I mean...new meta since March 2020.
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Sony confirms Horizon Zero Dawn is coming to PC
It’s a big shift in Sony’s strategy.
www.theverge.com
PlayStation co-CEO Hideaki Nishino says consoles will remain the core of their business
- Thread starter Puff
- Start date
I mean...new meta since March 2020.
www.theverge.com
That would be all of the country-specific reports we have information for - I posted a number of threads about 2023 earlier this year. PC 'growth' is centred around freemium and gatcha models. There's not enough of a user base there to sustain AAA gaming, and what is there is a drop in the bucket compared to consoles. Games that appeal to China, where the plurality of the PC/steam market is located, like WuKong, are the exception to the rule.
Like Mobile? howcome that's the growing segment while PC is supposedly declining?
Well like some others said, SIE are trying to expand the console in other territories like, say, China. But this isn't really so much as expanding their TAM with console as it is leveraging those markets to make up for stalls or drops in other regions like certain parts of Europe and Japan. It's a lateral transfer of chunks of the TAM, not growth on top of what they were already peaking at before.
But the funny part is, they are already soft-gating total potential growth in those markets by also simultaneously pushing into PC, mainly by leveraging the exact same library of offerings as their own console. If the PC push were with specific PC-centric exclusives (say, a new EverQuest MMO), then things would be very different. But it isn't, so in any case where they're using using similar/same games across multiple platforms, some degree of cannibalization is bound to occur.
This is only true for a very small number of GAAS IP; if what you just said were true of GAAS in general, Concord wouldn't have died in 3 weeks.
They already had some GAAS hits if you're including live-service/limited live-service. MLB The Show, GT7, Ghost of Tsushima's multiplayer update mode, and in the past stuff like Factions.
Sony simply did not cultivate or iterate on these effectively. MLB The Show should've had a mobile F2P version years ago. GT7's multiplayer could've been morphed into a separate GT Sport 2 GAAS prioritizing console & PC. Ghost's multiplayer should've been the foundation for a samurai/combat-based live service that could address the mistakes of For Honor and carve out a new space in the market. Factions should've been remade as an add-on and standalone product to/from TLOU2 and TLOU Remake by 2021/2022 latest, then phased over into Factions 2 by now or into 2025.
Sony should've also had contingencies lined up for Helldivers 2 in case it took off the way it did, to ensure enough meaningful content came out regularly to keep the hype going. They should've bit their tongue on the PSN thing and left it optional for Steam users vs. waiting until reaching peak popularity to force it and create a debacle of their own making that drove down player counts and sales.
Arguably, if they weren't distracted with trying to rush out Concord just a few months later, they would've had the clarity to prioritize properly supporting Helldivers 2. Instead Concord is dead after three weeks and they're hoping to revitalize Helldivers 2 with the next update, after striking gold and then letting greed & nearsightedness get the better of them.
OK but someone should've stepped up and said that pushing out 12 GAAS in a short span of time would inevitably lead to cannibalization, and a lack of focus on hits where needed because resources would be strained in pumping the next GAAS out the door.
Also this "GAAS need the biggest userbase" argument has its equivalent for non-GAAS games: that one is called "sales". So where is this idea SIE, focused on what they seem to be prioritizing more and more, wouldn't apply this same metric guiding their GAAS strategy, to their non-GAAS?
You were not saying 9 years even just a couple weeks ago so
Most of those 3P PSVR2 games were late ports. So a VR headset already costing more than other major market options (not an issue in and of itself), already needed a $400-$500 console on top of that to use (potentially a problem in itself), got late ports with maybe some visual improvements that most VR users outside of PlayStation didn't care for (as seen by sales of PSVR2 vs Oculus)?
Yeah, that's some 32X or Atari Jaguar kind of 'ish.
It's cute you think wireless PSVR2 is happening when that would require a whole new swath of headsets to be produced, for a device selling very few in the first place. Unless you think they can do a firmware update for existing headsets to function wirelessly. But if that's the case, why would such an update slow down 1P studios?
Speaking of that, what other projects are 1P working on with "way more sales potential" than the next big 1P AAA blockbuster? A GAAS? You mean a GAAS that has a 50/50 chance of having been cancelled? If it's one of those studios, and they aren't working on a GAAS and aren't picking back up work on a traditional AAA or AA game, what else would they be doing?
Well there aren't many options outside of handling PC ports, something you'd like to pretend involves nothing from the main 1P studios at all even if games like Wolverine already show that to not be the case (speaking of, how else do you explain Wolverine having a PC build so quickly after the ransomware hack, except Insomniac already starting dev on that port? You can't populate the code with missing Windows & DX12U API calls that quickly unless those were already there BEFORE the hack!).
I want SIE to succeed and be better than they ever have been in the console space, so I don't know what you're talking about with "dooming and glooming".
However, I simply refuse to agree that such a thing is only measured by how much money SIE are pocketing, unlike yourself. Because I see and care more about this industry in terms of it as an art form and what gaming can provide creatively as an experience. I'm not a suit and I don't run my mouth for suits, so apparently that means all my criticisms are doom & gloom for SIE somehow
That's the problem. They're chasing that 1%. Everyone wants to be the next Fortnite. And it's not possible. Problem is, suits just see the possible golden goose.
Instead of making a highly profitable SP AAA or even AA game, they'll spend hundreds of millions on shitty GaaS, hoping they hit one out of the park.
Highly Profitable AAA works only on Playstation and Switch.
PC Gamers don't like paying for games that much, especially not full price, if the game is not online or an MMORPG.
Sales Numbers on PC alone for AAA Games would not justify development.
Steam has 120 Million Users, most of them playing some Online/F2P Game.
Explain the Wukong and Helldivers 2 numbers on PC then? or Elden Ring?
Sheesh, where do you guys get this narrative from? How do you think Steam as a platform managed to live for 20 years if PC gamers were so averse to the concept of paying for games?
When someone say the PS console market or console market isn’t growing does this only applies to PS & not Nintendo? Why does no one says that Nintendo console market isn’t growing which they’ve from a sales perspective been selling the same amount of consoles ever gen.
Do we expect Nintendo to release Pokemon & Mario on PC, mobile or PS? Because I don’t see Nintendo ever doing that instead I see Nintendo increasing output of games that exclusively release on Nintendo to increase profit & growth by creating new ip that cater to a younger audience I also see them use parks, cross media & merchandise/toys to build & grow Nintendo markets instead of diminishing there platform & storefront where they get 100% & this has been confirmed by them by buying a port studio but not to port there games to PC, mobile or PS but they bought a port studio to bring in more 3rd party to Nintendo to further bolster the Nintendo platform & storefront making Nintendo the default/defacto place to play games similar to PC/Steam. This is something PS isn’t doing games like Once human, Lethal Company, Bodycam & many other 3rd party not available on PS making PC & Steam have these default exclusives.
Do we expect Nintendo to release Pokemon & Mario on PC, mobile or PS? Because I don’t see Nintendo ever doing that instead I see Nintendo increasing output of games that exclusively release on Nintendo to increase profit & growth by creating new ip that cater to a younger audience I also see them use parks, cross media & merchandise/toys to build & grow Nintendo markets instead of diminishing there platform & storefront where they get 100% & this has been confirmed by them by buying a port studio but not to port there games to PC, mobile or PS but they bought a port studio to bring in more 3rd party to Nintendo to further bolster the Nintendo platform & storefront making Nintendo the default/defacto place to play games similar to PC/Steam. This is something PS isn’t doing games like Once human, Lethal Company, Bodycam & many other 3rd party not available on PS making PC & Steam have these default exclusives.
Why Sony doesn't release camera lenses for Canon? They are missing alot of revenue in not doing so.
Don't waste your time. Been there, done that. It's useless. Over the last 20 years we have seen:
Console manufacturers exiting the market (SEGA)
Nintendo opting out of the power game first and home console second.
PS exiting the portable segment (and no, that portal thing is not a true portable)
Xbox selling less and less since the late 360 days
PS console sales peaking with the PS2 and almost flat lining PS4 vs PS5
All in a context where videogames went from nerdy past time to an industry bigger than Hollywood.
On the other hand we got the PC gaming industry that was dead outside of MMOs before Steam took off.
A platform that for example received no japanese games until late 7th generation. That today gets all games outside of vanilla ware and some others.
Console first parties putting games on PC. On Steam and other platforms. Big players like Epic and Tencent wanting a piece of the pie. Steam breaking user records each year.
But yeah, It's PC gaming thats dying. Sure Jan. In 2005 that would have made some sense. These days...
Any 1st and 3rd party sales data. With a few exceptions.
Nah, they an early work to grow during the PS4 gen and China and Saudi Arabia increased their position in their country rankings. From a couple years ago:
More recently, with efforts during PS5 gen supporting stuff like PS China Hero Project, Wukong or Mihoyo stuff etc. pretty likely they kept improving there.
We know their PS console (not only PS5, also includes PS4) userbase is at record levels from official data, and from leaked Insomniac stuff we know that at least in the early years the new user rate for PS5 was around 50%.
So their console userbase is growing, and on top of that they have the players from non-PS platforms who aren't double dipping. So their userbase is growing, both in total and in PS console only.
It's true in general, GaaS generate the majority of the game revenue and individually they generate more than non-GaaS titles because GaaS have more addons where the player can spend money. Like in any market, in gaming most of the revenue is made by the top players. In this case dozen or two companies make around 80% of the gaming revenue.
The Concord case of a GaaS dying in a few days is an extremely rare exception, specially coming from a top publisher.
But yes, many GaaS titles fail just like many non-GaaS titles also fail. In fact there are way more non-GaaS games, so there are way more non-GaaS titles that fail (like the thousands of indies released every year that almost nobody plays).
GaaS = Live service game
MLB and GT7 are GaaS. GoT isn't.
Online multiplayer doesn't imply that a game is a GaaS. Live service games are those designed to get periodical post launch support with new features, content rebalancing, fixes up to whatever makes sense according to its performance and hopefully long term.
A game getting a handful dlcs or a game mode after launch doesn't mean GaaS. This is just some isolated DLC to keep the game fresh and make some extra money. GaaS is when they add or change way more stuff over time or keeps changing/evolving, and often (not always) has stuff like microtransactions, battle passes, gatcha, etc. Things like Fortnite, No Man's Sky, FIFA, Tekken, ZZZ, GT7, Destiny 2, etc.
They are taking longer than I expected, but they are working on their mobile business. I never thought before about it but MLB is a good fit for it if they adapt the gameplay of that version for a more casual audience and controls.
As shown on its performance, I think that it was a good idea to go back to include a more classic single player experience in GT7 instead of focusing that much in the more MP/eSports GT Sport approach. I think that in general all games should have a solid SP experience independently if they have MP or not. I think MP only games are a mistake but I understand they make MP only games because to make games is too expensive so many companies focus on what gives them money and where their players are focused.
Regarding PC, Yamauchi explored it and rejected it. I assume because of the difficulty of ensuring a steady solid, equal and fair experience to all players, plus because of all the work required to support all the accesories and because of cheaters. But well, maybe Jimbo or Hermen told them to keep some games PS only like GT.
I didn't play a lot but it was fun and yes, there's GaaS potential there. But they have Sucker Punch focused on SP, pretty likely because they considered that for now they already had enough GaaS with the dozen ones of the initiative.
I assume that after releasing that dozen they'll rest a bit of releasing new GaaS for a while, and regarding GaaS during some years they'll mainly only release new stuff for the ones that succeded.
And then some years later there will be another batch of some GaaS, but smaller because some top performing ones will continue there.
I think Sucker Punch is making GoT2, and will make GoT3 after it or a new IP. But in the same way despite growing, Sucker Punch apparently wasn't included in the first batch of GaaS, they weren't also included in the first batch of studios who grew from having 1 team to having 2-4 teams. But I think they'll do it in the second, like Bend, Asobi and MM if their next project is successful (and Haven too if their game is successful).
So I see them that after releasing GoT2 (SP only) they may grow to have 3 teams at the same time: GoT3 (SP only), GoT GaaS (hiring top experts and maybe codeveloping it with some top GaaS team) and new IP.
I think what they are doing is to rehash most of the models, animations, weapons, backgrounds, music, etc. they had from TLOU Online for a SP only TLOU3. That would be the smartest thing if they don't want to go MP/GaaS.
Because nowadays to make games is so expensive and in a AAA level MP makes only sense if GaaS.
The players who complained about having to spend half a minute to create a PSN account and login are childish morons, it isn't Sony's fault. All Sony GaaS must use a PSN account to track info they need. In fact -as they say in all their trailers of stuff released in PC, even in the SP only games- PSN should be mandatory to all their PC games. There wasn't anything wrong from them in that topic.
Something Sony must address (and are working on it) is to increase the list of countries with a PSN store/oficially supported. Not only for Helldivers 2 or for PC, but also for console. I understand that these over 150 countries combined don't generate even a 10% of the PC/console revenue and that pretty likely requires a lot of paperwork and isn't profitable. But it should run everywhere in the world (including countries sanctioned by USA) in an easy way (it is already possible).
Helldivers 2 had a huge active userbase and retention and they kept losing it mainly due to dumb rebalancing decisions included in the middle of great rebalancing decisions, new content and features and fixes. They are apparently start to solve this in the upcoming big update, which full release notes we'll know in 3 days but sounds promising so far. It won't recover all the lost userbase, but a portion should go back.
Helldivers 2 and Concord are totally unrelated projects developed by two totally different teams. Concord had absolutely nothing to do with Helldivers 2 losing players because of bad decisions taken at Arrowhead.
12 GaaS in the span of 5+ years is barely 2 or 3 games per year. And each one focused into a different niche, most of them to completely different player types. One was for VR, another is a racing game, another a baseball game, other was a coop PvE TPS, etc.
Sure, like in non-GaaS titles (or in any business) some will be cancelled, some will flop and other ones will succed, maybe in a few cases with a bit of overlap. They know that and for that reason they put money on many projects, to later keep only the best performing ones. To secure a few great performing ones they must invest in way more, because even having the most talented people in earth projects can and will fail (as we saw in Concord, made by ex-Halo/Destiny/CoD/etc devs).
12 GaaS was less than half of the first party projects they have been developing. They grew to make these GaaS acquiring, signing 2nd parties or hiring people to open a new dedicated MP/GaaS teams if they already didn't have them before (London did PS Home and ND made several MP modes).
The investment made on GaaS was on top of the one made on non-GaaS, it didn't replace resources. As happened with the PC, they got new dedicated teams to make the ports. The investment put on GaaS or PC isn't removed from non-GaaS titles for console.
GaaS having the biggest userbase isn't an argument, it's a fact that can be doublechecked in many places. In the charts that split the gaming userbase by platform showing that chunk for mobile. In the ranking of most played games or CCUs, in charts that split the revenue sources of the gaming or console markets, or even in the one from PS.
Like any big company in any business area, they look at the market to see what works best (in this case GaaS), take note and try to invest there. It isn't any secret or anything new.
Regarding non-GaaS, they always have been doing that. They take note of what it works and invest on it. As an example, Sony saw Nintendo makes a ton of money with platformers. So Sony decided that one of the genres where they want to grow is platformers, so invested on Astro Bot.
Here you have many posts where I said that since last year, and here some posts where I said that in February.You were not saying 9 years even just a couple weeks ago so
VR is a small market, so for a 3rd party unless the game is funded by the platform maker it's a suicide to make an exclusive game. So most are multiplatforms or late ports. Yes, some late ports people were asking for. In the same way that people keep asking for some old ports of PSVR1 games.
Inflation adjusted PSVR2 was cheaper than the kit needed to play PSVR1 was needed at launch.
PSVR2 is cheaper than the equivalent options, and has a better hardware than most of them.
It's selling very few according to your ass. According to Sony, sold better than PSVR1 launch aligned on its launch window and some months after that they said again they were happy with its sales. That's all the info we have.
The wireless version of the device comes from a leak that had all the other new (PSVR2) info it provided correct, and a a related icon has been shown in the most recent PS5 OS update. Meaning, it's release won't be too far.
That leak did say they were designing a wired and a wireless version of the headset, and that the wiresless one would be released later. So PSVR2 was designed like that since the start.
The slowdown I think it is because they have a limited amount of budget and resources, and after releasing some 1st party titles they thought that it was better to put these resources in PS5 games, because they make more money than PSVR2, which they may have considered is well enough served with 3rd party stuff for a certain period of time.
And well, because to make games requires time. I think they may time the release of the second batch of 1st party games more or less with the release of the wireless version to give it extra support.
If I have to bet, I think the wireless version will be released in the first half of the natural year 2025 and obviously will be more expensive than the standard device. Because as happened in PS5 Pro, if you add more stuff the price goes up.
The revenue potential of a AAA is higher in GaaS than in non-GaaS. That's the reason of why all big publishers have been investing in GaaS in recent years.
Games have been cancelled or tanking in sales since the '70s, it isn't anything exclusive from GaaS. There are way more non-GaaS titles that got cancelled or that tanked in sales than GaaS. Not only in Sony, but in the whole gaming market.
I'm a dev and I know what a porting team like Nixxes, Iron Galaxy etc does. Why do you think Sony pay them if they don't do nothing?
What it was leaked from Wolverine wasn't the PC port of the game, it was a couple of WIP vertical slices. And as I told you many times, console exclusive games are made and tested in PCs during most of the development process, particularly in the early stages. They testing their WIP vertical slice on a PC doesn't mean they are making the PC port.
Nintendo Switch games also run on PCs while under development, and that doesn't mean they are making the PC port.
Nah, you want them to get stuck making non-GaaS full console exclusive games, which in the long term would be a suicide and you know it.I want SIE to succeed and be better than they ever have been in the console space, so I don't know what you're talking about with "dooming and glooming".
However, I simply refuse to agree that such a thing is only measured by how much money SIE are pocketing, unlike yourself. Because I see and care more about this industry in terms of it as an art form and what gaming can provide creatively as an experience. I'm not a suit and I don't run my mouth for suits, so apparently that means all my criticisms are doom & gloom for SIE somehow
You want them to fail just because you can't stand that people in other platforms can play the same games that are in your platform, in the same way you can't stand that Sony makes games of players with other tastes different than yours.
That's the reason of why people like you keep spamming Sony doom and gloom derailing every single Sony thread with lies and non-issues that you perfectly known are lies and non-issues because I told you so a gazillion times showing even their related metrics and quotes confirming what I say.
As an example, the quote in the OP of the fucking CEO of SIE saying AGAIN like many times their higher ups said before, that their gaming focus will continue being consoles. But you refuse to accept it because you continue stuck in your fantasies.
Sure, PC players don't pay. These over $40B (almost a quarter of the total game revenue), maybe grew in trees or something:
Sad how the CEOs left a PlayStation are so blind and incompetent.
They are not growing with PC, they are just losing on the other side as more and more people abandon their platform.
Xbox also wanted to grow everywhere with PC, mobile, subs and cloud but people are not stupid. If you want to go everywhere at the same time, you lose your way.
You're not actually reaching anybody.
They are not growing with PC, they are just losing on the other side as more and more people abandon their platform.
Xbox also wanted to grow everywhere with PC, mobile, subs and cloud but people are not stupid. If you want to go everywhere at the same time, you lose your way.
You're not actually reaching anybody.
what narrative, can PC guys stop with the same few games from hundreds released? no one cares about tiniest minority.
first, from 1st and 3rd party sales data.
second, from mouth of the developers, who multiple times said that without consoles, AAA, AA gaming would be impossible. probably most indies too.
Steam's meagre revenues are largely driven by the genres I mentioned. Your outliers are explained by being games popular enough to even get the penny-pinching poors that make up the PC user base to open their wallets. They are, as I've already pre-empted, the exception to the rule.
Seriously, look up the difference between PSN revenue and Steam. Worlds apart. And that's with a fairly sizeable difference in users, in favour of steam. The fact is console users are more affluent and are keeping AAA gaming afloat.
A huge chunk of that money comes from Microtransations and Online-Services.Sure, PC players don't pay. These over $40B (almost a quarter of the total game revenue), maybe grew in trees or something:
