboy Adventure, Miles Morales2020
20142021
DriveClub, Infamous Second Son, LBP3, TLOU:RReturnal, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Destruction All Stars2021
20152022
Bloodborne, Order 1886, Until DawnGod of War Ragnarok, GT7, Horizon Forbidden West,2022
20162023
Ratchet and Clank, Last Guardian, Uncharted 4Spider-Man 22016
20172024
Everybody's Golf, GT Sport, Gravity Rush 2, Horizon Zero Dawn, Knack 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy????Shouldn't be hard to beat
20182025
Detroit Become Human, God of War, Spider-Man,????
20192026
Day's Gone, Death Stranding, MediEvil????
And this doesn’t count 3rd party ps5 exclusives like FFXVI cause if it did, 2023 would be better than 2016 tbh.
 
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