https://x.com/paultassi/status/1735511480756252878?s=46&t=O_AGT9SEnlptKOF_2SxtqQ
Who should really be the fault or takes the majority of it? Or is it all equal?
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I see some people celebrating about faction’s cancellation and saying that they should just focus on single player games, which is fair. However, with the ballooning cost of game development, I don’t know how Sony would be able to increase their margins if they don’t have big live service games/or mobile to offset rising cost. I feel like they will try to maximize profits like make tons of sequels/spinoffs, remake/remasters , or popular IP’s for guaranteed revenue. New IP’s, unless GAAS will probably take a back seat.
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Last time I checked, a bevy of Xbox first party studios have consistently put out games with single and multiplayer components. @Shpeshal_Nick and I talked about this when I was on the pod a year or so ago; Xbox consistently puts out massive packages for games and somehow it’s never even taken into account, nor are they given credit for that fact, but Sony consistently puts out titles that have singular components and that’s just totally fine universally (I’m not at all saying every game needs multiplayer).
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It’s absurd to put blame on Bungie for this at all; Naughty Dog had five years to come up with something compelling, and after the report about Bungie thinking it was shit, I don’t buy the “we would have to only be a multiplayer studio”… you know, because Xbox has plenty that continually do both (as does most of the industry’s publishers). This is solely on Sony and the leadership at ND.
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That’s bungie’s senior level executives running wild with retention money on ostrich.
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Absolutely. They kept hopes alive for more then 4 years. In the end, just abandoned it. They may try to hide it all they want but they are inapt.
Gurellia has signalled live service multi-player game via there tweets. It is in development.
Factions could’ve been nice tightly scaled MP mode like the first game and the Unchartered MPs. I’m pretty sure ND would’ve been capable of delivering that, problem is Sony obviously wanted it to be a big full-on GaaS, something ND was never even in the proximity of, if they had pushed with that it might seriously damage the studio. It’s correct decision to cancel the GaaS ambition and scale that Sony wanted, but it’s wrong to cancel the whole project and not letting a nice small mode come out of it.
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It makes me mad how this is not acknowledged or credited. An Xbox game like Halo misses Forge and co-op at launch, yeah it’s upsetting, but it’s never contrasted to other devs or games that make a single component releases and take 4-5 years with it, while in the same time some Xbox IPs are expected to have like 3-5 components and long-term support and if not all of it is ready at launch it’s a clown show.
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Naught Dog is getting worsely managed every gen. On PS5, they only produce up to now a remake of a remaster of a ps3 game. And nothing is even announced. Unless Factions which is cancelled.
But the Last of Us Part 2 remake is coming, why should we be worried ?
If Playstation is smart… Then maybe remasters are way to go for them to make a live service kind of revenue.
I am not against remasters as long as it adds something to the game which i want. It is another way of making a live service game.
Not an ideal way but we don’t like actual live service games anyway.
Remake of remasters, now waiting for the remaster of the remake of the remaster …
Many people love live-service games, in fact most people love them. There is a reason Sony has launched 12 potential Gaas games. There is also a reason the lead manager of Gaas games at Sony has left (so has the boss) after cancellations and delays.
SP games can only exist in the presence of a strong backbone of Gaas games. This is why MS bought ABK and Bethesda. The shear number of Gaas games produced by MS is the reason now we have a large set of reveals of Single player games.
You know you need to give consumer a reason to subscribe PS Plus right? Remember, Fortnite is free and CoD is only helping your enemy. Give them more than those two games to subscribe and what better way than an exclusive title.
To be fair, 3 years is not that long or an unusual amount of time to have not announced or released a major new game especially when they have released content in that time.
I think blaming Bungie on this is very misguided, all Bungie did was provide their opinion which is a big reason they were even purchased, their knowledge and insight for GaaS
This is on Sony and ND management, they spent what was likely 5 years on this project and then only realised that a GaaS would take a ton of resources and devs to keep it alive?
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What remasters make nearly GaaS money? The point of GaaS is continuous and recurring monetization and engagement. Remaster is a a big RoI potential but it’s definitely not GaaS money.
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Ok… I clearly mentions and as I quoted ‘live service kind of revenue’
So take that into context before having any assumptions.
https://x.com/hazzadorgamin/status/1735655938550542847?s=46&t=O_AGT9SEnlptKOF_2SxtqQ
To be honest, I am leaning towards this attitude. Perhaps not as harsh but still. I’m not saying they chose wrong to go back to Single Player, but they are not freed from criticism.
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People in the know have been saying exactly this for years now including Shawn Layden (directly referring to TLoU2) and Sony messiah Mark Cerny and many other industry figures.
As the cost of developing AAA games rises and prices stay (broardly) the same developing them will become unsustainable.
The pivot to GaaS was clearly an attempt to rebalance the books in that respect and support the single player games they produce.
So the question I’d ask is if they cancel the GaaS title and focus back on single player titles what will Sony do to increase profitability. Two obvious answers would be to reduce budget (shorter games) or increase prices. Neither is a particularly good look.
Don’t see increased remakes or remasters as a viable alternative in the long run as they still cost $ to make and they’ll soon run out of stuff to remake.
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Even in this case the gaming media protects Sony and their clear failures (Games cancelled, Studio closing, Bungie problems, layoffs etc.) with generalizations making it seems normal what is happening. I’ve bought in July a PS5 instead of a gaming laptop and I’ve regretted it. After watching hours of videos describing the controller as revolutionary (I like it but I cannot stand the fact that the battery lasts only 3-4 hours), that it is soo silent (The Series X did not make a peep in almost 4 years while the PS5, immediately out of the box, makes a constant buzzing sound) and the amazing tempest audio ( The audio is flat and I am unable to understand from where sounds are coming from most of the time, instead on Xbox I have DTS and it is a game changer for me). Sorry for the rant guys, but I feel an idiot to have trusted the gaming media and Sony’s marketing.
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