Which Sony tentpole titles do you think will be released during the holiday seasons of 2024, 2025, and 2026?
- Thread starter Yurinka
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What isnt *edit* oh yeah. But we don't know if that's concept art from a game they're working on
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OP
Notice that in that Bluepoint page their current projects are listed as "Original Content" instead of the name/codename of a game. Notice also that doesn't include outsourcing budget, pretty likely because whoever was doing the document still didn't contact Bluepoint to ask for it (reason of why that person didn't that the "original content" was God of War Ragnarok).
This is the page of the leak for Guerrilla, notice the codename of the game (Horizon Online or Horizon 3, "Hunters Gathering"), the employees difference between both studios and that in this case the image isn't an artwork:
In this case that person had Guerrilla's info, but the image instead was a random image they took from a Guerrilla website post from 2021 where they were talking about their new office:
https://www.guerrilla-games.com/read/a-first-look-at-guerrillas-new-studio
So yes, the "original content" they were working on was God of War Ragnarok and that artwork was just a random concept art, or if not a concept art of the project they were going to work after GoWR, pretty likely the next GoW set in a new mythology.
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That tweet was about them having lay-offs despite being profitable as you stated. Media Molecule output hasn't been great and their founders and core creative leads have left over the years. The issue is that other PS studios have levelled up in the time they were on Dreams.
Again Hermen came out being stricter about production pipelines and cut off quicker when teams don't deliver milestones/wast money. The days they can fumble as long as they want with Dreams under Layden is over. They have to deliver otherwise it's game over. 15
About Santa Monica, on the interview during 2021 showcase was asked about his project. He simply didn't have something to show at the time but would speak ''soon'' to Sid the focus was on Ragnarok.
For Castlevania it's just Eric has a wish for it to do it and reckoned fans can pressure for it. Sony already has a deal with Konami for Silent Hill, they have dormant IP's and that IP could also lead to PS productions collabs since. It depends on what kind of deal they can work out if that happens similar to Spider-man. Personally would find that awesome, can't see another studio do a better job.
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OP
Studios like Bungie or Naughty Dog also had layoffs and they are also profitable. Firing a small percent of their workforce doesn't mean they will shut down the studio.
MM had a smaller output because it's a smaller team and was supporting a live service game and released plenty of stuff for it, like the VR version.
In most of these cases layoff means they stopped working in a project (TLOU Online in case of ND, Dreams in case of MM) and some of that people won't be needed during maybe years, so are fired. This mixed with -or in the context of- a global push to reduce costs reducing their total manpower in 8-9% where they remove the less productive people to make room for future growth.
Helldivers 2 was supposed to be developed in 3 years and released in 2019, around when Hermen got in charge. He allowed them to have 5 years of delay and released it after a total of 8 years of development.
Media Molecle worked on Dreams during 10 years. The same time that the whole Destiny franchise has been in the market. Like any GaaS it had its run and when didn't generate enough moved the team away to their next project.
Regarding Castlevania, Eric was asked in Kinda Funny in which IP he'd like to work and said that one. In the same way that when Druckmann got asked he said Cowboy Bebop, The Punisher or Hotline Miami.
They aren't hinting anything, they're just replying a question in an interview and saying personal wishes. Doesn't mean they hope to ever work on that.
Regarding Silent Hill, Sony signs 3rd party exclusives with a ton of companies of games. One of them being these SH games. That just means that, they signed to get some Silent Hills. Doesn't mean Sony will develop games for a 3rd party game publisher, they because never did that in the same way Nintendo or MS never did it.
And well, Silent Hill and Castlevania never have been super sellers. They sell like shit compared to God of War, Spider-Man, Horizon or even Bloodborne. Regarding console horror games they signed Resident Evil, 5 nights at Freddy's and now Silent Hill. They have it covered. If Sony would want a game like that they'd make a new IP, or would bring back Bloodborne. Castlevania is too small for Sony and it's a 3rd party IP, so they won't work on it.
Unlike MM those studios had rapid expansions and are delivering content e.g. remakes/remasters or expansion you literally said it yourself remove the less productive people. Bungie had lay-offs but grew to 1400 under PS and moved to a new HQ and opened a Amsterdam office, same for ND growing to 400+
Helldivers 2 was reworked and got bigger in scope after 3 years per Pilested the CEO, the Helldivers 2 that was greenlit under Layden was different simply under time scope. No doubt during the live-service initiative and in similar manner what happened with Housemarque evolved the studio from indie style games to bigger productions.
9 years is way too long and then extend to try to make it work as well being absent for the first half of PS5. Comparing Destiny 2 to Dreams is crazy. We will see what happens if Media Molecule doesn't meet the milestones, I hope they do for them.
Eric Williams said: “You guys can make [Castlevania] happen because you have the audience of the world here.” When speaking about his future plans after Ragnarok he went on to say: “I don’t know what I’m doing next, but if somebody gives me that Castlevania license, we would love to make that.”
That is very different from saying my fantasy game is Cowboy Bebop.
That was his quote, I said it would be awesome if they did cause the IP has potential.
It's strange you refer to those as small not noteworthy for Sony despite saying they signed Silent Hill 2 and considering them working (xDev) with Shift Up for Stellar Blade while not owning the IP. It's not a horror game, the genre is called MetroidVania for a reason and the X360/PS3 games are very similar to older GoW. Difference is it's a Sony owned studio and if that would happen it would be on favourable terms for both that means (console) exclusivity for Sony and revenue share for Konami.
Btw Nintendo hands out a lot of their IPs/partnerships with developers (Intelligent Systems/Koei Techmo, Camelot, HaL/Bandai Namco) and bought Bayonetta rights from Sega. Similar what Konami is doing currently (Blooper, Virtuous) and could potentially sell rights.
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OP
Yes, in recent years they highly grew basically all their teams. Including Media Molecule, who as of last year were 135 people. But when it makes sense.
In the case of MM, last year they sunseted Dreams and started a new project (which may not be a GaaS). Meaning that there are server programmers, testers, community managers, data analysts etc., that won't be needed during at least a few years -or even more if their new project isn't GaaS/online MP-, people who works in GaaS related stuff, online MP stuff, being close to release a game or new IP, etc.
They can't have these people sitting there for months or years doing nothing, so get fired. Plus in their case, Dreams despite being profitable like all the other games wasn't a big success and pretty likely underperformed compared to their expectations and took way longer to be made than they expected.
So instead of growing the team makes more sense to reduce it a bit and try to control better the scope of their next project, something smaller that would take less resources and would generate more profit.
Helldiver 2 was greenlight under Yoshida, not Layden. But yes, it got reworked many times as usual in game development and also as usual their scope grew during development.
And yes, with the Sony money they did grow their team too turning into a AAA studio. Something that also is very complicated and has many related challenges regarding production, management, internal communication, human resources, etc.
To make games is very hard.
Well, when I said they did work on Dreams for 10 years I meant developing it, also including post launch development.
In Gamescom 2012 they said they were working in two projects, Tearaway and another one (Dreams, which was announced in 2013). It got released in 2020, after around 7-8 years of development. Add 3+ more years of post-launch development.
They were a relatively small team with tons of team members being juniors hired directly from the university or from their community. So didn't need great sales to keep it profitable.
But looking at the future they need to be more careful, do less drugs and focus more in the business side, making more commercial games with a shorter development time.
Mark Healey agrees and said that it made more sense to put somewhere else as head of the studio with a more business related mindset, which is what is needed in that position. He is a creative guy not interested in the business side and other stuff related to run a studio, he was there because when they started the studio had to put someone in charge and with the inertia many years later he was still there.
So he did put somebody that he thinks will do a better job than him running the studio and moved away because he wants to work directly on his own personal stuff, not being a manager. He thinks the studio is in good hands and looks forward to their next project.
It is the same, dev gets asked something like "if you could choose to work in a franchise from another company which one would you choose?" and they say whatever IPs while knowing they won't work on it.
In this case, Sony won't spend around $300M on a Castlevania IP whose best selling game sold under 2 million copies and was two generations ago. And even less when it's owned by another publisher.
And the quote "You guys can make [Castlevania] happen because you have the audience of the world here" was either desilusional or just something to give the interviewers or fans something they wanted to hear.
Because everybody who has worked inside a AAA company in high positions like him knows that any meaningful decision and budgets have to be properly justified in a data driven way, carefully analyzed and double checked against alternatives, and that there's a lot of market research and approvals behind what the next title is going to be and how is going to be.
Specially when isn't just to pump another sequel of your best selling IPs with a team who already worked on it. And even more if you're talking about using somebody else's IP.
It isn't decided by few random player comments in a youtube video or social media.
Fun fact: I was part of a team who went to Ubi HQ to the final greenlight approval meeting of a new IP where I worked, and among many other people I know some of the top people of the team who developed the best selling Castlevania (same one who did the best selling Metroid).
Both Sony and Nintendo make 2nd party games (like Stellar Blade, Fire Emblem, Bloodborne or Smash Bros), which is to hire other gamedev studios to work in games they publish (independently of who owns the IP). This is what XDEV does in case of Sony, in addition to find and manage internal or external support teams to help the lead team.
Or sign 3rd party exclusives, a different thing, which is to pay publishers in exchange of some type of exclusivity of some game published by that publisher.
Sony or Nintendo pay these studios to work for them. Not the opposite, which would be the case of putting an internal Sony or Nintendo team to develop a Castlevania/Konami game. In the same way Nintendo won't put the BotW or Mario Odyssey teams to work on a Ninja Gaiden or Saints Row game. It wouldn't make sense at all.
And well, Konami is doing great with their finances and they have no need of selling their IPs, which is one of the most valuable assets of a game publisher.
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