Shawn Layden: Japan Studio closure 'Wasn't Necessarily a Surprise'

[ethomaz]

I did not find that here but I found very very interesting.

"That was sad," he said. "It wasn't necessarily a surprise. I love Allan [Becker, former head of Japan Studio], and he worked really hard, but there was so much legacy malaise. It's tough when a studio hasn't had a hit for a while, then they forget how that feels. You know, if you have a hit once it's it's like a drug, man, you're chasing the next one, right? And then if you don't have that for a while, you forget what it felt like, and then you start to forget how to get there.

"There were probably two roads. One was the road they took. The other road was a real tough-love program. And maybe that's what the Team Asobi thing is. It's like pruning a bonsai, right? You get it back down to its nub and see if you can grow back out again."

"And sadly, I think you can see that problem across the Japanese market," he continued. "Writ large, there's a lot of legacy, historically super talented teams that haven't tasted success for a while and are still struggling to get back to it.

"But, you know, Capcom is prosecuting that problem fairly directly. I think Sega finds itself in a pretty good place. Bandai Namco has got some refactoring to do. Koei Tecmo has its market, owns that market, and they seem happy with that...How many different versions of FF7 have been made?! Square Enix. I think when they abandoned their overseas developer/publisher ambitions and brought it back to home truths, that was a good move for them, but it'll still take a while for them to get out of the woods."

Ex-PlayStation Boss Talks About Why He Thinks the Japan Studio Closure 'Wasn't Necessarily a Surprise' - IGN

Former PlayStation boss Shawn Layden reflected on the 2021 reorganization and subsequent mass exodus of talent from Sony Japan Studio, giving a bit of context as to why he thinks the dissolution happened in the first place.

www.ign.com

 

[TubzGaming]

I have to say he sure does talk a lot now he works and is strategic advisor at Tencent Games.
It feels like we can not go a week/month without him saying something about Sony, Good or Bad.

 

[Impulse]

I have to say he sure does talk a lot now he works and is strategic advisor at Tencent Games.
It feels like we can not go a week/month without him saying something about Sony, Good or Bad.

It's all coming from the same event, Gamescom Asia.

 

[Kokoloko]

Asobi done a great job.

I just think Sony should of kept them in name somehow

 

[Bryank75]

They didn't see them useful for pc ports, probably...

Some of the greatest but most underrated games came out of Japan Studio. Barely any marketing though...

 

[Kokoloko]

They didn't see them useful for pc ports, probably...

Some of the greatest but most underrated games came out of Japan Studio. Barely any marketing though...

I wish they kept the name Japan studios at least. Hired some young guns to make smaller titles like before, even some classic remakes. And then have Asobi and Xdev could carry on what they have been doing under the Japan Studios Umbrella. I mean thats how Asobi and alot of others became great, by being smaller studios growing in quality.

Sony is alot richer than before, they can hire some small teams to make games like Patapon, Loco Roco, Fat Princess, Resogun esk type games, remakes, new ips. Use Japan studios for making games like Everybody golf etc.

They are small titles, but every title doesnt need to be a 2-20 million seller. We cant expect huge sales for certain genres, but that doesnt mean Sony shouldnt cater to them. They have a “knack” of doing great gameplay, let that be for all genres and titles, big and really small.
As long as it makes a small profit and has fans, thats all that matters. You have the big AAA games and gems to make the big bucks

 

[Yurinka]

Sure, Astro Bot and Team Asobi doesn't exist.

And sure, XDEV Japan and their Death Stranding Director's Cut, Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Convalllaria, Lost Soul Aside, Death Stranding 2 or Physint don't exist, either.

And sure, they don't continue doing the same work and in the same building they were before the restructuring.

It's stupid to talk about closure. In the same way to talk about Japanese companies like Capcom as if they were having any issue, when they have record numbers, which kept improving since over a decade.

 

[ethomaz]

Sure, Astro Bot and Team Asobi doesn't exist.

And sure, XDEV Japan and their Death Stranding Director's Cut, Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Convalllaria, Lost Soul Aside, Death Stranding 2 or Physint don't exist, either.

And sure, they don't continue doing the same work and in the same building they were before the restructuring.

It's stupid to talk about closure. In the same way to talk about Japanese companies like Capcom as if they were having any issue, when they have record numbers, which kept improving since over a decade.

Koei Tecmo operating profit in recent years:

Team Asobi is exactly one of the road Sony choose.
Did you read the quotes?

You cut the bonsai to it grow stronger.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

I have to say he sure does talk a lot now he works and is strategic advisor at Tencent Games.
It feels like we can not go a week/month without him saying something about Sony, Good or Bad.

He doesn't work for Tencent. That role was temporary. He works for two start up companies in an advisory role.

 

[TubzGaming]

He doesn't work for Tencent. That role was temporary. He works for two start up companies in an advisory role.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

View attachment 5767

That's wikipidia.

He literally said where he's working on a podcast with SkillUp last week. It's not for Tencent.

 

[Yurinka]

Team Asobi is exactly one of the road Sony choose.
Did you read the quotes?

You cut the bonsai to it grow stronger.

Yes, Sony 'did cut their Japan Studio bonsai to grow it stronger' by firing some people and splitting it rebranded as Team Asobi and XDEV, with plans of growing both teams after the restructing on new and bigger offices located in the same building. This is what they did: a restructuring. Which is not a studio closure.

They did continue doing the same stuff that did before, in the same building, and since the restructuring released Death Stranding Director's Cut, Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin and Astro Bot. If they would have shut them down they wouldn't have released anything.