Sony hires former MS 1st party business manager as a business finance manager

[KickNamesTakeAss]

Just because other tried it first, doesn't mean we can't criticized Sony for doing it. They have 12 of these games in the works. Not 2-3, 12.

Jim Ryan saying something doesn't really hold water. The same goes for all these executives. We're talking about the same man that spouted "we value generations". It's just PR. We're in a situation where they're investing more in GaaS that traditional games. We have that info from their own financial presentations. That's a cause for concern.


I somewhat agree with them branching out. GaaS are what bring in money. I just think they're going overboard with them. Especially since we have no idea what SP games they're working on. Their last showcase was horrible.

And that brings me to Sony's second biggest issue, first being inability/unwillingness to secure IPs, lack of communication. We have no idea what they're working on outside of a few games, one of which is being released soon. We do know that they had ND working on a GaaS that got trashed by the overlord Bungie. Again, not a good look.

If Sony wants to prevent people whom criticizing them, show something. And by something I don't mean a slide showing how they're investing more in GaaS that SP games.

I don’t understand your criticism of Sony gaas games. If it’s 2 or 12 shouldn’t matter, if multiplayer gamings not your bag just ignore them. You never know, maybe you’ll like them but that shouldn’t stop Sony for expanding and that’s the key word expanding and catering to multiplayer gamers. (Again if we count the PS3 days)

You have every right to criticise Sony btw, they do market research to PlayStation gamers for this very reason. But you’re not criticising the quality of the gaas games you’re criticising that they’re doing it at all? It’s just not reasonable criticism especially when it’s this binary thinking that Sony can only do one thing or the other at time.

Yes I believe Jim when he says they won’t stop making single player games. He even elaborated in an interview saying how much better the studios get with each release. I’m not going to dismiss him because people chose to take his words out of context to mock him. In fact any gaming ceo that just comes out and says “we’re gonna let the games do our talking” is the type of ceo I’d want running a gaming company. I also think he’s doing a great job (under the circumstances) much better than he gets credit for.

The lack of securing (buying) ip is just not their strategy. And it seems only MS get to buy a 3rd party company and make them exclusive. I remember the FTC having concerns over the Bungie acquisition about sony keeping their promise to stay multiplatform. They eventually approved of course but that’s what would happen if sony buy a 3rd party company. They’re in a better position now making exclusive deals to secure content.

I understand the critisizing the lack of communication it’s frustrating not knowing what they’re working on. We’re used to knowing years ahead what games are coming. Unfortunately there is a trillion dollar company razor focused and hell bent on destroying PlayStation. It’s been made clear this is war to them. To the death it seems judging by mr booty’s words. And in war you don’t lay out your future plans years ahead for your opponent to see, have time to counter or buy a company that does something similar. Last gen yeah, but not this gen, not against this MS. That’s what any sensible ceo should do under these circumstances but agree it’s frustrating having such long waits between showcases.

 

[Nomen_Nescio]

The lack of securing (buying) ip is just not their strategy. And it seems only MS get to buy a 3rd party company and make them exclusive. I remember the FTC having concerns over the Bungie acquisition about sony keeping their promise to stay multiplatform. They eventually approved of course but that’s what would happen if sony buy a 3rd party company. They’re in a better position now making exclusive deals to secure content.

If I had a final say, this would be the way to go, grow your own IPs internally and leave 3rd party stuff alone. But it is not the industry right now. Sony might as well roll over and die if they do not intend to at least try. There is only so much 3rd party IP, at leas try to snag SOME of it. I do not think Sony would have issues after the ABK acquisition.

 

[Airbus]

Dumb decision to employ someone from xbox (1st party business manager) after what happened there the last few years

Not to mention a posible mole for phil spencer

Jim Ryan is stupid

 

[Impulse]

If you are going to start having GAAS games that are each ongoing and function as almost a business unit of its own, it might pay to have a business manager overseeing the financials of it all.

Also people love to downplay Microsoft too much, they are losing their shirts in the console war, but they also managed to land some pretty good money generators in Sea of Thieves, Halo MCC, Grounded etc.

They are actually ahead of PS in the GAAS game and poaching people who know how that stuff is made makes sense.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Also people love to downplay Microsoft too much, they are losing their shirts in the console war, but they also managed to land some pretty good money generators in Sea of Thieves, Halo MCC, Grounded etc.

None of these are massive money generators. None. And none of these could be considered big players in their respective fields, either, in terms of game design/creativity or revenue makers. Halo MCC's decent revenue generation, for example, is in large part because Halo Infinite was such a failure, so the Halo community don't have another choice in terms of a valid, current Halo game to sink time and money into outside of MCC.

I get some of what you're saying but listing these games as the big bullet points to prove it doesn't work very well. And all that said...again, wasn't the $3.6 billion for Bungie supposed to already give Sony these answers? Not a single GaaS from MS in terms of internal 1P games (i.e GaaS they didn't gain through acquisitions) is as big a money maker as Destiny 2, or near the top of their respective fields as Destiny 2 is. It'd be one thing if Sony were hiring the financial manager from the Zenimax side for this position; ESO is a pretty big deal.

But the wording here makes me think it's from the XGS side, so there's maybe a small chance this person oversaw Minecraft performance in a similar capacity? Again, acquired IP that was already big prior to MS buying it, but that'd be a notable get I suppose.

 

[KickNamesTakeAss]

Because Sony's messaging has gotten rather imbalanced. It's that simple. We went a long stretch for about a year with the main SIE news being small start-up studio acquisitions, rebuking to the ABK deal (and ensuring drama), sales reports (ironic that the thing Sony got made fun of years ago spending so much time at E3 for is now hotly anticipated and endlessly discussed by many people today. How times change..), and live-service/GaaS announcements and reveals, PC ports, PSVR2 and...Spiderman 2, which is due in about two months.

Keep in mind I'm focusing specifically on the 1P studios here, not 2P/3P announcements or deals like Stellar Blade (which might not release this year) and Rise of the Ronin, or the new China Hero Project reveals most of which are many years off from release. If the May showcase had even one new 1P traditional AAA (or two 1P traditional AA) game reveal(s) alongside everything else shown, the reception would've gone much better and I don't think we'd be seeing so much questioning or critique of Sony's future strategy. It'd have gone a long way towards showing that they're still committed to a balanced output of traditional and GaaS titles going forward; instead we just have to take their word for it. And, considering the vast majority of developments with SIE I highlighted above, very few if any involved new 1P AAA or AA traditional games.

The May Showcase was the first main Showcase from SIE in almost two years, so it wasn't unrealistic to expect a couple new 1P non-GaaS IP to be revealed there. We know they'd of been PS5-only games, adding extra value and also favored outlook to see the PS5's capabilities flexed further.

100% agreed about the showcase felt the same too, in fact I agree with your entire post. However giving more attention to gaas games doesn’t take anything away from the single player games in development. I think it’s reasonable to suggest there will come a time fairly soon where Sony opens the floodgates. Looks like the choice this time was to give the multiplayer games some time in the spotlight without being overshadowed.

 

[Impulse]

None of these are massive money generators. None. And none of these could be considered big players in their respective fields, either, in terms of game design/creativity or revenue makers. Halo MCC's decent revenue generation, for example, is in large part because Halo Infinite was such a failure, so the Halo community don't have another choice in terms of a valid, current Halo game to sink time and money into outside of MCC.

I get some of what you're saying but listing these games as the big bullet points to prove it doesn't work very well. And all that said...again, wasn't the $3.6 billion for Bungie supposed to already give Sony these answers? Not a single GaaS from MS in terms of internal 1P games (i.e GaaS they didn't gain through acquisitions) is as big a money maker as Destiny 2, or near the top of their respective fields as Destiny 2 is. It'd be one thing if Sony were hiring the financial manager from the Zenimax side for this position; ESO is a pretty big deal.

But the wording here makes me think it's from the XGS side, so there's maybe a small chance this person oversaw Minecraft performance in a similar capacity? Again, acquired IP that was already big prior to MS buying it, but that'd be a notable get I suppose.

You need to think in broader terms, and honestly speaking, let go of your attachment to a strategy that is showing some macro-weakness (they focused singularly on 1P AAA titles, and allowed too much of their revenue generation machine to come from ActiBlizz EA etc, and those companies now have a price, they can't out-buy Microsoft in that game if it comes down to it).

Sea of Thieves is a good success, is it pulling in Fortnite money? No. But it's doing well enough to be making money, the main issue is that the overarching Xbox strategy has larger issues that detract from its success as a whole, and that also screw with Sea of Thieves' potential as a GAAS game, it's attached to the lowest-selling console series (Xbone/Series X/S). The same goes for things like Grounded as well, despite being hampered by being off the larger install-bases, they managed to bring out some good solid numbers.

Sony isn't necessarily going for a trillion dollar hits in a black/white fashion, they are also going after the more "mid-sized" GAASs, think stuff like Payday etc.

 

[Alabtrosmyster]

Sony is draining the bird brains that ran xbox to the ground.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

100% agreed about the showcase felt the same too, in fact I agree with your entire post. However giving more attention to gaas games doesn’t take anything away from the single player games in development. I think it’s reasonable to suggest there will come a time fairly soon where Sony opens the floodgates. Looks like the choice this time was to give the multiplayer games some time in the spotlight without being overshadowed.

Well in a way the GaaS they showed at the May Showcase were already overshadowed by Spiderman 2, so what difference would it have made it another 1P AAA or couple of 1P AA a few years off were shown in addition?

Again, especially after it's been almost two years. While on one hand I would agree that GaaS doesn't take away from traditional game funding, the truth is SIE have a finite budget so theoretically speaking, any GaaS in development could've been another traditional game in development instead. We also have to keep in mind, these AAA games are taking longer t develop, and at least for now we know Sony doesn't have any 1P AA traditional titles in development outside of anything for PSVR2, which is an add-on, and not PS5 itself.

So any such 1P AAA game that just entered development this year or last year, isn't realistically going to come out until near the end of this generation or around the launch period of PS6.

You need to think in broader terms, and honestly speaking, let go of your attachment to a strategy that is showing some macro-weakness (they focused singularly on 1P AAA titles, and allowed too much of their revenue generation machine to come from ActiBlizz EA etc, and those companies now have a price, they can't out-buy Microsoft in that game if it comes down to it).

Sea of Thieves is a good success, is it pulling in Fortnite money? No. But it's doing well enough to be making money, the main issue is that the overarching Xbox strategy has larger issues that detract from its success as a whole, and that also screw with Sea of Thieves' potential as a GAAS game, it's attached to the lowest-selling console series (Xbone/Series X/S). The same goes for things like Grounded as well, despite being hampered by being off the larger install-bases, they managed to bring out some good solid numbers.

Sony isn't necessarily going for a trillion dollar hits in a black/white fashion, they are also going after the more "mid-sized" GAASs, think stuff like Payday etc.

But part of me feels Sony can't "just" do Payday-style games; the standards they've built through their 1P AAA traditional games will be held to some degree for the GaaS titles too. So people are expecting the GaaS titles to be top of their field in one way or another. I think that's a healthy ambition to try reaching as a platform holder, but it's also a lot of pressure, and there is no telling how much that may impact traditional games in development, or when.

Bringing up Microsoft's internal, 1P GaaS titles as measures of success is murky because Microsoft simply does not disclose individual game performance in ANY measure outside of lifetime player counts. They do not specify sales numbers, or money generated, or anything like that. And that data is likely bound by NDAs, so there is no telling if Sony somehow now get that data through hiring this person.

But, maybe it was information revealed in sealed testimony via Amy Hood in the FTC hearing? Considering people from all involved parties were watching & engaging in those hearings, Sony got some idea of that info through the sealed testimony, and that's influencing this hire? Which would suggest they liked what numbers were provided, even if the chances of us ever learning them publicly are slim to none.

Still though, it's just yet another move by Sony WRT their GaaS/live-service plans but without seeing equal movement towards 1P AAA or AA traditional games in terms of hires, acquisitions, new game reveals etc. Just very vague claims like "13 traditional games in development" gleamed from a quote in October 2022, meaning one of those (GOW Ragnarok) and another (Spiderman 2) are either already out or coming in two months, dropping that number down.

If we had a better balance of news and developments from Sony/SIE in terms of 1P traditional game announcements (and no, not including PC ports) or acquisitions geared towards that, or even just additional 3P exclusivity deals (genuine 3P exclusivity deals) from 3P besides Square-Enix, then that would d some good.

 

[KickNamesTakeAss]

If I had a final say, this would be the way to go, grow your own IPs internally and leave 3rd party stuff alone. But it is not the industry right now. Sony might as well roll over and die if they do not intend to at least try. There is only so much 3rd party IP, at leas try to snag SOME of it. I do not think Sony would have issues after the ABK acquisition.

It wasn’t Sony’s strategy before but you’re right they might need to change as MS are allowed to continue the pay-to-win strategy under the guise of bringing games to more people. Something not so easy to say next time as Sony rolls out its own full scale cloud gaming initiative.