PlayStation Has Acquired Firewalk Studios

[Johnic]

As a consumer, this is just another no name studio with zero IPs to their name. Meanwhile, MS is getting some of the biggest IPs in gaming.

I get the talent acquisition is important but so are IPs. Getting to play yet another game as a service new IP doesn't excite me. Losing access to more IPs, on the other hand, makes me annoyed at Sony.

P.S.

Sorry for the little rant.

 

[voke]

5 years of development already means the game could launch very soon!

 

[Firefly]

Is Firewalk the studio that's rumored to be working on a Horizon live service game that looks like Immortals Fenyx Rising? Or is that a different studio.

im pretty sure it was leaked that guerrilla themselves were making it

 

[Nhomnhom]

Not surprising, Sony clearly have a pattern to how they are doing this, they usually buy long time partners or studios that they just helped set up.

Meanwhile, their Japanese studio count is still stuck at 2. I think they need to balance this a little bit by acquiring a big dev there, a publisher or by starting new studios.

 

[AshHunter216]

As a consumer, this is just another no name studio with zero IPs to their name. Meanwhile, MS is getting some of the biggest IPs in gaming.

I get the talent acquisition is important but so are IPs. Getting to play yet another game as a service new IP doesn't excite me. Losing access to more IPs, on the other hand, makes me annoyed at Sony.

P.S.

Sorry for the little rant.

Pretty sure this has been in the works for a while now and isn't meant to be a response to stuff like ABK. Anything like that would take longer to happen.

 

[peter42O]

im pretty sure it was leaked that guerrilla themselves were making it

Oh, okay. Even better. Thanks.

 

[Firefly]

They bought bungie, haven, savage and now firewalk. All those studios fit in sony's pc/mobile strategy so i wouldn't hold my breath for any SP studio acquisitions any time soon.

 

[Nhomnhom]

As a consumer, this is just another no name studio with zero IPs to their name. Meanwhile, MS is getting some of the biggest IPs in gaming.

I get the talent acquisition is important but so are IPs. Getting to play yet another game as a service new IP doesn't excite me. Losing access to more IPs, on the other hand, makes me annoyed at Sony.

P.S.

Sorry for the little rant.

Nothing wrong with this move, Sony setting up new studios then acquiring them is a positive thing. Organic growth as Jim Ryan would put it.

Buying or not buying a publisher is a different matter, going by how aggressive MS has been it's almost inevitable that PlayStation would have to make some big moves of their own but we don't even know if Sony has their back in going for it.

 

[Puff]

Another live service studio

 

[FatKaz]

As a consumer, this is just another no name studio with zero IPs to their name. Meanwhile, MS is getting some of the biggest IPs in gaming.

I get the talent acquisition is important but so are IPs. Getting to play yet another game as a service new IP doesn't excite me. Losing access to more IPs, on the other hand, makes me annoyed at Sony.

P.S.

Sorry for the little rant.

I think with FPS market they don't have many options for big acquisitons so this is good.

But yeah defintley they need a big pub soon.

I think one thing folks need to understand is these smaller acquisitons are small risk with a chance of a huge payout.

 

[Deleted member 417]

The other day we had the story about the senator pushing Sony to reveal their acquisition plans.

Is this Sony getting ahead of the game before they are forced to show who they are buying?

I hope acquisitions were not part of their summer showcase, or MS could deal a PR blow to Sony.

 

[Nhomnhom]

They bought bungie, haven, savage and now firewalk. All those studios fit in sony's pc/mobile strategy so i wouldn't hold my breath for any SP studio acquisitions any time soon.

Well, hopefully that means their other studios get to focus on single player game but I doubt it. It does look like a big shift in the direction of multiplayer games.

The other day we had the story about the senator pushing Sony to reveal their acquisition plans.

Is this Sony getting ahead of the game before they are forced to show who they are buying?

I hope acquisitions were not part of their summer showcase, or MS could deal a PR blow to Sony.

Sony hasn't announced a single acquisition on stage, they are not MS, they have at least some self awareness.

 

[EDMIX]

Sony really gearing up for a online future.

From a "meh" online effort in 2006, to becoming an online giant. Respect.

 

[AshHunter216]

The other day we had the story about the senator pushing Sony to reveal their acquisition plans.

Is this Sony getting ahead of the game before they are forced to show who they are buying?

I hope acquisitions were not part of their summer showcase, or MS could deal a PR blow to Sony.

I don't think one senator can force them to hand over all of their plans. They could try a subpoena, but they'd have to convince a judge that they actually need all of that.

 

[Deleted member 223]

There is a common denominator from all of these acquisitions.

First Person Shooter Talent in spades.

Not only is Bungie in house now but previous heads/producers who have left Bungie are also all in house as well as Sony has acquired their studio off-shoots. COD devs too.

It's a "dream team" agglomeration of FPS devs and top managerial class when looked at as a whole. Genre subset more specifically tending to sci-fi FPS.

These are quality buys that should be looked at not individually but as the sum of its parts. Certain acquisitions in the UK are the ones I'm sort of indifferent about...

Remember, SONY only needs 1 GAAS hit out of them to make up in order of multitudes what they've invested in all of them combined. Destiny being a constant ace in the hole.

 

[One eyed jacks]

Deviation Games is next.

Sony is getting just about ALL the new talent working for them. Meanwhile MS buying old, dusty irrelevant IPs that are on life support

Talent will always gravitate back to Sony no matter how much money microsoft throws around.

As a consumer, this is just another no name studio with zero IPs to their name. Meanwhile, MS is getting some of the biggest IPs in gaming.

I get the talent acquisition is important but so are IPs. Getting to play yet another game as a service new IP doesn't excite me. Losing access to more IPs, on the other hand, makes me annoyed at Sony.

P.S.

Sorry for the little rant.

IP’s are meaningless if the talent that made them great leaves, just ask halo.

 

[Entropi]

Deja vu?

 

[Swift_Star]

So this means it’s pretty clear that ABK will go though and Sony finally has settled with it huh?
So now Sony can finally continue the M&A and maybe announce their bigger deals when ABK is officially finalised.

Not really, this is pretty tame, they have no IP under their name.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Guess Sony have decided to move on from the ABK deal and start to boost their own first party. Hoping for something out of Japan next.

If they're sticking to just developers, Arc System Works or Vanillaware would be great picks, if not both. But if we're talking publishers, well, that potential opens up a lot more.

As a consumer, this is just another no name studio with zero IPs to their name. Meanwhile, MS is getting some of the biggest IPs in gaming.

I get the talent acquisition is important but so are IPs. Getting to play yet another game as a service new IP doesn't excite me. Losing access to more IPs, on the other hand, makes me annoyed at Sony.

P.S.

Sorry for the little rant.

I get the feeling Sony are going for a balanced approach, so I wouldn't be surprised if more known devs and a big publisher or two are in the pipeline.

Honestly, if I were in charge of their M&A strategy, I'd do the following:

[M&A - Developers]

-Arc System Works (in-house fighting game talent)​

​

-Vanillaware (high-quality 2D action-adventure RPG content, great fit for certain legacy PS IP)​

​

-Deviation Games​

​

-Ember Lab​

​

-Shift Up (Stellar Blade dev)​

[M&A - Publishers]

-Capcom (lots of valuable IP, in-house fighting game talent, big MMO asset in Monster Hunter, etc.)​

​

-Square Enix (Final Fantasy, lots of valuable IP that could due with new installments like Einhander, Parasite Eve, etc.)​

[Investments (Financial & Share Purchases)]

-Kadokawa/From Software​

​

-EA​

​

-Take Two​

​

-Ubisoft​

​

-CDPR​

​

-Bandai Namco​

​

-Koei Tecmo​

​

-Devolver Digital​

​

-Sega Atlus​

​

-Konami​

​

-Epic​

​

-Pearl Abyss​

Some of these companies they would obviously want to invest in more/buy more shares in than others, if the shares are available to buy. Take Two, for example, would be a higher-priority investment target than Sega-Atlus, especially if Sony acquired Capcom and/or Square-Enix. The point of the investments and share purchases is so that Sony has key investments in key 3P partners, to have some say in case competitors try to purchase these companies, among other things.

 

[Nhomnhom]

There is a common denominator from all of these acquisitions.

First Person Shooter Talent in spades.

Not only is Bungie in house now but previous heads/producers who have left Bungie are also all in house as well as Sony has acquired their studio off-shoots. COD devs too.

It's a FPS "dream team" agglomeration of FPS devs and top managerial class when looked at as a whole. Genre subset more specifically tending to sci-fi FPS.

These are quality buys that should be looked at not individually but as the sum of its parts. Certain acquisitions in the UK are the ones I'm sort of indifferent about...

Remember, SONY only needs 1 GAAS hit out of them to make up in order of multitudes what they've invested in all of them combined. Destiny being a constant ace in the hole.

My bet is on Faction begin the hit, TLoU has crazy momentum right now and the gameplay from Part II was just phenomenal. I have close to no interest in playing multiplayer games at this point but I checking this one out.