Hermen isn't the guy who scouts Japanese games though? Christian Svensson does that if i'm not mistaken
Rate the State of Play (31st January 2024)
- Thread starter John Elden Ring
- Start date
The reality leads to think it's the opposite:
He cancelled the mobile games being made at Japan Studio and fired those who told them to do them, plus has been growing Team Asobi, their Japanese XDEV team (the former Japan Studio 2nd party publishing team) and Polyphony plus strenghtening their relationship with Kojipro, Kadokawa+FromSoft and Team Ninja.
Hermen is the boss of PS Studios, 1st party games. Meaning, he isn't related at all with 3rd party games and publishers such as Square, Capcom, Sega or Bandai Namco. He is in charge of the games published with the PS Studios logo which include titles like Demon's Souls, Death Stranding, Astro, Gran Turismo, Rise of the Ronin etc.
SIE has a separate division for 3rd party relationships where Christian Svensson works (he isn't the boss of that division and he isn't in charge of Japan), he's in the USA. He is one of the heads of that division, that recently also handles 2nd party partnerships (the ones published by SIE publishing but not PS Studios). His current title is "VP, Head of 2nd/3rd Party Content Ventures & Strategic Initiatives at Sony Interactive Entertainment" (there are more people with the same or similar position).
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To those who claim "no first party was shown" Did you not see Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Silent Hill, Helldivers 2, Death Stranding 2, Physint? Then you have FF7R SoP next week? Sony doesn't need to own those companies for them to "count", that's a narrative that only works to benefit Microsoft and their bloated ass dev roster. So you guys not remember Ps2 era Sony? It wasn't their in house games that made it popular, it was the absolute chokehold they had the rest of the industry in. Today's Sony is very much reminiscent of that, I think exclusives wise this is the strongest they have been since Ps2. Their techincal powerhouses (Guerrila, Naughty Dog, Sucker Punch, Insomniac & SMS) will return towards the end of the generation and put the cherry on top.
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Asobi existed before him and were critically acclaimed. Their debut game sold extremely well across Europe. We can discuss how be bled Sony Japan dry of Talent though and how Nintendo scooped up quite a few Japan Studios talent gladly since they at least recognize talent.
X-Dev isn't Hermen's creation and he cannot kill a support arm in that region for obvious reasons, so of course he has to staff them up so they can outreach to indie projects to help people like Shu, Christian and Shawne Benson
as for Polyphony, if Hermen messed with them he'd get demoted
Team Asobi was one of the internal Japan Studio teams, and like all the Japan Studio games their members also worked in the other internal Japan Studio teams. Yes, Japan Studio existed before him.Asobi existed before him and were critically acclaimed. Their debut game sold extremely well across Europe. We can discuss how be bled Sony Japan dry of Talent though and how Nintendo scooped up quite a few Japan Studios talent gladly since they at least recognize talent.
X-Dev isn't Hermen's creation and he cannot kill a support arm in that region for obvious reasons, so of course he has to staff them up so they can outreach to indie projects to help people like Shu, Christian and Shawne Benson
as for Polyphony, if Hermen messed with them he'd get demoted
He put them in charge of the studio, fired the bosses who had them making mobile games and had several money pits and gave them a bigger office where they'll have been and will continue growing. Plus kept the second party publishing team away so they can focus on making their internal games.
Japan Studio also had an XDEV 2nd party publishing team that also existed since the PS1. As previously happened with the EU and USA XDEV teams, with Hermen they branched out from the local gamedev team where they were to have their own office and become part of the global XDEV team instead of part of and depending on a local gamedev team. He also gave them a big office to grow, where are they growing and working in more games at the same time than ever before, because they are now in charge of 2nd party games developed in the whole Asia, not only in Japan. As their boss, he could have shut them down.
Before Hermen, Polyphony had 1 studio since the PS1 era. As their boss, he can shut them down but instead did help to grow and Polyphony now it has 4 offices spread around the world: Tokyo, Fukuoka, Los Angeles and Amsterdam.
Hermen is the top boss of Team Asobi, XDEV and Polyphony, he obviously could kill them all or downsize them. But instead, even if you reject to accept the reality, he helped all of them to grow.
Gaming flatearthers who have the need to complain at whatever Sony does and reject to accept reality. Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Helldivers 2, Death Stranding 2 and Physint (plus Until Dawn) are first party, which means published by Sony.
Silent Hill and Final Fantasy are 3rd party, which means not published by the platform holder (in this case Sony).
Voted B grade. In general, one of the better State of Plays that Sony has had but for me personally, more like a D grade because last September's State of Play gave me more games of interest than yesterday's State of Play did. But again, in general a great State of Play.
No offense but I didn't ask for a history lesson about stuff I was already aware of.
Asobi was a start up within Japan Studios from 2012 and they always focused on augmented reality type stuff. The head of the studio also worked on the Eye-Toy. Rescue Mission and Playroom were the reason they weren't also axed which I'm happy about. But Hermen is no champion of Japanese gaming.
You are delusional if you think Hermen could kill Polyphony
... Be for real.
B is a step in the right direction compared to last year's state of play. I'm interested in purchasing and playing 90% of the games shown.
Exactly and leaving some space to improve and for them to reach to is the right feedback.
PlayStation always keep us gaming.
Dave the diver released on Switch and PC last year. V Rising is an early access PC game released in 2022. They are porting the 1.0 game to PS5.
The early access was big, very popular game.
I wasn't expecting any first party studio game reveals like some here did, because this is a State of Play and not a Showcase, and gave it a B+ for featuring a lot of weeb games I'm not interested in. However there were a lot of games for me too. Helldivers 2, DS2, Judas, Metro VR and the other VR game are all in my sights but I wish there was more Western oriented games to look forward to.
They're always angry, always looking for revenge in some way.
They need to let go, cause Xbox has no chance of coming back in the platform space.
Well, the only way to top it, besides that, is having the reveal of some new game sequel everyone is waiting for but that’s just not going to happen anymore, I guess.
You needed to read and learn it because you were totally wrong. Like in this reply.
You are totally wrong, Team Asobi (previously known as Japan Studio Asobi! Team) never has been a separate company or even office than Japan Studio.
It always was one of the Japan Studio internal development teams who worked together in the same office with the other teams, and like in the other teams most of their members rotated from a Japan Studio team to another Japan Studio team as needed.
Playroom VR, Astro Rescue Mission and Astro's Playroom have absutely nothing to do with augmented reality stuff. Only The Playroom (their first of theri 4 projects) did, which btw was codeveloped by Firesprite, featured AR.
Team Asobi was the Japan Studio team that researched and prototyped with upcoming tech and sometimes some of them ended being shipped as a tech demos & minigmes showcase collections or in the case of the Astro games, in proper games.
The Team Asobi staff who worked in Astro's Playroom had people who also worked in other Japan Studio games like Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, The Last Guardian, Knack, Knack II, LocoRoco, LocoRoco 2, LocoRoco: Remastered, PlayStation Move: Ape Escape, Ape Escape: Pumped & Primed, Ape Quest, Siren Blood Curse, Forbidden Siren 2, Gravity Rush, Gravity Rush 2, Gravity Rush Remastered, Puppeteer, The Edge of Judgement, Kung Fu Rider, The Legend of Dragoon, WTF: work time fun or Vib-Ripple. Plus supporting a few 2nd party games and in Demon's Souls remake.
The Team Asobi staff who worked in Rescue Mission had people who worked on Demon's Souls remake, Gravity Rush, Gravity Rush 2, Gravity Rush Remastered, Knack, Knack II, Puppeteer, SotC, The Last Guardian, Edge of Judgmement, Legend of Dragoon, Locoroco, Locoroco 2, Appe Escape: Pumped & Primed. Plus supporting some 2nd party games and Demon's Souls remake.
In addition to Doucet there are a couple of exceptions of people who came from outside, like the art director of both games, who previously worked in Run Sackboy! Run!, Wipeout 2048, Motorstorm Apoclypse and Artic Edge, Wipeout HD & Fury, Wipeout Pulse and as support in Killzone 2, and the composer worked in many western games, most of them being Media Molecule games.
When Japan Studio got restructured all their internal development teams were merged into one of them: Team Asobi, and branched out their XDEV team out to give them their own studio/office. This means that right now they have even more people in Team Asobi who worked in non-Team Asobi Japan Studio games.
You're the desilusional one if you think that a boss of a company can't shut it down.You are delusional if you think Hermen could kill Polyphony
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