I personally think SIE's GAAS pivot is a right move(Market analysis).

[historia]

OK. Before picking up your pitchforks hear me out.


PS brand is at all time strong since PS2.

The problem with PS brand and SIE as a whole is that their portofolio is that their are only singleplayers games. Most of them move consoles sale for Sony and build stronger brand.

After ABK deal annouced, Sony feeled so threatened about one of their big revenue source being chipped away that they acquired Bungie and pivot to GAAS.

Is it a bad idea?

The thing is the main revenue maker of the gaming industry right now are, well, Game as a Service:

Fortnite, Call Of Duty, EA FC UT, GTA, NBA 2K, Genshin Impact and Destiny 2
(This comes from Europe/US most played chart)

ISony main revenue source could be threatened by many reasons(ABK deal can be one reason)


So how exactly does it play out?

-Just build off your success with first-party singleplayer games. Sony's budgets for singleplayer games actually lincrease compared to 80℅ believe it or not. Maybe they are just a bunch of movie games but casuals eat that shit up.

-Diversify GAAS portofolio. The problem with GAAS is that not many survive after a period of time. Sony's solution is spamming as much turd to the wall and hope one sticked. And just one sticked would increase their budget and revenue sources.

-Working with third party publishers and studios for PS exclusive singleplayers contents .

They could work with many partners. As long as they manage to retain their IP or have long interest with publishers, it gonna be fine. 2024 PS has a bunch of PS exclusives from 3P.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

-Just build off your success with first-party singleplayer games. Sony's budgets for singleplayer games actually lincrease compared to 80℅ believe it or not. Maybe they are just a bunch of movie games but casuals eat that shit up.

The budget increased to bring it in line percentage-wise with certain previous fiscal years. But without knowing the absolute/raw number of funding allocated to software development, we have zero idea if the increase is enough to net more 1P AAA (or even AA) traditional games, or if it means the same number as previous years, or fewer of them (due to inflation, growing budget for games development).

It also isn't known when certain games would have started initial development; a game getting greenlit today that's AA won't be ready for release until at least 2028/2029. That's PS6 territory.

-Diversify GAAS portofolio. The problem with GAAS is that not many survive after a period of time. Sony's solution is spamming as much turd to the wall and hope one sticked. And just one sticked would increase their budget and revenue sources.

But that budget would be cut back some by the money wasted on the failures. Knowing GaaS is such a competitive space and certain genres are heavily saturated, Sony's strategy should be less, not more, and focused on surefire successes. Games like Fairgame$ and Concord stand little chance most likely because even if they're quality, they are completely new IP, and the market for entrenched IP in the FPS GaaS space is stiffer than it was when, say, Apex Legends and VALORANT came onto the scene.

Unless one or two of those big entrenched games sees a sharp decline, the total room capacity for a new entrant to come and get similar presence is extremely low. The customer pool for these games (or any type of game, really) isn't infinite, and neither is their spending power. If Sony want to put out big GaaS titles that have no prior IP brand to attach to, they should be extremely novel in their concept to stand out in the market better.

That's why stuff like Factions 2, Marathon (would be replacing Destiny 2, and it's from extremely well-known dev), etc. work. Why stuff like a GT Sport 2 and MLB The Show GaaS spin-off (for console, PC and mobile) would work. Why stuff like a rhythm game PvPvE/co-op GaaS type title could work. And why stuff like Fairgame$ and Concord will have a much harder time finding an audience, comparatively.

-Working with third party publishers and studios for PS exclusive singleplayers contents .

Honestly, this is primarily what Sony should be doing with the GaaS titles, instead of taking internal 1P teams highly focused on single-player/light MP content and pushing them to do GaaS. Because, in the event their game takes off, chances are likely that studio will shift to doing content upkeep for the GaaS, so you'd get less non-GaaS content from them over time.

Doing GaaS with external devs already tuned to that type of dev model would also allow Sony to acquire them if the GaaS is successful or looks to be shaping up to be a success. That said, yes working with 3P for PS exclusive traditional titles (AAA, AA, new IP, legacy IP, many preferably being games with substantial exclusivity and would likely not have been made without Sony's involvement) is absolutely necessary as well.

Not just to have a steady flow of games, but to also secure positions and standings with those 3P for future partnerships, potential M&As, investments etc. in the face of competitors looking to squeeze Sony out.

 

[JAHGamer]

The problem with PS brand and SIE as a whole is that their portofolio is that their are only singleplayers games. Most of them move consoles sale for Sony and build stronger brand

How is this a problem? This is the only thing that matters

This is strictly what Sony should focus on, create more great single player games, a few co op games, and gaas ONLY where it makes sense like Gran Turismo and MLB. They should diversify with more smaller AA games, not gaas junk that’s 95% likely to fail. These will lead to a larger install base. The larger the install base, the more Sony makes from 3rd party.

Let 3rd party try and fail with live service games and take your 30% cut. Everyone knows selling pickaxes is always more profitable than mining for gold.

No need to impulse react to Xbox, fundamentally nothing has changed.

 

[historia]

How is this a problem? This is the only thing that matters

This is strictly what Sony should focus on, create more great single player games, a few co op games, and gaas ONLY where it makes sense like Gran Turismo and MLB. They should diversify with more smaller AA games, not gaas junk that’s 95% likely to fail. These will lead to a larger install base. The larger the install base, the more Sony makes from 3rd party.

Let 3rd party try and fail with live service games and take your 30% cut. Everyone knows selling pickaxes is always more profitable than mining for gold.

No need to impulse react to Xbox, fundamentally nothing has changed.

How that ABK going for you?

 

[JAHGamer]

How that ABK going for you?

What’s changed with ABK?

CoD is still on PlayStation, they’ll still get 30%
Diablo 5 won’t be out for 10 years
Overwatch 2 is dead (still on ps)
WoW/Starcraft are dead and were never on PlayStation

The studios that made Spyro, Crash, and Tony Hawk have all become CoD support studios

Xbox wasted $70 billion on trash and Sony lost pretty much nothing. Xbox will probably kill CoD and another game will take its place, that will also be on PS.

 

[Say1nMan]

How is this a problem? This is the only thing that matters

This is strictly what Sony should focus on, create more great single player games, a few co op games, and gaas ONLY where it makes sense like Gran Turismo and MLB. They should diversify with more smaller AA games, not gaas junk that’s 95% likely to fail. These will lead to a larger install base. The larger the install base, the more Sony makes from 3rd party.

Let 3rd party try and fail with live service games and take your 30% cut. Everyone knows selling pickaxes is always more profitable than mining for gold.

No need to impulse react to Xbox, fundamentally nothing has changed.

The point that I see brought up a lot about why PS is expanding into GAAS is because the cost of development of AAA games in the industry is balloning out of control and it's ain't stopping anytime soon. As a result, solely relying on selling only single player AAA games isn't enough to maintain your profit margin consistently. But who knows.

 

[voke]

Im all for experimental sony ala PS3 honestly.

 

[Vertigo]

GaaS should be applied where it makes sense and natural. For something like Halo/Destiny, Monster Hunter, Street Fighter, Gran Turismo, etc… it’s a natural evolution of their iterative nature.

However, I don think that means taking TLOU and Horizon and making them mmo-likes and PvP games. You want devs to keep making what they’re best at and want to do. They can want to do something you don’t like of course … so be it.

Nearly all successful online action games have the studio and talent pedigree and history behind them. It’s not like RPG maker BioWare can just turn into a studio that makes an online and action gameplay driven online game.

Furthermore, the gimmick of hero sandbox co-op games like Arkham, Suicide Squad that follow the approach of just having a campaign and cosmestics battlepasses that sure as fuck ain’t it either.

 

[Killer_Sakoman]

The budget increased to bring it in line percentage-wise with certain previous fiscal years. But without knowing the absolute/raw number of funding allocated to software development, we have zero idea if the increase is enough to net more 1P AAA (or even AA) traditional games, or if it means the same number as previous years, or fewer of them (due to inflation, growing budget for games development).

It also isn't known when certain games would have started initial development; a game getting greenlit today that's AA won't be ready for release until at least 2028/2029. That's PS6 territory.



But that budget would be cut back some by the money wasted on the failures. Knowing GaaS is such a competitive space and certain genres are heavily saturated, Sony's strategy should be less, not more, and focused on surefire successes. Games like Fairgame$ and Concord stand little chance most likely because even if they're quality, they are completely new IP, and the market for entrenched IP in the FPS GaaS space is stiffer than it was when, say, Apex Legends and VALORANT came onto the scene.

Unless one or two of those big entrenched games sees a sharp decline, the total room capacity for a new entrant to come and get similar presence is extremely low. The customer pool for these games (or any type of game, really) isn't infinite, and neither is their spending power. If Sony want to put out big GaaS titles that have no prior IP brand to attach to, they should be extremely novel in their concept to stand out in the market better.

That's why stuff like Factions 2, Marathon (would be replacing Destiny 2, and it's from extremely well-known dev), etc. work. Why stuff like a GT Sport 2 and MLB The Show GaaS spin-off (for console, PC and mobile) would work. Why stuff like a rhythm game PvPvE/co-op GaaS type title could work. And why stuff like Fairgame$ and Concord will have a much harder time finding an audience, comparatively.



Honestly, this is primarily what Sony should be doing with the GaaS titles, instead of taking internal 1P teams highly focused on single-player/light MP content and pushing them to do GaaS. Because, in the event their game takes off, chances are likely that studio will shift to doing content upkeep for the GaaS, so you'd get less non-GaaS content from them over time.

Doing GaaS with external devs already tuned to that type of dev model would also allow Sony to acquire them if the GaaS is successful or looks to be shaping up to be a success. That said, yes working with 3P for PS exclusive traditional titles (AAA, AA, new IP, legacy IP, many preferably being games with substantial exclusivity and would likely not have been made without Sony's involvement) is absolutely necessary as well.

Not just to have a steady flow of games, but to also secure positions and standings with those 3P for future partnerships, potential M&As, investments etc. in the face of competitors looking to squeeze Sony out.

I can't go through your thicc wall of text, but I usually agree with you whenever I manage to read what you write

 

[JAHGamer]

The point that I see brought up a lot about why PS is expanding into GAAS is because the cost of development of AAA games in the industry is balloning out of control and it's ain't stopping anytime soon. As a result, solely relying on selling only single player AAA games isn't enough to maintain your profit margin consistently. But who knows.

That would be a problem if PlayStation was purely a publisher….but they’re not. They sell consoles at profit, peripherals at profit, subscription services at profit, and take 30% from 3rd party software sales, microtransactions, and dlc.

And even if their games are expensive and take long to make, they’re still extremely profitable.
Ragnarok cost 200m ~ and generated over 400 million in revenue in its first week and over 700 million in 3 months. Same story with Spider-Man 2. Even if these games only broke even, it’s still a huge W if it pushes console sales.

 

[Yurinka]

OK. Before picking up your pitchforks hear me out.


PS brand is at all time strong since PS2.

The problem with PS brand and SIE as a whole is that their portofolio is that their are only singleplayers games. Most of them move consoles sale for Sony and build stronger brand.

Yup.

After ABK deal annouced, Sony feeled so threatened about one of their big revenue source being chipped away that they acquired Bungie and pivot to GAAS.

Most Sony GaaS were greenlighted years before the ABK deal was announced. Can't remember right now what percentage generated CoD of SIE's revenue, but as I remember was 4-7%, smaller than Sony's growth.

So even if they'd lose it, they wouldn't miss it. And Sony knew CoD can't be profitable without being released on PS, it would mean big loses per game because it's their biggest platform. So basically Jimbo knew CoD was going to remain on PS.

And was less afraid because the ABK acquisition started when Sony already was working to acquire Bungie (who was working on Destiny 2, Marathon, Matter and more), and while Sony already had under developent Condord (shooter by ex-Halo and ex-Destiny devs), Deviation's game (by ex-CoD and ex-other top shooters), Fairgame$ (by ex-Rainbow Six Siege and the back then fastest selling ever new IPs Assassin's Creed and Watchdogs), Helldivers 2, Gran Turismo 7, MLB, etc.

Is it a bad idea?

The thing is the main revenue maker of the gaming industry right now are, well, Game as a Service:

Fortnite, Call Of Duty, EA FC UT, GTA, NBA 2K, Genshin Impact and Destiny 2
(This comes from Europe/US most played chart)

ISony main revenue source could be threatened by many reasons(ABK deal can be one reason)

So how exactly does it play out?

-Just build off your success with first-party singleplayer games. Sony's budgets for singleplayer games actually lincrease compared to 80℅ believe it or not. Maybe they are just a bunch of movie games but casuals eat that shit up.

-Diversify GAAS portofolio. The problem with GAAS is that not many survive after a period of time. Sony's solution is spamming as much turd to the wall and hope one sticked. And just one sticked would increase their budget and revenue sources.

Yep. In the worldwide console industry, mobile gaming indusry and in the worldwide gaming industry addons (mtx, dlc, season passes, battle passes etc.) are now the biggest software revenue source and during years has been the software portion with the biggest growth. Some data from Sony.

Notice that addons (so GaaS) is replacing the revenue coming from game sales. Meaning, that in the long term wouldn't be too smart to continue avoiding GaaS and making only super expensive SP, non-GaaS games.

It's ok continue making SP non-GaaS, but for the long term they -and any other big publisher- need a to have an important presence in the GaaS area.

-Working with third party publishers and studios for PS exclusive singleplayers contents .

They could work with many partners. As long as they manage to retain their IP or have long interest with publishers, it gonna be fine. 2024 PS has a bunch of PS exclusives from 3P.

Yes, Jim Ryan said they were making an extra effort with 3rd parties, and that PS5 will be the PS console with the biggest amount of exclusive games ever. And well, traditionally a big majority of exclusives are always 3rd party. So make sure that every year during the whole generation they'll continue having a great 3rd party exclusive lineup of both AAA games and indies.

 

[Killer_Sakoman]

That would be a problem if PlayStation was purely a publisher….but they’re not. They sell consoles at profit, peripherals at profit, subscription services at profit, and take 30% from 3rd party software sales, microtransactions, and dlc.

And even if their games are expensive and take long to make, they’re still extremely profitable.
Ragnarok cost 200m ~ and generated over 400 million in revenue in its first week and over 700 million in 3 months. Same story with Spider-Man 2. Even if these games only broke even, it’s still a huge W if it pushes console sales.

Thats exactly what I am telling people. Sony already makes huge money from 3rd party GaaS. Their AAA games already profitable in their 1st week of release. Sony has to spend more on AAA and keep them exclusive to attract people to their echo system and keep making even more money out of 3rd party.

 

[Bryank75]

Not the way they did it though...

They shouldn't have had a big announcement, they should have focused on 3-5 really targeted GAAS games... FPS for instance and a few more.

But they went too big, with unproven studios in that arena. They had their premier studios pivot to areas where they had no idea and now there is frustration and delay and time lost. No roadmap, few big exclusives to look forward to.

3rd party has tons of GAAS games and Sony doesn't need to compete with all of them...

They need to make the games that their fans expect and what propelled them to popularity during the PS4 and rescued them during PS3.

They could have a had a nice little selection of GAAS on the side, while they really focused on expanding their AAA story game offering and elevating the PSStudios name...instead of polluting it with no-name studios like Firesprite and Haven games etc.

They should have been adding top level studios with prestige IP's to PSStudios.... making PS5 totally unavoidable.

 

[Zzero]

The budget increased to bring it in line percentage-wise with certain previous fiscal years. But without knowing the absolute/raw number of funding allocated to software development, we have zero idea if the increase is enough to net more 1P AAA (or even AA) traditional games, or if it means the same number as previous years, or fewer of them (due to inflation, growing budget for games development).

It also isn't known when certain games would have started initial development; a game getting greenlit today that's AA won't be ready for release until at least 2028/2029. That's PS6 territory.



But that budget would be cut back some by the money wasted on the failures. Knowing GaaS is such a competitive space and certain genres are heavily saturated, Sony's strategy should be less, not more, and focused on surefire successes. Games like Fairgame$ and Concord stand little chance most likely because even if they're quality, they are completely new IP, and the market for entrenched IP in the FPS GaaS space is stiffer than it was when, say, Apex Legends and VALORANT came onto the scene.

Unless one or two of those big entrenched games sees a sharp decline, the total room capacity for a new entrant to come and get similar presence is extremely low. The customer pool for these games (or any type of game, really) isn't infinite, and neither is their spending power. If Sony want to put out big GaaS titles that have no prior IP brand to attach to, they should be extremely novel in their concept to stand out in the market better.

That's why stuff like Factions 2, Marathon (would be replacing Destiny 2, and it's from extremely well-known dev), etc. work. Why stuff like a GT Sport 2 and MLB The Show GaaS spin-off (for console, PC and mobile) would work. Why stuff like a rhythm game PvPvE/co-op GaaS type title could work. And why stuff like Fairgame$ and Concord will have a much harder time finding an audience, comparatively.



Honestly, this is primarily what Sony should be doing with the GaaS titles, instead of taking internal 1P teams highly focused on single-player/light MP content and pushing them to do GaaS. Because, in the event their game takes off, chances are likely that studio will shift to doing content upkeep for the GaaS, so you'd get less non-GaaS content from them over time.

Doing GaaS with external devs already tuned to that type of dev model would also allow Sony to acquire them if the GaaS is successful or looks to be shaping up to be a success. That said, yes working with 3P for PS exclusive traditional titles (AAA, AA, new IP, legacy IP, many preferably being games with substantial exclusivity and would likely not have been made without Sony's involvement) is absolutely necessary as well.

Not just to have a steady flow of games, but to also secure positions and standings with those 3P for future partnerships, potential M&As, investments etc. in the face of competitors looking to squeeze Sony out.

I don't think Marathon is a Destiny replacement, in Asia, where GaaS is strongest, its not at all odd for a group to have multiple GaaS ongoing at once. Or even in the US with, for instance, all of Blizzard's ongoing titles.

 

[flaccidsnake]

I'm happy to have Sony making AAA online games again. One of my favorite PS3 exclusives was MAG, which was basically a GaaS. I can tell because my MAG disc is completely useless and there's no way to play the game anymore. Also Zipper was shut down, another feature of many GaaS games.

 

[historia]

Not the way they did it though...

They shouldn't have had a big announcement, they should have focused on 3-5 really targeted GAAS games... FPS for instance and a few more.

But they went too big, with unproven studios in that arena. They had their premier studios pivot to areas where they had no idea and now there is frustration and delay and time lost. No roadmap, few big exclusives to look forward to.

3rd party has tons of GAAS games and Sony doesn't need to compete with all of them...

They need to make the games that their fans expect and what propelled them to popularity during the PS4 and rescued them during PS3.

They could have a had a nice little selection of GAAS on the side, while they really focused on expanding their AAA story game offering and elevating the PSStudios name...instead of polluting it with no-name studios like Firesprite and Haven games etc.

They should have been adding top level studios with prestige IP's to PSStudios.... making PS5 totally unavoidable.

I mean every publishers got a big GAAS. Take2 got NBA 2K, EA got Apex, FUT, Ubisoft got Rainbow6 and Epic got Fortnite

Hell even Nintendo got Pokemon franchises, which is a GAAS in disguise.

The problem is there is a high chance they could be bought out, and there would be nothing Sony could do to stop that.


Singleplayer wise, I think Sony doing the moneyhatting strategy well but could suffer from the same problem.

I

 

[historia]

What’s changed with ABK?

CoD is still on PlayStation, they’ll still get 30%
Diablo 5 won’t be out for 10 years
Overwatch 2 is dead (still on ps)
WoW/Starcraft are dead and were never on PlayStation

The studios that made Spyro, Crash, and Tony Hawk have all become CoD support studios

Xbox wasted $70 billion on trash and Sony lost pretty much nothing. Xbox will probably kill CoD and another game will take its place, that will also be on PS.

Yea, I think the ABK may not play like what MShit wants.

ABK value is inflated. King is mobile, Blizzard got WoW and other games are PC centric, then there is Activision, the main console pie.

The problem is Activision is that they are the COD machine, built for the exactly one purpose. For 10 years COD could go irrelevant, who knows?

And about improving output, does Phil and Booty gonna do, force them to make other games? Slow down COD machine? That's suicide.

Xbox will remains dead as it is right now.

 

[Abdizur]

Sony going after live-service games makes totally sense. It always made sense. You just have to know what you're talking about and follow the industry and Sony's earnings reports. PlayStation already has successful 1st party teams for singleplayer games. But these singleplayer games are more expensive than ever before. Games like TLOU2, GOW Ragnarok, Spider-Man 2 or Horizon Forbidden West cost $200 - $250 million dollars.

Sony needs a few successful live service games to ease the pain of high development costs.
It's pretty obvious why Sony has so many GaaS in the pipeline.
Sony needs some successful live-service games as soon as possible. It's why their big push for GaaS is crucial for them. It's mind blowing some fans are hoping for them not to do it.

Everyone always talks about revenue. Yeah, SIE is generating a lot of revenue. But what about profit? You know, the money that actually goes to your bank account.

PlayStation's profits are a joke because the costs are out of control. You can't just go after singleplayer games and nothing else. You have to do BOTH. And that's fine. Sony's singleplayer teams are still making singleplayer games, while newly formed teams and newly acquired studios are working on new live-service games.



So maybe think before you complain about Sony's live-service push all the time.
They need better profits. Not every 1st party singleplayer game sells like Spider-Man, Horizon, God of War or TLOU. Returnal, Demon's Souls Remake, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, or Sackboy: A Big Adenture surely did not.
Fifty-Fifty is the golden middle. One half singleplayer games and one half live-service/multiplayer games. Good for Sony and good for singleplayer AND multiplayer/live-service fans.

They can't just do a Microsoft and buy the most successful live-service games in this industry for ~$80 billion. So they are trying to make new ones. It will be a difficult road (just like not all Sony singleplayer games were good or successful) and some games will fail, but that is okay. As long as a few games stick and make profit.
All the "THeY dOn'T mAkE gAmEs fOr tHe CoRe AuDiEnCe aNyMoRe" takes are stupid.

The same goes for PlayStation PC and PlayStation Mobile. Small teams port some ~2 year old games to PC for some "free money" makes sense.

BETTER PROFITS! Sony is trying to right the financial ship.

 

[JAHGamer]

Everyone always talks about revenue. Yeah, SIE is generating a lot of revenue. But what about profit? You know, the money that actually goes to your bank account.

PlayStation's profits are a joke because the costs are out of control.

you lost all credibility with this graph

I told you all awhile ago that DeekeTweaks misinformation was insidious, we see it first hand now. These idiots are so desperate to cling on to that fake graph.

 

[Abdizur]

you lost all credibility with this graph, you must be a brain dead Xbox fanboy don’t forget to breathe

The hell is wrong with you?