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Hermen Hulst: PlayStation is “Reevaluating how we operate” in light of the recent layoffs
Interfectum
Member
Did those cost $500 million to make? How many people did Larian layoff? Nintendo? Valve?
It's not gamers, it's Sony. No one asked to see the beads of sweat on Abby's forehead while getting fucked in the ass. ND spend time and money to make that happen.
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geary
Member
That Horizon MMO or GAAS is still on track?
James Sawyer Ford
Member
These games all cost a ton of money to make, with the exception of the latter two (which aren’t AAA in the slightest and shouldn’t be included)
Spider-Man 2 was highly profitable, a large cost comes from licensing the IP
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Fabieter
Member
Additionally, create your own launcher, moving away from Epic Store and Steam. Build a cohesive ecosystem instead of engaging in unfocused ports.
Games like Ed, bg3 and botw are also expensive as fuck. Botw did cost like 100m on a switch.
ProtoByte
Weeb Underling
Also worth mentioning that whatever money they didn't cost is entirely down to being made in lower cost centers when wage and exchange rates are taken into account. Also, fucking look at Mario Wonder and Zelda, please.
FoxMcChief
Gold Member
Not just Sony. Sony is just in the crosshairs today. It’s these companies making terrible short sided deals and partnerships that eventually end up hurting your bottom line.
These studios really need to be audited, inspected and looked at. Find out where the money really is being wasted. It can’t just be terrible management. Employees have to have some responsibility here too. Maybe telling higher ups it will take you longer to do something than it really takes.
There was an interview with an older game developer who is now in management and caught workers trying to give him inflated work dead lines, when he knows the coding would take literally minutes.
ThatOneGrunt
Member
There have been too many damn remakes and remasters lately.
1. Literally no. They need the extra money that they would make in sales from those other platforms. This is where GAAS would be great.
2. With the way it's going, Bungie might lose control of itself and Sony's leadership will step in.
3. GAAS games are NEEDED in this day and age. Games cost too much and take too long to make. They need GAAS to bring in extra $$$.
4. How do you expect to do that with the way they're going? The whole point of this "re-evaluation" is because they're not making enough with how much they're spending.
5. What they need to focus on is a handful of 1st party IPs and a few GAAS titles so they get the ball rolling. After that, bring in more titles.
With the way Playstation is going, they will end up losing more money than making it with their spending.
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MrRibeye
Member
Real talk:
If they had spent less time debating about the game and showing off their cats on Zoom calls, but instead crunched a little, got shit done and met for pints after work to laugh it off, then they probably would have shipped a game and still had their jobs and be shooting nerf guns at each other in the office right now.
FoxMcChief
Gold Member
Someone posted a screenshot of someone’s take from another board, about how the Sony London Studio was a chill stable place and you didn’t have to worry about your job.
That’s not a good thing. In an industry like this, you’re only as good as what you just did. I think the workforce needs to be cut throat. Not back stabbing, just know who’s better at their jobs and reward the harder workers and get rid of the ones just coasting. The ones just coasting are likely getting paid more than hungry up and comers that are better for the tasks.
That’s not a good thing. In an industry like this, you’re only as good as what you just did. I think the workforce needs to be cut throat. Not back stabbing, just know who’s better at their jobs and reward the harder workers and get rid of the ones just coasting. The ones just coasting are likely getting paid more than hungry up and comers that are better for the tasks.
ByWatterson
Member
Reads like, "We want to keep making blockbusters but we can't keep paying people $200K to live in Los Angeles and London and work for seven years on one title. So we're gonna shrink our teams, our budgets, and our timelines."
Which, you know......fair.
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Varteras
Member
I honestly suspect that a big reason for the bloated Spiderman 2 budget was Insomniac having the same mentality and hiring more people just to make everyone's life easy. Like you said, you need some amount of pressure to produce. When you create a culture that feels like you don't have to work and you still get paid, most people default to laziness. I've seen that first hand. Needless to say, the company had to sell to stay alive.
SmokedMeat
Gamer™
Day One is coming.
JohnnyFootball
GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
Here is an idea:
Don't let budgets balloon out of control to $300+ M.
Ghost of Tsushima is proof that you can get great games that are epic in scope for relatively low cost. That game (supposedly) cost only $60M.
Don't let budgets balloon out of control to $300+ M.
Ghost of Tsushima is proof that you can get great games that are epic in scope for relatively low cost. That game (supposedly) cost only $60M.
MrRibeye
Member
Haha finally someone is getting the math right. Listen here Hermen.
NuclearDiarrhea
Member
More cinematic third person games with photorealistic graphics are the answer.
CosmicComet
Member
Hopefully they re-evaluate Herman's job and put Shuhei back where he should be.
Under Herman's leadership is the first time I can say I dont care about Sony's studio output.
Under Herman's leadership is the first time I can say I dont care about Sony's studio output.
Bitmap Frogs
Mr. Community
It’s clear by now that Hulst has fallen into the Peter principle trap and promoted for a job he’s not qualified to do.
They should be replacing him.
They should be replacing him.
what matters is what they’ve been doing
Insomniac has long been hailed as by far one of the most efficient studios in the game, and they’re set up to push out multiple award winning games over a relatively short period of time. So I’m not sure that’s the right example to use. Though $300m does seem really steep for Spiderman 2.
I’m not sure the game development strategy they employ at Insomniac is very tolerant of the laziness you’re describing.
SmurfMustard
Member
Looks like day one PC is back on the menu.
Represent.
Represent(ative) of bad opinions
Its more like 250-350 million - 500 is a reach. only a few games in history have cost that much.
I've been a huge advocate for shorter games released more frequently and reduced budget costs,
I want 5-15 hour games anywhere from 30-70 dollars to be the norm.
Give me more Miles Morales, Lost Legacy style games.
Sony is responding to gamers demands and industry trends. If they made a 8 hour GOW 2018 sequel people would fucking riot. Because they've been conditioned to need 30+ hour games since the beginning of the PS4 era.
There is nothing wrong with an 8 hour game. Maybe tack on an MP mode. It doesn't have to be GAAS. But the industry thinks that model is dead. Because gamers equate VALUE to LENGTH/CONTENT instead of quality.
I did. I wanna see her titties jiggle correctly too.
As they should. Quality > Quantity. ND is one of the only studios on Earth that can do both. R* is another one, theres a couple others.
Some studios need to be the ones to push the industry forward and raise the bar. The other devs will get there next gen. We need trail blazers.
Ditch the pc and mobile efforts psssh. Once you taste a piece of the PC pie there’s no going back. Look at all the third party developers that were console only move to pc. Capcom was damn near on life support last gen but by adding PC games day and date helped them get out their financial woes. Now they are one of the publishers that are doing the best in the industry. Sony needs to expand they can only sell so many consoles. By the end of this gen I’m expecting Sony will have a PC store that will be the way to play day and date. I also think you may see selected exclusive titles going to other platforms other than PC.
Wildebeest
Member
Partisan group 1: More 5 hour single players with 200 million dollar budgets sold for $30 now!
Partisan group 2: More infinite hour multiplayer GAAS games made on a shoestring with 200 million dollars of microtransactions now!
Nobody: More VR games now!
Partisan group 2: More infinite hour multiplayer GAAS games made on a shoestring with 200 million dollars of microtransactions now!
Nobody: More VR games now!
Tiago Rodrigues
Member
My god...you guys really want Playstation to close huh.
Killjoy-NL
Member
Yes, and they're doing exactly what they've been talking about for the past 4 years or so.
Varteras
Member
If I recall, in the leak, big questions were asked why the budget was so steep compared to the first and no real answer was given. At the same time they were making that game, their studio size swelled. I think they added hundreds of people to the studio during development. Now that may not mean anything, but I have a hard time believing the budget for the second game was around three times higher than the first, without much to show for it in the game itself, and that a bunch of extra, possibly unnecessary mouths were a big cause.
Yes, because working in a stressful environment where you always worry about your job, is definitely going to work long-term.
Sounds like a lot of the corporate managers who can't see beyond the next quarter.
They spent 6+ years working on GoT. Very unlikely the budget was $60m.
This is the LinkedIn post that drove the rumors . The person left Sucker Punch in 2016, and the claim there is that the $60m was for a 4 year budget. We don’t know for sure what period that covers, but it certainly doesn’t cover the development period.
Mibu no ookami
Demoted Member® Pro™
People reading this as less GaaS and less PC are woefully incorrect in their analysis.
Salty Popsicle
Banned
They have already attempted to do this with SpiderMan: Miles Morales and the upcoming Venom expansion. However, I think more than anything it's just making people get SpiderMan and superhero game fatigue.
ozz ex machina
Member
Show me examples and evidence please?
Monkfish877
Member
Erik Ten Hag's twin, utterly useless.
JohnnyFootball
GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
Spiderman 2 didn't even have a 40H playtime. I finished it in 30H and I took my time. 100% completion. I am grateful that it wasn't longer.
SkylineRKR
Member
There is a reason I consider Returnal to be Sony's best game of this generation yet. Its not bloated, its replayable, its challenging. Its not open world. You can take your time, but you can beat it in one sitting too.
Miles Morales was also much better than Spider Man 1. Because it was more focused. I'd rate Lost Legacy above UC4 too.
To be honest, those cookie cutter AAA open world games can fuck off.
Miles Morales was also much better than Spider Man 1. Because it was more focused. I'd rate Lost Legacy above UC4 too.
To be honest, those cookie cutter AAA open world games can fuck off.
Killjoy-NL
Member
Then why do people want a PS5 Pro or Playstation games on PC?
To play Helldivers 2 or Returnal at 120+fps?
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Salty Popsicle
Banned
If that was the answer, Sony would never have shifted their strategy away from what they were doing with PS4 once the PS5 generation started. Sony doesn't have the money to invest into a project that will take 5+ years of development time ($200 - $350 million dollars) and 1-2 years' worth of sales to recoup that investment and finally make profit. That amount of money being tied up for nearly 6-7 years is a just not viable and extremely risky.
spons
Member
The Switch's sales numbers are unilateral proof that Sony can't compete with PS5. Neither can it with the massive install base of PC. Make no mistake, PlayStation is in no way a competitor to these platforms.
NuclearDiarrhea
Member
It was sarcasm my guy.
FeastYoEyes
Member
I expect more of the GaaS games to be cancelled and only a couple remain by the end of the year. Theres no way they haven't seen the writing on the wall for most of these games.
Fabieter
Member
Funny thing is most games including helldivers 2 were greenlighted under shuhei. I dont know wtf hermen is going but he was the wrong guy for the job.
NickFire
Member
His statement says "Delivering the immersive, narrative-driven stories that PlayStation Studios is known for, at the quality bar that we aspire to, requires a re-evaluation of how we operate." I don't understand why anyone is doubting they will continue making those types of games. He is saying they need to re-evaluate operations for that reason.
I really think people are over-thinking this. Their revenue is through the roof and the consoles have been flying off shelves. It sounds like they are just trimming the fat / bloat, and cancelling anything in progress that they aren't confident in. There is zero indication that they plan to drop what put them on the top.
DarthPutin
Member
Exactly. It's not nice to say, but one obvious and only sure-fire way to keep the costs down is to have less studios in expensive places like California, and more in affordable ones. I think Sony is trying some things in this direction, e.g. they have Malaysia studio I believe to help with development. Studios like ShiftUp can be promising in this direction.
As for the length, People absolutely want big open worlds with tons of possibilities, as much as it angers GAF. Including much maligned AC: Valhalla, highest selling game in series. Including Elden Ring, BG3 (giant game with open zones), BOTW, etc. I agree that they shouldn't go too insane with graphics, late PS4 graphics for big games are totally fine, you can keep graphics experimentation for smaller linear titles like HellBlade, maybe occasional game from flagship prestige studio, but you can't afford too many of those.
Horseganador
Member
This is EXCELLENT news, picking up cable by canceling Gaas and focusing on single player adventures.
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Nickolaidas
Member
Just fire the developers you hired simply because they weren't white or straight and start hiring people with actual talent, REGARDLESS of race or sexuality.
And stop pandering to the woketards.
That's it. That's all you need to do, and you'll earn a shitload of money.
And stop pandering to the woketards.
That's it. That's all you need to do, and you'll earn a shitload of money.