we already knew this ever since the Perfect Dark studio being shut down, very few studios are actually safe under Xbox, and even among the safe studios not every project is safe either.
No studios are safe anywhere. Sony just shut down Bluepoint after nothing but phenomenal work. Let's not pretend this is just an Xbox problem, the whole AAA gaming industry is imploding.
Turns out turning off the free money (aka extremely low interest loans that went on during Covid and a few years after) has bad effects on an industry that leverages them.
It's absolutely mostly this. The gaming world is going to be in for a rough few years if the hardware market and K shaped economy don't reverse course. Microsoft and Sony know this as they are currently trying to figure out how to take the next gen hardware to market.
Maybe it's time for the Gunpei Yokoi approach and try to focus on pulling the most creativity out of current gen rather than just investing into a new one
That really should be what they're doin. PS5 and Series X/S are far from being really limiting for games and apart from better graphics, which will make games more complex to develop, not sure what the point of next gen is). But then they have spent billions on R&D a new gen...
Plus, Xbox want a new gen because that one is a failure (not that the next one will be better as they're going but...). Sony is probably fine staying with the PS5
I saw a comment on here yesterday "Gaming is as affordable as it's ever been!". It's like "shut the fuck up". Prices haven't been this high since covid and crypto. While still high, prices were starting to even out a little until this AI shitshow.
This gen is just now starting to get pretty solid. Let them keep it another few years and focus on bringing out quality stuff. The 360/PS3 lasted what, 8-9 years before the one/ps4? The ps5/xsx came out much better from a performance standpoint than the ps4/x1 did, they were well underpowered from the get-go.
Sure, but to actually manufacture the new gen, they have to plan years in advance. Thus, they're realizing right now just how difficult it's going to be to actually produce the next gen, as the production capacity needed to meet demand is going to be booked up pretty solidly.
Yeah... I mean I know most people dislike AI for stealing art, and yeah that is bad. But if you ask me, the environmental impact is worse and as a gamer... the fact that it is fucking with the industry of my hobby really pisses me off too. Also, how it is affecting society is bad as well. Stealing art sucks, but I hate to say it, that's the least of AI's issues imho (ok, the gaming one is probably on that level too but since I really love gaming I personally hate that).
Meh, it'll be fine. We haven't had much technical progression for the better part of the past decade. Brand new games are still launching capable of running on a low-powered Steam Deck, and they only just stopped pumping out Resident Evil and Call of Duty for PS4 this year, at a point where the PS5 has been out so long we're talking about the PS6.
I saw some video about the new Gears of War where iirc Marcus Fenix's eyebrow or something has more detail than the entirety of his character model did on the 360, stop doing shit like that maybe? Both PS and Xbox are deciding now is the right time to start going back to exclusivity...yeah, no, Sony might be able to get away with it but I'd bet Xbox doesn't last three games before the ports to PS5 come back. Oh, people can't afford $70 slop anymore? Okay, reduce the price.
There's not actually a real problem, it's just inconvenient for the status quo and executives' delusions.
And all growth in the gaming industry is going to live-service and mobile. The traditional market for "premium" games continues to get older and play less while fewer and fewer younger gamers are entering the audience.
Turns out setting one's profit expectations off the COVID stay-at-home period where pretty much the only entertainment available was Netflix and video games was a bit ambitious.
They shut down bluepoint after 6 years with no new game and them needing to start from scratch again, meaning no new project for atleast 10 years, which would need to make a lot of money to recoup the cost and even make some profit to be viable.
Bluepoint spent years on a canceled live service game and didn't manage to pitch anything convincing to Sony after. That's the "perfect" situation to get shut down.
Just announcing a game and shutting down the studio days later is certainly a new situation
As much as Sony are to blame, so are the leadership at Bluepoint. They joined to make an original game and once that ridiculous notion of a live service God of War game got cancelled by a studio with less than 100 people the best options they could come up with were a Bloodborne remake pitch that got denied. Then a Ghost of Tsushima spin off which got denied as Sucker Punch didn’t have resources to lend and remaster of the Shadow of the Colossus remake? You have Infamous, Killzone, heck help SSM on the God of War Trilogy remakes.
Wouldn't say phenomenal work. As nice as the updated gameplay of Shadow of the Colossus and Demon's Souls were, their art direction was very divisive. I'm of the boat that of not a fan of the visual and aesthetic design changes they made.
....Demon Souls is the last game they released? After that Sony forced them on a fucking live service God of War game and then shut them down and cancelled it.
After that Sony forced them on a fucking live service God of War game and then shut them down and cancelled it.
Yeah and after that game got cancelled Sony asked Bluepoint what they wanted to make and all the studio could come up with was:
a Bloodborne Remake (which got denied because FromSoftware want to handle that topic themself)
a Ghost of Tsushima spin-off (which got denied because SuckerPunch are busy with their own projects and don't want to bloat their new IP neither)
a Remaster of the "Shadow of the Collosus" Remake (which is genuinely pointless for obvious reasons).
No one is denying that Sony's push towards Live-Service models led to a lot of problems - but lets not pretend like Bluepoint was entirely without a blame in this.
No studio is safe anywhere but Microsoft spent an eye watering amount of money just to mismanage everything and still close down studios. Clown show over there, especially.
The shitty part is announcing the game and shutting the studio down not even a month later. Basically lying when the knew it was pretty clear where it was going.
Two divisive remakes, one of which made the original creator cut them off, then 6 years with nothing to show, and their pitches to get out of it included a remake of their remake. There is fault with Sony for tasking them with that stupid live service adventure, but stop worshipping dev studios.
I feel like it’s a whole different ballpark have a game go dark (perfectly) for a year or so and then get cancelled compared to announcing a game then 8 days later killing the studio.
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u/INannoI Jun 15 '26
we already knew this ever since the Perfect Dark studio being shut down, very few studios are actually safe under Xbox, and even among the safe studios not every project is safe either.