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Sony - Is Sony saving VR? - View Post

VAMatt on 17 December 2018
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twintail said:
VAMatt said:

My point is not that Sony isn't releasing VR games.  My point is that of all the developers out there, the one that you would expect to make the big budget system sellers is Sony.  Yet, they have failed to do so.  There really aren't any system seller VR games, unfortunately,  

Nobody except the hardware guys can possibly come up with justification for putting big development money into VR game development, as the install bases are too small for big budget games by third parties to be profitable.  Sony is the leader in VR hardware sales, which would usually lead to some big games that in turn drive further hardware sales.  We've seen it with PS4, for sure.  But, they haven't done so for PSVR. 

That shows me that for one reason or another, Sony has determined that there isn't big money to be made in VR right now.  And that spells problems for the future of VR. 

It's pretty strange to compare a console to a console peripheral requiring said console, especially one with a high price tag involved. 

So of course there can't be AAA budget investment in a game right now, but that doesn't mean that their current lineup is lacking. 

DriveClub, Rigs, Farpoint, Firewall, Wipeout and Astrobot (especially this) are all strong investments. Blood & Truth and Dreams still have to release, and those aren't small investments either. 


Just because they don't have a system seller doesn't mean there is a lack of trying. SCEJ are making VR games, Sony London is making games, contracts with US companies for games. And don't forget that they built a whole new studio for VR game development, Manchester Studio.

Besides, PSVR has a software ratio of 7:1. There is money in VR in its current form for Sony.  

I don't disagree with any of those statements. But, there really has been no AAA level investment in psvr games. If there had been some, maybe sales would be a lot higher. We don't know that.  

I should probably walk back my statement from my original comment in this thread. Clearly Sony has done quite a bit to further virtual reality.  But, I think it is also true the Sony would have been the most obvious candidate for pproduction of a big-time, system seller, AAA type of game.  They have not attempted to make a game of this sort, at least not that I'm aware.  And, as we see mentioned on this site all the time, the software sells the hardware.  

I'm happy with my psvr. I think it's cool to play around with, and I'm glad to have a virtual reality device that did not require a massive investment on my part. It gets a steady streams of games, some of which appear to have a fair amount of effort and investments behind them.  But, I had higher hopes for VR a few years ago. With gigantic names like Sony, Facebook,   HTC, Samsung, and Valve behind the technology, I thought we'd see some real serious investment in software.  The fact that we have not seen this investment leads me to believe that these companies have determined that there is not going to be widespread appeal in the gaming market for this stuff in the near future.  And I find that disappointing.