The reason exclusives exist

[Bryank75]

The recent discourse has pivoted, there are many pushing the idea that exclusives are a thing of the past and will continue to diminish as time goes on.

There are PC gamers who question why games are made only for a console and do not understand why first party games are not day and date on PC.

I want to break it down into simple terms... there are two main functions of first party games;

1. A vanity style project, that required massive capital investment and will act as a showpiece to attract customers to a platform to spend money on other games and services etc, so the overall business will profit and grow in the longterm. I.E. Spider-man / GOW

2. Pure profit, where the game is created with a tight budget, to be sold to the mass market and should be available as widely as possible. I.E. Helldivers / Destiny

PlayStation has decided to try to port their premium (1) games to PC, they have sold little there, undermined their utility as an attraction for the PS5 (which has seen sales falter, coincidentally...or not) and the porting has not solved PlayStations issues with low margins.

All in all PlayStation has forgotten the main function of exclusives and how VITAL they are to a platform holder and it has lead to degradation of the strength of the brand.

If costs are too high, they need to be cut directly, no PC or other platform sales will EVER fix out of control costs. Only good management can improve the situation.

It's time to reassess the strategy that has got them to this point. It is time to go back to full exclusives and time to recenter the company around selling as many consoles as possible, across the entire globe. Global saturation has always been the great power of PlayStation... a massive consumer-base.

The business should never be built around the egos of a few game creators who want to make a name for themselves, that is a fragile foundation for success.

 

[Evilms]

Exclusives forge the console's identity.

 

[flaccidsnake]

Exclusives forge the console's identity.

there's no reason for a console to have an identity. dvd players don't have an identity. games forge a publisher's identity.

not that there isn't a certain hobbyist joy to vinyl records and record players, but if you're more excited by record player than the music, there's something wrong.

 

[Gods&Monsters]

I don't want PC Day and Date for their SP games (GOW, TLOU) but the CEO already confirmed he was talking about PC only and not rival consoles. I still think it's going to kill consoles sales like it did for Xbox if they do that terrible mistake.



The new narrative is that Sony is going to release their games on Xbox because their margins are too low but xbots don't buy games so how would that help

 

[avenovah]

there's no reason for a console to have an identity. dvd players don't have an identity. games forge a publisher's identity.

not that there isn't a certain hobbyist joy to vinyl records and record players, but if you're more excited by record player than the music, there's something wrong.

Call me old-fashioned, but to me each console represents an exclusive line of games, it's been that way since the NES, if not before. Times are changing, of course, but Nintendo is showing that this approach still works.

Day 1 releases of Sony games don't make sense on PC without their own game launcher.

 

[Sircaw]

there's no reason for a console to have an identity. dvd players don't have an identity. games forge a publisher's identity.

not that there isn't a certain hobbyist joy to vinyl records and record players, but if you're more excited by record player than the music, there's something wrong.

Did DVD players produce and sell their own content? no, they were just a device to play stuff on.

Sony, on the other hand, has always been known for its incredible studios, you are trying to simplify it way to much.

 

[BroodCorp]

These are reasons but not good ones.

As a consumer I’ve always felt like the exclusive war between Xbox and PS has only harmed us. SquareEnix is one of the richest Japanese companies, they did not need a boost from PlayStation, and if they did, then fuck them. The latest game in a franchise with 16 titles + spin-offs should be on every system. I don’t care about the business dealings, it does nothing positive for the culture to deprive such a staple in gaming from people. I only pick on that game because it’s a recent occurrence, but there are many other examples.

If Sony wants to downsize their exclusive output while spreading it to more systems I think that’s a great option. It’s not losing. If anything it’s a pulling back of the veil and admitting none of the brand loyalty stuff matters. Maybe years ago but not now. Games should be everywhere.

 

[Sircaw]

Exclusives forge the console's identity.

This is how I saw it when I bought my first Sony console, a PS4 pro.

I searched all of the exclusive games on the Sony system vs what Microsoft had, and to me, it was like a no-brainer.

Bloodborne, rachet and Clank Uncharted series sold me the idea of owning the console.

Exclusives Lives Matter.

 

[flaccidsnake]

Did DVD players produce and sell their own content? no, they were just a device to play stuff on.

Sony, on the other hand, has always been known for its incredible studios, you are trying to simplify it way to much.

in the past, the first party title's purpose was to make the console popular. but strong content has greater potential than the console. playstation is one of the best publishers in the industry and probably has the most world class teams out of any publisher. their success is limited by the number of playstations in the world and the fact that all playstations expect to sell around 100-150M. there's no obvious path to the next playstation selling 500M worldwide. if you want playstation teams to keep pushing the envelope, either tools will have to massively improve (i.e. so fewer people can do more) or playstation games will have to be available to a wider install base than just the console.

 

[J_Paganel]

The business should never be built around the egos of a few game creators who want to make a name for themselves, that is a fragile foundation for success.

I got the impression that Naughty Dog and Guerrilla had special treatment from the top management.

They were given big budgets and deadlines, and provided with expensive marketing.

In turn, Sucker Punch, Bend Studio, and other smaller divisions were eating the scraps of the budget, working in less than ideal conditions, and receiving much less resources for marketing their games.

As a result, we could have already gotten sequels to Days Gone and Ghost of Tsushima, but DG was slashed, and nothing is known about GoTs, I doubt that the sequel was allocated as many resources as Naughty Dog and Guerrilla projects...

 

[Evilms]

Exclusive games make all the difference between one console and another.

When I see, for example, the PS2 game library, it had tons of exclusive games, which allowed it to stand out enormously from the Dreamcast, Game Cube or Xbox in terms of the game library. Exclusives are important and always have been.

Why else bother releasing several consoles if you're just going to end up with the same games everywhere ? Of course, I'm talking about consoles and only consoles, because for me the PC is a different platform.

 

[Bryank75]

These are reasons but not good ones.

As a consumer I’ve always felt like the exclusive war between Xbox and PS has only harmed us. SquareEnix is one of the richest Japanese companies, they did not need a boost from PlayStation, and if they did, then fuck them. The latest game in a franchise with 16 titles + spin-offs should be on every system. I don’t care about the business dealings, it does nothing positive for the culture to deprive such a staple in gaming from people. I only pick on that game because it’s a recent occurrence, but there are many other examples.

If Sony wants to downsize their exclusive output while spreading it to more systems I think that’s a great option. It’s not losing. If anything it’s a pulling back of the veil and admitting none of the brand loyalty stuff matters. Maybe years ago but not now. Games should be everywhere.

You mean that you dont benefit... because you are just dismissing the millions of gamers who use PS or Nintendo that got great games due to first party exclusives.

Basically you are saying less games, is better for everyone?

Which is absolute nonsense.

Without exclusives smaller companies like Nintendo and Sony couldnt compete with Microsoft...it would just be a worse disaster than it is. Dominated by the company with the most money and the least creativity.

 

[Bryank75]

I got the impression that Naughty Dog and Guerrilla had special treatment from the top management.

They were given big budgets and deadlines, and provided with expensive marketing.

In turn, Sucker Punch, Bend Studio, and other smaller divisions were eating the scraps of the budget, working in less than ideal conditions, and receiving much less resources for marketing their games.

As a result, we could have already gotten sequels to Days Gone and Ghost of Tsushima, but DG was slashed, and nothing is known about GoTs, I doubt that the sequel was allocated as many resources as Naughty Dog and Guerrilla projects...

Exactly.

I think many of us felt that.

 

[Kx11]

Call me old-fashioned, but to me each console represents an exclusive line of games, it's been that way since the NES, if not before. Times are changing, of course, but Nintendo is showing that this approach still works.

Day 1 releases of Sony games don't make sense on PC without their own game launcher.

Nintendo tried that approach and failed hard with GC then again with WiiU, what happened??

pretty much Nintendo knowing that their market is the kids walking everywhere with their games ie DS/Switch, the sit down gaming consoles market is mostly run by Playstation these days with some competition from xbox, PC entered the sit down gaming market since 2010 and it grew so fast thanks to Nvidia pushing super fast gpus that allowed 4k gaming since 2014 but in 2023 PC entered the walking everywhere with your games market with Deck and the rest of them and those can play emulators of Nintendo games for free so slowly Nintendo is going to lose their market outside of Japan for sure hence the leaks about Nintendo 1st party games coming to PC officially in some shape or form, now if Sony entered the walking everywhere with your games market with the new PSP they'll be the laughing stock of the world lol

 

[Danja]

there's no reason for a console to have an identity. dvd players don't have an identity. games forge a publisher's identity.

not that there isn't a certain hobbyist joy to vinyl records and record players, but if you're more excited by record player than the music, there's something wrong.

@Bryank75 you should incorporate a propaganda emoji reaction into the list... This guy is trying his hardest for sure.

 

[Sircaw]

in the past, the first party title's purpose was to make the console popular. but strong content has greater potential than the console. playstation is one of the best publishers in the industry and probably has the most world class teams out of any publisher. their success is limited by the number of playstations in the world and the fact that all playstations expect to sell around 100-150M. there's no obvious path to the next playstation selling 500M worldwide. if you want playstation teams to keep pushing the envelope, either tools will have to massively improve (i.e. so fewer people can do more) or playstation games will have to be available to a wider install base than just the console.

If all of Sony's exclusives were on, say steam, I would agree with you.

But their entire ecosystem had been built up around a brand of games.

I played a lot of sports throughout my life; in some ways, you're saying well that cricket bat is just a piece of wood, when in fact, it has a century of design, quality and expertise behind its manufacture and crafting.

An expensive, well-known cricket bat brand, for example, can cost you upwards of £500, and with it, there are expectations attached to things like quality, performance, craftsmanship and durability.

You are trying to denigrate it, making it sound like it is a piece of Balsa wood, which it is not.

Sorry for the Cricket analogy; it's the first thing that came to my mind.

 

[Sircaw]

@Bryank75 you should incorporate a propaganda emoji reaction into the list... This guy is trying his hardest for sure.

I'm still waiting for my personal fish emote, which he promised me over a year ago.

He's basically ignores it till he delivers the goods.

 

[flaccidsnake]

If all of Sony's exclusives were on, say steam, I would agree with you.

But their entire ecosystem had been built up around a brand of games.

I played a lot of sports throughout my life; in some ways, you're saying well that cricket bat is just a piece of wood, when in fact, it has a century of design, quality and expertise behind its manufacture and crafting.

An expensive, well-known cricket bat brand, for example, can cost you upwards of £500, and with it, there are expectations attached to things like quality, performance, craftsmanship and durability.

You are trying to denigrate it, making it sound like it is a piece of Balsa wood, which it is not.

Sorry for the Cricket analogy; it's the first thing that came to my mind.

a playstation is not an artisan crafted collectors item with a history and a 'soul' like your cricket bat. it's a mass produced collection of plastic and chips. and not particularly exotic chips at that. it's a boring ass ibm-compatible computer down to the bone in a flamboyant chassis. the only meaningful difference is that you're locked out of the bootloader.

and that's not to denigrate it. that's what it needs to be. because it's a delivery mechanism for videogames.

 

[BroodCorp]

You mean that you dont benefit... because you are just dismissing the millions of gamers who use PS or Nintendo that got great games due to first party exclusives.

Basically you are saying less games, is better for everyone?

Which is absolute nonsense.

Without exclusives smaller companies like Nintendo and Sony couldnt compete with Microsoft...it would just be a worse disaster than it is. Dominated by the company with the most money and the least creativity.

We’re already getting less games. Yeah I’d love to tell them to lower budgets and go back to the output during the mid-gen refresh of PS3, but it doesn’t seem like they’re reversing course.

Nintendo and what MS and PS pull with their exclusives are two different things. I purposely left the Mario company out of this.

 

[Gods&Monsters]

there's no reason for a console to have an identity. dvd players don't have an identity. games forge a publisher's identity.

You're the biggest fanboy for a brand I have ever seen in my life and then you say this shit. Full hypocrisy and zero self-awareness

What is Valve even publishing nowadays that makes you wet like this?