What do you want from the next PlayStation CEO?

[ghostwriter74]

No matter who follows him, the strategy is set. Many goals such as GaaS and PC ports were already decided under Layden.

After Layden resigned at short notice due to burnout, I always had the impression that Ryan was a temporary solution. Due to the difficult PS5 launch thanks to Covid and the ABK deal, he was probably in office longer than planned. At 65, he is also one of SIE's oldest CEOs.

Don't think someone like Shuhei, Hulst or Price will become CEO now. They all have experience running studios, but little knowledge of business and marketing. There are certainly other competent candidates, but they may still be too young for such a position.

I would assume that Eric Lempel would be a candidate for the position, even though he has only been at Sony since 2015 and is quite young. Imo, the CEO of SIE isn't as important as the head of Playstation Studios anyway. Hermen Hulst has a lot more responsibility to bear right now. The PS5 will continue to be successful after Ryan's departure. What is important now is the first party game output.

As long as Phil Harrison doesn't have anything to say about Playstation again, things can't get any worse.

 

[historia]

You should know that even if genshin devs are chinese they are massive weebs, the entire point of their games is to spread the anime aesthetic

There are more 2 to 3 times more weebs in China than Japan.

Same for SEA, Indonesia Malaysia and Phillipines hold "weaboo con" every year, their sale figures at least for comics has been pretty high.

 

[JAHGamer]

It is a cinematic slog according to some people.

But if you like that, Sony has some game like that, took place in much later though, game that made by teamninja.

Also bring back horror games, for obvious reasons

No GoT is a masterpiece, but yeah I'd love some horror games, especially survival horror.

No matter who follows him, the strategy is set. Many goals such as GaaS and PC ports were already decided under Layden.

After Layden resigned at short notice due to burnout, I always had the impression that Ryan was a temporary solution. Due to the difficult PS5 launch thanks to Covid and the ABK deal, he was probably in office longer than planned. At 65, he is also one of SIE's oldest CEOs.

Don't think someone like Shuhei, Hulst or Price will become CEO now. They all have experience running studios, but little knowledge of business and marketing. There are certainly other competent candidates, but they may still be too young for such a position.

I would assume that Eric Lempel would be a candidate for the position, even though he has only been at Sony since 2015 and is quite young. Imo, the CEO of SIE isn't as important as the head of Playstation Studios anyway. Hermen Hulst has a lot more responsibility to bear right now. The PS5 will continue to be successful after Ryan's departure. What is important now is the first party game output.

As long as Phil Harrison doesn't have anything to say about Playstation again, things can't get any worse.

The strategy is never set, things are constantly evolving, no one would've thought Jim randomly retires today, right? I don't want Shuhei as CEO, I meant as head of PlayStation Studios. Hulst should just go back to Guerilla and stay there. And never say things can't get worse because they always can.

 

[Vertigo]

Stay the course. Buy CDPR.

And they will stay the course…

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

there is something imperative that Jim has to do before leaving:

Secure the exclusivity (marketing or timed) of GTAVI.

that move will kill Xbox Hardware and buy time for PS to figure out their shit moving forward.

 

[AllBizness]

I want the next ceo to merge with EA and Take Two

 

[ghostwriter74]

The strategy is never set, things are constantly evolving, no one would've thought Jim randomly retires today, right? I don't want Shuhei as CEO, I meant as head of PlayStation Studios. Hulst should just go back to Guerilla and stay there. And never say things can't get worse because they always can.

Of course the strategy is set. Everything Ryan implemented was already the topic of a speech given by his predecessor in 2017. Ryan didn't "suddenly" resign; after all, he and the Sony management announced this to the press. His exit is in 6 months, so it has been planned for a long time.

I don't understand why Shuhei should take over Playstation Studios again. He was already in this position during the PS4 era and made decisions that led, among other things, to the end of various studios such as Evolution. It was also his restructuring of the Japan Studio that led to the final end. Imo, his current position is perfect and he has built an excellent network to support indie developers.

Hermen Hulst hasn't had a chance to prove himself yet. Even if he changes positions at some point, there are many who are certainly more suitable than Shuhei. Ted Price, Cory Barlog and Neil Druckmann are some who have a lot of experience and are highly respected in the industry. Druckmann will be President of Naughty Dog for a few more years and would be the perfect solution as head of Playstation Studios due to his experience in games and media.

I like Shu, but he's almost 60 years old. At 55, Ted Price is the perfect age for such a position. However, I think he will say goodbye to the business at some point. Insomniac is doing great and there are plenty of suitable successors. But that's a different topic.

 

[Petekilla]

just make being a playstation fan fun again, don’t be so buttoned up and corporate, metaphorically speaking

AKA a friend, a gamer just like Phil Spencer right? Lol “He’s a gamer just like me man”

 

[Petekilla]

Now that Jim Ryan is gone (woohoo ) what do you want to change for PlayStation? I'll start

- Fire/demote Hermen Hulst and hire Shuhei (if he still wants the position), Hermen can go back to Guerilla if he wants.
- Cancel all the live service games in development (except Factions 2)
- Sell Bungie (yuck)
- Shutdown Nixxes or make them into a remaster studio
- Remaster all of the PS3 and PS2 classics
- Cancel PS Plus Premium, PS Plus Extra, and make ONLINE FREE
- Cancel all PC Ports, bring back "Only on PlayStation"
- Do better marketing for VR
- Invest in 2-3 more VR studios and focus on more blockbuster AAA VR titles like HL Alyx
- Cancel anything to do with cloud gaming
- Bring back Japan Studios so they can start making more AA 1st party games like Gravity Rush, Astrobot, and Ape Escape

These are just the few off the top of my head, I'll probably think of more later.

What’s the beef with Hermen Hulst? He was just doing as he was told.

 

[Yobo]

What makes you say that? everything I listed would make PlayStation into a dominant powerhouse

You cut off billions in yearly revenue with that PS plus move alone and all your investment is into niche VR games and niche Japanese games

 

[Yurinka]

• Keep Hermen in charge of PS Studios
• Keep Cerny working on PS6 and PSVR3
• Keep Yoshida in PlayStation Indies and give them more budget to support more indies. Check out Unseen or Bokeh.
• Continue growing the manpower of all the SIE teams to allow them work in more games at the same time until they are able to work in 3 or 4 games per studio
• Continue keeping half of the games being new IPs, and keep the majority of new games not being GaaS
• Keep spending a record investment on 2nd and 3rd party deals, particularly Asian and Japanese. Consider also the new studios by Tabata and Toshiro Nagoshi for 2nd party titles, plus obviously call From to make Bloodborne II.
• If still didn't happen, sign 2nd party deals with the Kena, Sifu, Stray devs and allow select indies like these to use PS IPs if desired and if there's fit.
• I know Sony won't continue with acquisitions until the mid to long term, but when possible and if possible (I assume isn't possible because they won't want to sell) chase to acquire Capcom, FromSoft, ARC System Works, Devolver, Annapurna, Square (at least the FFXIV, FFXVI and FFVIIR studios plus Taito and secure the FF & DQ brands), the gaming part of Sega Sammy and if possible make an effort to get Bandai Namco or Mihoyo
• Acquire also more support and porting studios to shorten development times of new games and to make sure that the main studios spend the minimum effort on remasters and PC ports
• Release the PC PSN store, where all games would be crossbuy: buy the game once and play it in PS5, PC (or if PS+ Premium subber) via cloud gaming on smartphones, tablets or tvs. Same trophies/friendlist/library in all platforms for the games available in each platform (all digital PS1/PS2/PSP/Vita games should be available in PS5 and PC emulated).
• Release PS cloud in smartphones, tablets, tvs and increase the number of servers to have a better ping/latency in the different countries where already available
• Include Crunchyroll in PS+ Premium with no price increase (at least 3 free months of Crunchuroll premium)
• Move all the gaming studios from Sony Music (Lasengle, the other Aniplex ones, Crunchyroll Games, etc) to SIE

- Fire/demote Hermen Hulst and hire Shuhei (if he still wants the position), Hermen can go back to Guerilla if he wants.

That would be stupid since PS Studios is more sucessful than ever. Shuhei asked Jim to work with indies, and Jim created the PlayStation Indies team for him, Shuhei does what he wants.

- Cancel all the live service games in development (except Factions 2)
- Sell Bungie (yuck)
- Shutdown Nixxes or make them into a remaster studio
- Remaster all of the PS3 and PS2 classics
- Cancel PS Plus Premium, PS Plus Extra, and make ONLINE FREE
- Cancel all PC Ports, bring back "Only on PlayStation"

- Cancel anything to do with cloud gaming

Horrible business decisions, worse than Phil Spencer

- Do better marketing for VR
- Invest in 2-3 more VR studios and focus on more blockbuster AAA VR titles like HL Alyx

This makes sense.

- Bring back Japan Studios so they can start making more AA 1st party games like Gravity Rush, Astrobot, and Ape Escape

Not sure why you keep acting as if Team Asobi didn't exist and didn't have many Japan Studio devs who worked in these games, and as if the Japan Studio 2nd party team didn't continue doing the same work but with a bigger team now also in charge of games developed in the rest of Asia.

Peter Moore.

He would be good for MS, to make there the same he did with the Sega consoles.

PC Ports hurt PlayStation

PS5 hardware and software sales numbers (particularly 1st party sales numbers) say the opposite.

 

[Airbus]

Horrible business decisions, worse than Phil Spencer

Were here for PS games not PC ports by Jimbo

Tired yal about PC port announcement on PS State of Play

We dont need that shit and none of that benefit us as PS gamers

 

[JAHGamer]

You cut off billions in yearly revenue with that PS plus move alone and all your investment is into niche VR games and niche Japanese games

Nope, I would just bring ps plus back to what it was during the ps3 era. You get 2-4 monthly games but don’t need to pay for online. The extra/premium catalog devalue gaming, create negative purchasing habit , and lose money. They’d still lose some subscribers but people will buy every single 3rd party online game on PlayStation instead of Xbox, and enough people would switch over just for the free online. They’ll make way more than what they lost on ps plus subs in the end

 

[JAHGamer]

What’s the beef with Hermen Hulst? He was just doing as he was told.

Ever since he became head of PlayStation studios we've seen nothing but live service junk.

The latest showcase was evidence of that, when everyone heard "we can't wait to show you what our 1st party studios have been working on" we think of games like TLOU, Uncharted, God of War, etc, and then what are we met with? Concord, Fairgame$, Marathon...... what a joke. It feels like he's trying to compensate for Killzone not doing well. He let Bungie walk in as "consultants" and take over his job even though their own game is a pile of dogcrap. PS just doesn't have the same excitement under him, not to mention almost all of the state of plays have been terrible. The only time we hear from him is when he's hyping up garbage live service games, congratulating Phil Spencer or posting pics on a yacht.

 

[shrike0fth0rns]

I would like a CEO from Japan. Connie Booth or Ted Price as head of WWS.
Bring back Japan Studio. More AAA jp games. More variety in the writing from 1st party games, right now there's too much oscar bait

Japan studio went away because it was not profitable and it was dysfunctional. It’s gone all they could salvage was team asobi. Japan studio didn’t make triple A games they were double A at best and the games barely sold even in Japan. Sony isn’t going down that road again. They will probably buy some Japanese devs but it won’t be to have them making the type of games Japan studio made. It will be high production quality more western type games.

 

[historia]

Japan studio went away because it was not profitable and it was dysfunctional. It’s gone all they could salvage was team asobi. Japan studio didn’t make triple A games they were double A at best and the games barely sold even in Japan. Sony isn’t going down that road again. They will probably buy some Japanese devs but it won’t be to have them making the type of games Japan studio made. It will be high production quality more western type games.

People seems to live in their bubble think Japanese games are the most important things gonna change the table. Sadly it is not the 2000s anymore.

The only thing that so good here in Japan are legacy franchiese and Nintendo games.

More Japanese games are good because they diversify the portoflio.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

@JAHGamer

chill out. let's wait for the second real showcase and then we talk.

 

[historia]

@JAHGamer

chill out. let's wait for the second real showcase and then we talk.

You are delusional if you think there are a second showcase this year.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

You are delusional if you think there are a second showcase this year.

Am I?

 

[JAHGamer]

Stay the course. Buy CDPR.

And they will stay the course…

idk why people keep saying buy CDPR, I love their games but that acquisition makes zero sense. It pushes Sony closer to PC when they should be moving away from PC, they have 2 big legacy multiplat IPs and knowing Sony they'd probably keep them multiplat. We shouldn't be wanting Sony to waste resources making multiplat games when there's countless other publishers that can do that. Let them sell to Tencent if they need help