If you’ve been noticing a lot of “changes” within the video game industry recently, that’s because there have been. Change is a natural part of the gaming space, but there is a limit to how much can happen before things get bad, or it’s clear that some people have made mistakes. Those “mistakes” have been prevalent all across 2024 so far, and it doesn’t seem like it will end. Even the biggest companies in the industry, like Sony, have had serious issues this year. That’s why the company promises that PlayStation Studios will be better going forward and crank out as many “hit titles” as possible.
If you’re confused by what they mean, it’s simply that in all of 2024, PlayStation Studios will not release a “significant” 1stparty title. To be fair, they have released console exclusives, including a certain Game of the Year nominee from Square Enix, but the internal team didn’t make that. Plus, while they do have a few 1st party titles headed to the PS5 later this year, they all have caveats to them, including one already being panned by gamers, one being on Nintendo Switch, and the final one not being a “grand-scale” title like you would expect from Sony with its 1st party titles.
When Sony noted that it wouldn’t have a new game in a familiar franchise until the next fiscal year, gamers weren’t happy, and that led to the most recent earnings call, where Sony talked about the state of the company and gaming division. Earlier in the year, Sony laid off 900 people across numerous divisions, and that doesn’t touch upon what’s going on with Bungie.
Regardless, they noted at the call that they’re trying to reorganize things so that they can “continuously” make and release games of high quality for the PS5:
“The Studio Business Group is strengthening its development schedule management and optimizing development projects in order to consistently and continuously release hit titles.”
They also noted in the call that they were trying to “expand the user base” of PlayStation so they could have a more “stable” set of buyers going forward.
The irony of this is simple, they should’ve been shooting for that from the start! While the PS5 recently crossed 60 million units sold, it’s technically behind the sales of the PS4 in the same period, plus, sales are likely to slow further for the time being because of the lack of titles.
We’ll see if Sony’s attempts at changing things work.
