Tango Gameworks would still exist if Sony bought Zenimax

[Bryank75]

In retrospect, I think Sony was the perfect partner and buyer for Zenimax. We have now seen the impact of Microsoft buying them... layoffs, flops and studio closures.

With Sony, the Zenimax studios would have filled notable gaps in the PS lineup... Doom as a very masculine shooter, Elder Scrolls and Fallout as WRPG's, Hifi rush as a niche music based melee game etc.. but PlayStations quality control would also have massively benefited Zenimax studios.

That would have been especially true for Starfield, which badly needed some oversight and support.

With Sony's PC ambitions, it would have also helped, offering more console exclusives, leaving more leeway to allow PS first party games, like GOW and Spider-man to remain exclusive for longer.

In the case they made their own PC store, it would have been an additional draw too.

Finally, I believe Tango would have survived, had Sony bought them. The studio being in Japan, Ghostwire and Hifi launching on PS instead of Gamepass and first party hype would have made them far more sustainable.

 

[Nhomnhom]

Just like Japan Studios.

Please stop, thankfully even Sony was smart enougth to avoid that trap. MS even spared them of the embarassing Starfield exclusivity that we had some rummors about.

Very few game publishers are worth acquiring Capcom and Square Enix are the exception.

 

[Bryank75]

From / Kadokawa too.

 

[Orangee]

Just like Japan Studios.

I feel like you guys are always mentioning the "closure" of Japan Studio, just to annoy @Yurinka lol

 

[Kokoloko]

I feel like you guys are always mentioning the "closure" of Japan Studio, just to annoy @Yurinka lol

Lol. I just love Japan Studio games and will always be pissed at the decision

 

[shrike0fth0rns]

In retrospect, I think Sony was the perfect partner and buyer for Zenimax. We have now seen the impact of Microsoft buying them... layoffs, flops and studio closures.

With Sony, the Zenimax studios would have filled notable gaps in the PS lineup... Doom as a very masculine shooter, Elder Scrolls and Fallout as WRPG's, Hifi rush as a niche music based melee game etc.. but PlayStations quality control would also have massively benefited Zenimax studios.

That would have been especially true for Starfield, which badly needed some oversight and support.

With Sony's PC ambitions, it would have also helped, offering more console exclusives, leaving more leeway to allow PS first party games, like GOW and Spider-man to remain exclusive for longer.

In the case they made their own PC store, it would have been an additional draw too.

Finally, I believe Tango would have survived, had Sony bought them. The studio being in Japan, Ghostwire and Hifi launching on PS instead of Gamepass and first party hype would have made them far more sustainable.

I don’t know about that. Sony doesn’t mess around. ghost wire and hifi rush were both flops commercial. The evil within also weren’t great sellers and those games were multiplat. No way would Sony let a studio put out 4 triple A games and none of them being able to clear 5 million copies.

 

[Yurinka]

Yes, it would continue alive because Sony wouldn't put their games day one on game subs and prefer to have a profitable business instead. And in addition to this, their games would be better. But well...

I feel like you guys are always mentioning the "closure" of Japan Studio, just to annoy @Yurinka lol

Yep, everybody knows Team Asobi and XDEV Japan don't exist. Some magical fairies worked in Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Astro Bot and Kojima's stuff instead of them.

 

[ethomaz]

Nobody knows.

Ifs are just guesses and wishes…nobody know if it should really happen.

 

[Orangee]

Yep, everybody knows Team Asobi and XDEV Japan don't exist. Some magical fairies worked in Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Astro Bot and Kojima's stuff instead of them.

There was literally no point in keeping the Japan Studios name after team gravity went independent, since there was only one final development studio indie It (asobi).

 

[Kokoloko]

Yep, everybody knows Team Asobi and XDEV Japan don't exist. Some magical fairies worked in Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin, Astro Bot and Kojima's stuff instead of them.

Lool. Can you get these magical fairies to make me Tokyo Jungle 2 and SOTC2.

In all seriousness bro, any words on Level 5 making a game for PS5? They use to make some exclusives for PS

 

[AllBizness]

Sony is smart enough to just use other devs without involving the entire corporation said devs work for, it's a pretty good strategy I think. Never buy an entire publisher only do that if you're trying to also be a multiplat publisher like Microsoft is doing. Sony would've fired more people then Microsoft had they bought Zenimax. That would've been way too many redundancies Sony does not need. Microsoft had to buy Zenimax to defend against Sony getting Bethesda exclusives and those games are coming to PS5 anyways lol. I expect a Starfield PS5 announcement in the coming months.

 

[Zzero]

Yeah, probably. Being a Japanese studio who's games don't sell well is anathama to how MSGS works these days.

 

[Yurinka]

There was literally no point in keeping the Japan Studios name after team gravity went independent, since there was only one final development studio indie It (asobi).

Only a few "Team Gravity" team members are at Bokeh, if you meant that. Same goes with "Team Ico" and GenDesign.

With a few heads as exception, Japan Studio devs moved from a Japan Studio project to another as needed independently if was from that team or not. Team Gravity, like Team Asobi or Team Ico were mostly only names they did put to the people working in some specific game.

Many GR2 devs moved after the game to work in many different other Japan Studio (including XDEV Japan) games (incomplete list made with MobyGames info, I stopped filling it when I got tired):

• Astro Bot Rescue Mission: Yoshimi Eguchi, Takanori Shigihara, Yasuhiro Fujii, Toshihiko Nakai, Félicien Nozières, Motokazu Sakai, Kyoung Mo Sung, Miho Kinebuchi, Shunan Sukawa
• Astro's Playroom: Satoshi Kondō, Toshitake Tsuchikura, Miho Kinebuchi, Tetsuya Abe, Yasuhiro Fujii, Toshihiko Nakai, Félicien Nozières, Kyoung Mo Sung, Daisuke Mogi, Tomohiko Yamano, Yoshiro Watanuki, Yuji Yamada, Shunan Sukawa, Rui Katakura, Shingo Yoshimura, Noriko Fujisaki
• Knack 2: Shinichi Takebayashi, Rei Omura, Aki Kawashima, Masato Arai, Akira Fujiki, Masaki Tanaka, Asako Sanada, Tomohiko Yamano, Kazuko Manabe, Yoshiro Watanuki, Yuji Yamada, Shunan Sukawa, Rui Katakura, Shingo Yoshimura, Noriko Fujisaki, Sei Kokubu, Hironori Komiya
• Locoroco Remastered: Koji Mitsuda, Kivi Wakisaka, Sei Kokubu
• Death Stranding or Death Stranding Director's Cut: Daisuke Suganuma, Noriko Yanagimoto, Takahisa Suzuki, Mayo Ochiai, Erina Masuzawa, Ryo Sogabe
• Gran Turismo 7 or GT Sport: Noriko Yanagimoto, Takahisa Suzuki, Shunsuke Saitō
• Déraciné: Hirokazu Yokoyama, Takahisa Suzuki, Sei Kokubu, Hironori Komiya
• Demon's Souls remake: Yoshimi Eguchi, Masashi Kudo, Toshitake Tsuchikura, Saori Kurono, Kivi Wakisaka, Shunan Sukawa
• Stellar Blade: Takahisa Suzuki
• Rise of the Ronin: Takahisa Suzuki
• Matterfall, Bravo Team or Marvel Iron Man VR: Kyo Suzuki
• Demon Slayer: Kimmetsu no Yaiba: Keiichirou Kusanagi
• Many also worked in several other 1st or 2nd party non-Japan Studio/XDEV Japan games, or in SotC remake or Everybody's Golf

Norihiko Takami passed away during the GR2 development.

When the Japan Studio restructuring was made, the different mobile games they were developing got cancelled, the different internal Japan Studio teams merged into Team Asobi, some people moved to XDEV Japan (another former Japan Studio team btw), and some people got fired.

Some GR2 devs (mentioned above or not) left/were fired at some point, either in the restructuring or before, or were freelancers or from Japanese small support teams who worked on GR2, and worked in post GR2 already published 3rd party games (meaning they are not at Bokeh):

• Shintaro Nishida, Syounosuke Tsuha, Hiroaki Yamagishi, Masao Masutani, Tsuyoshi Koyama, Daisuke Kikuchi, Ryoichi Nanbu, Tomoyuki Kawasaki, Yosuke Kitazono, Hiroyuki Goto, Eric Bailey, Shinichi Takebayashi, Aki Kawashima, Hideki Kinoshita, Naoki Hirai, Seiji Sasaki, Masaaki Takayasu, Daisuke Mizuma, Shouhei Nakamura, Masato Arai, Kiyoshi Kunimori, Yusuke Nemoto, Masahiro Arimitsu, Hideki Kawabata, Flyukishila, Takeshi Oga, Norimasa Kawano, Akira Fujiki, Mizuochi, Kōhei Magome, Mayo Ochiai, Daisuke Mogi, Masaki Tanaka, Takeshi Oga, Asako Sanada, Kazuko Manabe, Ryoko Morita, Yutaka Sakai, Masato Arai

But well yes, having merged the internal development teams into Team Asobi and having branched off XDEV Japan to a new and different/"independent" office (even if in the same building), didn't make sense to keep the Japan Studio name.

 

[Danja]

Sony staying away from Zenimax was a great thing.

 

[Yurinka]

Lool. Can you get these magical fairies to make me Tokyo Jungle 2 and SOTC2.

Well, magical faires don't exist and I'd say they want to focus Team Asobi and XDEV on games with potential to be profitable instead.

In all seriousness bro, any words on Level 5 making a game for PS5? They use to make some exclusives for PS

According to their website for 2024 they have announced Megaton Musashi Wired (Switch + PS + PC), Inazuma Eleven: Victory Road (Switch + PS + PC + mobile) and DecaPolice (Switch + PS).

And for later they have announced Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time (published by Nintendo outside Japan), Professor Layton and The New World of Steam and (revived cancelled PSP game, in development and having issues since forever) Ushiro for Switch.

Considering that most of the stuff they did in recent years ended being multiplatform maybe Layton and Ushiro may end in PS unless Nintendo paid for them.

PS exclusive Level 5 games weren't big sellers, so I assume they'll prefer to continue multiplatform to avoid getting (almost) bankrupt again. From Sony's side, I assume to invest in 2nd/3rd party games with more sales potential, directly or indirectly (recent investments in Chinese or Korean titles is to grow in such Asian markets).

Regarding Japanese 2nd/3rd party studios I assume they prefer instead to invest in Kojipro, FromSoft, Square, Capcom etc. I'd bet it's more likely to get a Horizon Musou from Koei Tecmo/Omega Force than a PS exclusive Level 5 game.

 

[Orangee]

Only a few "Team Gravity" team members are at Bokeh, if you meant that. Same goes with "Team Ico" and GenDesign.

With a few heads as exception, Japan Studio devs moved from a Japan Studio project to another as needed independently if was from that team or not. Team Gravity, like Team Asobi or Team Ico were mostly only names they did put to the people working in some specific game.

Many GR2 devs moved after the game to work in many different other Japan Studio (including XDEV Japan) games (incomplete list made with MobyGames info, I stopped filling it when I got tired):

• Astro Bot Rescue Mission: Yoshimi Eguchi, Takanori Shigihara, Yasuhiro Fujii, Toshihiko Nakai, Félicien Nozières, Motokazu Sakai, Kyoung Mo Sung, Miho Kinebuchi, Shunan Sukawa
• Astro's Playroom: Satoshi Kondō, Toshitake Tsuchikura, Miho Kinebuchi, Tetsuya Abe, Yasuhiro Fujii, Toshihiko Nakai, Félicien Nozières, Kyoung Mo Sung, Daisuke Mogi, Tomohiko Yamano, Yoshiro Watanuki, Yuji Yamada, Shunan Sukawa, Rui Katakura, Shingo Yoshimura, Noriko Fujisaki
• Knack 2: Shinichi Takebayashi, Rei Omura, Aki Kawashima, Masato Arai, Akira Fujiki, Masaki Tanaka, Asako Sanada, Tomohiko Yamano, Kazuko Manabe, Yoshiro Watanuki, Yuji Yamada, Shunan Sukawa, Rui Katakura, Shingo Yoshimura, Noriko Fujisaki, Sei Kokubu, Hironori Komiya
• Locoroco Remastered: Koji Mitsuda, Kivi Wakisaka, Sei Kokubu
• Death Stranding or Death Stranding Director's Cut: Daisuke Suganuma, Noriko Yanagimoto, Takahisa Suzuki, Mayo Ochiai, Erina Masuzawa, Ryo Sogabe
• Gran Turismo 7 or GT Sport: Noriko Yanagimoto, Takahisa Suzuki, Shunsuke Saitō
• Déraciné: Hirokazu Yokoyama, Takahisa Suzuki, Sei Kokubu, Hironori Komiya
• Demon's Souls remake: Yoshimi Eguchi, Masashi Kudo, Toshitake Tsuchikura, Saori Kurono, Kivi Wakisaka, Shunan Sukawa
• Stellar Blade: Takahisa Suzuki
• Rise of the Ronin: Takahisa Suzuki
• Matterfall, Bravo Team or Marvel Iron Man VR: Kyo Suzuki
• Demon Slayer: Kimmetsu no Yaiba: Keiichirou Kusanagi
• Many also worked in several other 1st or 2nd party non-Japan Studio/XDEV Japan games, or in SotC remake or Everybody's Golf

Norihiko Takami passed away during the GR2 development.

When the Japan Studio restructuring was made, the different mobile games they were developing got cancelled, the different internal Japan Studio teams merged into Team Asobi, some people moved to XDEV Japan (another former Japan Studio team btw), and some people got fired.

Some GR2 devs (mentioned above or not) left/were fired at some point, either in the restructuring or before, or were freelancers or from Japanese small support teams who worked on GR2, and worked in post GR2 already published 3rd party games (meaning they are not at Bokeh):

• Shintaro Nishida, Syounosuke Tsuha, Hiroaki Yamagishi, Masao Masutani, Tsuyoshi Koyama, Daisuke Kikuchi, Ryoichi Nanbu, Tomoyuki Kawasaki, Yosuke Kitazono, Hiroyuki Goto, Eric Bailey, Shinichi Takebayashi, Aki Kawashima, Hideki Kinoshita, Naoki Hirai, Seiji Sasaki, Masaaki Takayasu, Daisuke Mizuma, Shouhei Nakamura, Masato Arai, Kiyoshi Kunimori, Yusuke Nemoto, Masahiro Arimitsu, Hideki Kawabata, Flyukishila, Takeshi Oga, Norimasa Kawano, Akira Fujiki, Mizuochi, Kōhei Magome, Mayo Ochiai, Daisuke Mogi, Masaki Tanaka, Takeshi Oga, Asako Sanada, Kazuko Manabe, Ryoko Morita, Yutaka Sakai, Masato Arai

But well yes, having merged the internal development teams into Team Asobi and having branched off XDEV Japan to a new and different/"independent" office (even if in the same building), didn't make sense to keep the Japan Studio name.

Do you actually write this everytime, or just copy and paste It from the notes app?

And yeah, I know that. That's why we basically didnt loose all that much with the closure of TG.
Toyama WAS Team Gravity, while the majority of developers switched around the studios when needed. Trulely, while It may sound good on paper, It was probably one of the reason why Japan Studios was so inefficent with their releases.
What they did didnt really change anything on paper, It did improve and helped them work more efficiently. They should have done that back on the PS3. Maybe then It would not bleed out their talents like Ueda and Toyama.

 

[Kokoloko]

Well, magical faires don't exist and I'd say they want to focus Team Asobi and XDEV on games with potential to be profitable instead.

Just make it happen lol

 

[Kokoloko]

According to their website for 2024 they have announced Megaton Musashi Wired (Switch + PS + PC), Inazuma Eleven: Victory Road (Switch + PS + PC + mobile) and DecaPolice (Switch + PS).

And for later they have announced Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time (published by Nintendo outside Japan), Professor Layton and The New World of Steam and (revived cancelled PSP game, in development and having issues since forever) Ushiro for Switch.

Considering that most of the stuff they did in recent years ended being multiplatform maybe Layton and Ushiro may end in PS unless Nintendo paid for them.

PS exclusive Level 5 games weren't big sellers, so I assume they'll prefer to continue multiplatform to avoid getting (almost) bankrupt again. From Sony's side, I assume to invest in 2nd/3rd party games with more sales potential, directly or indirectly (recent investments in Chinese or Korean titles is to grow in such Asian markets).

Regarding Japanese 2nd/3rd party studios I assume they prefer instead to invest in Kojipro, FromSoft, Square, Capcom etc. I'd bet it's more likely to get a Horizon Musou from Koei Tecmo/Omega Force than a PS exclusive Level 5 game.

Yeah Id prefer Fromsoft or Square JRPG. But Id still like to see another Dark Cloud again or another AA JRPG from them

 

[Yurinka]

Do you actually write this everytime, or just copy and paste It from the notes app?

This time I went to Moby Games to check it because the last time I checked it was yeaars ago and I was curious about the list of games.

As a fun fact, I saw that maybe over a dozen went to Square or at least worked in the FFVII remake games and Forspoken. Meaning maybe they were already starting a joint venture with Square Enix.

Toyama WAS Team Gravity, while the majority of developers switched around the studios when needed.

Nah, the team was the team. A group of people. He was "only" the director (also made the initial story and design concept).

Yes, most people changed from a game to the other between the different titles of the "Team Siren" and "Team Gravity". But there were also several of them who repeated.

Trulely, while It may sound good on paper, It was probably one of the reason why Japan Studios was so inefficent with their releases.
What they did didnt really change anything on paper, It did improve and helped them work more efficiently. They should have done that back on the PS3. Maybe then It would not bleed out their talents like Ueda and Toyama.

Well, not sure when was needed to be done, I assume that some time ago. But Japan Studio never had a sales hit after its many decades, at least one or two important money pits and many games that pretty likely weren't profitable. And well, there's the cancelled games.

At some point they had to clean the house and put some order and try to get some profitability. So I understand it, even if I'm the top 1 Gravity Rush or LocoRoco fan.

 

[Polyh3dron]

Monkeys would be flying out of my butt right now had Sony bought Zenimax.

...and Tango Gameworks would still exist.