Sony's Next Gen Strategy

I agree. Doing the former adds value to me as a gamer. Doing the latter gives me a game I’d have been able to play anyway. The problem is that I’m not convinced the market sees it that way. We are at the point where whatever Sony do is the right thing, even if they contradict themselves later. The gaming media is complicit in this. Look how quick they jump on examination of an Xbox timed exclusive, yet Sony do it and you barely see a flicker. Media now saying Sony are doing this because it works so Xbox should too. But when Xbox do it, they just go with how it’s bad for gaming. Can’t win…

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One of the strangest things for me now in regards to Sony’s messaging is that they keep saying you need/must have a PS5 but our next showcase will be 40 minutes of PS4 and PSVR games. They’re going to be just as cross-gen as Microsoft is with games for the next year but they just try to obfuscate that. There is no added benefit to me as an eventual PS5 owner if 3rd party DLC is kept off of other platforms.

For SURE option 2

I will be playing Avengers on the most powerful console. Xbox should make more of their power advantage with multiplats.

While I don’t agree with this business practice this isn’t exactly true, the more people investing in the sony ecosystem means more revenue available towards future projects

It’s just petty, they’re not making hundreds of millions for moneyhatting dlc.

Don’t think we should jump on the anti-consumer bandwagon here. Does this suck? Yeah it does but to the average user it’s no different than Stalker 2 coming to the Xbox first. Sure, how these deals are made might be different but that doesn’t matter to the common gamer. It’s just the way things are…unfortunately.

I’m not really upset about Sony’s strategy of aggressive timed exclusives and content deals, though I do think it sucks. Mostly for me it just confusingly feels like “running up the score” in some cases so far with the deals made or rumored (FF16, Spider-man). I’m more curious/concerned with what one insider said on them aiming for games more usually associated with Microsoft that doesn’t feel like it’s come to fruition yet.

I think it’s a bit shitty but half of these things seem stupid to me, as if this is going to cause someone to go out and buy a console for.

Regarding exclusive DLC, i think its a dying trend because games are becoming platforms themselves.

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Never know , they may convince some spiderman fans that if they want that type of content go to Playstation :man_shrugging:t6:

The practice is absolutely anti-consumer. If that’s not anti-consumer, then the word has no meaning at all.

Since it doesn’t seem that the gaming press are going to truly roast Sony and the complicit third party publishers about it, all you can do is do is spread awareness and vote with your wallets.

I think S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 was ok at least as none of the games were multiplat and it stays on PC (where all the other games are). More just MS helping get a console port off the ground with incentives.

Still, they aren’t innocent either. While Phil has made clear his problems with timed dlc (“worst” I saw recently was an extra 500 atoms for those who buy Fallout 76 on Xbox), Warhammer 40k Darktide is harder to overlook.

Pretty sure Greensburg said these console launch exclusives aren’t moneyhatted in the traditional sense but instead MS provided additional funding or support so that a Xbox version can exist. That’s fundamentally different than paying a publisher to keep content off of another platform.

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Sony‘s strategy is to sell you the box, the accessories and the games individually at full price as much as they can. It‘s a very traditional model. And they are increasingly moneyhatting games from larger publishers. This to me is a crucial difference to Xbox, who hasn‘t done this since Rise of the Tomb Raider IMO. Greenberg recently stated they are doing timed stuff mostly for games where they feel they can make the game itself better by providing additional funding (in the AA and indie space) OR where they fully pay for development and are publishing. They‘ve also been on the hunt for projects that long seemed impossible, like a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. sequel, Scorn or the localization of PSO2.

For Sony, just for this year I could list timed games from large publishers like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered, Final Fantasy 7 Remake, Kingdom Hearts 3 DLC, Control DLC, Deathloop, Ghostwire Tokyo, Project Athia and now Avengers. These are all AAA games, and certainly none of those should be timed ever. They also have Godfall and Kena, and these seem to fall more under the category of games that Xbox has been snatching.

When people then come back and compare Avengers to Tetris multiplayer (a game available on PS4 already) or Xbox 360 deals 13 years in the past or something, I can just put up a faint smile. Plus Xbox must somehow react to the practices above, so I somehow expect them to go down a similar route soon (unfortunately).

I just wish timed exclusives were just a thing when actual funding was provided for the game‘s development rather than being a deal between platform holder and publisher. But this seems to be wishful thinking.

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The only thing with Sony’s strategy is that it’s a strategy that means they basically have to constantly burn money on getting bigger and better content. It’s something MS ran into at the end of the 360 and Start of Xbone where they were in an arms race to secure timed exclusives in games and DLC that their first party suffered for it and they are only rebuilding now. It works as a short term burn to acquire users. But it’s also gonna leave less for Sony in pursuing smaller and riskier games, which they need and have been lacking in. And it’s going to leave them less freedom in perusing different financial models as well. But if it works for them. It works. It just remains to be seen if MS’ long term plan works out against it.

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Agreed. :slight_smile:

First of all: anything Marvel-related bores me to death, therefore I couldn’t care less in this particular case, but according to rumors Sony will extend this practice to a lot of other titles.

I think it is the only way for Sony to compete because their ecosystem is still centered around their console.

Should MS do the same? A year ago I would have said “yes”, but I think the best way to counter such practices is to work out deals with 3rd parties to put highly anticipated games on Game Pass day 1. In this way MS aren’t the evil ones locking anyone out and at the same time elevate the value of Game Pass to new heights. It certainly depends on the cost, too (i.e. can it be done without eating too much into the budget).

If they can manage to grow the user base of Game Pass to a certain number, these timed exclusives will become more and more expensive for Sony until they can’t afford them anymore.

This will take a few years and it requires Game Pass to become more and more successful over these years, but I think it is a good strategy because Sony cannot really do anything about it.

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Tbh that’s a huge mistery to me.

They have psnow but haven’t done anything to expand the service in years. In fact they only saw some changes when they started offering downloads because as a streaming service it’s pretty bad. They are still reliant on console based blades and unlike SX there’s no info if they will be able to even use the ps5 blade for regular compute to reduce costs.

Then they have some games launching to pc but there’s no synergy there. Their console users get nothing out of their releases. There’s no crossbuy, no cross progression, no sub on Pc they can share the same games. Unlike Ms they also don’t have a store or any way to use their steam games as a Trojan horse to something else.

And finally on console they have the by far biggest user base but doesn’t seem to be leveraging it to smooth the transition. I think they should be the ones telling people to keep purchasing games and accessories for ps4 because it will work and transition smoothly for ps5. Not to artificially cut off the games to force people to upgrade, because then they just open themselves up for that person to switch to another console instead.

Like they have bc but even that is just there, their basically migration plan revolves around: We delivered the games you liked on ps4 so stay with us on ps5 and we will do it again, which sure, it’s a strong argument, but they could have that locked for people that are not too keen on their 1st party offerings.

Edit. Oh I guess I should have read more than the title lol. Completely missed the point

Trying again this time staying on topic XD

I really don’t mind timed exclusives but paying for existing versions of the game to be worse is a no go for me. I simply refuse to support any game that does this shit until the content comes.

And I hope Ms doesn’t try to counter that, mostly because I gain nothing from people on other consoles getting a gimped version.

I prefer Ms to use their money to my benefit like putting bigger 3rd party games day one on gamepass. That has market strength in itself because it keeps getting exponentially cheaper to game on Xbox

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