Sony had “no involvement” with Death Stranding’s release on PC Game Pass, despite the platform holder owning the intellectual property and funding the development of the title. “Matters relating to the PC release of Death Stranding are managed by Kojima Productions and 505 Games,” a spokesperson told us. “SIE has no involvement in this promotion.”
It raises the question: how has the Japanese giant managed to negotiate a licensing deal where it has zero control over where its product is ultimately distributed? Obviously, we’ve seen a similar situation unfold with MLB The Show.
It’s perhaps worth pointing out that the PC Game Pass version of the release will be based on the original Death Stranding campaign, and not its expanded Director’s Cut. The latter was alsopublished by 505 Games on storefronts such as Steam, so it’s possible a different licensing arrangement may have been drawn up for that particular version of the game.
This isn't an MLB situation. What kind of leverage do you think 505 have over Sony that they can't control their own IP?
Think a little
Sony signed wih Kojima to allow him to publish it on PC via another publisher many years ago. I may be wrong but I think Kojima mentioned a PC version almost at the same time he announced the game or that had a game with Sony. That publisher, 505 decides how it's distributed, price cuts, discounts, etc. Back then Sony didn't publish their blockbusters on PC, so had to do this kind of deal.
Gamepass PC didn't exist back then, so pretty likely the deal they had didn't include an anti-gamepass clause. So Sony can't do anything to stop it now because they signed back then a deal with certain conditions. MLB The Show is different: MLB owns the IP and licenses Sony to make the game and publish it on PS. MLB themselves publish it on other platforms so MLB is the one who decides if they include it on GP or not and Sony can't stop it because as in the case of DS PC, Sony doesn't publish MLB The Show on Xbox. And in that case, Sony doesn't own the MLB IP.
There are older cases of Sony allowing 2nd party games to publish their games on PC with non-Sony publishing. Like the games from ThatGameCompany or Quantic Dream. So eventually they could end on PC GP too.
But other than that, forget to see internally developed Sony 1st party games on GP or pretty likely newer 2nd party games because probaly Sony would publish themselves on PC and wouldn't put them on GP, or pretty likely if they allow someone else to publish them then they'd pretty likely apply a anti-rival gamesubs clause on the deal similar to the one we saw in the leaked Resident Evil Village marketing deal contract.