Dallinor said:
You have to factor in rising development costs and rising development time. That's a huge difference. It has meant bigger studios slowing down releases. Naughty Dog PS3: 4 games PS4: 2.5 games Sony Santa Monica PS3: 3 games PS4: 1 game This problem is industry wide. As costs continue to rise over the $100 million mark for a AAA title, publishers will be wary of releasing a title early (Anthem/Cyberpunk) and will double down investment/increase development time. Gamers demand higher quality and standards and the games industry will continue to more and more closely mirror the movie industry. Where blockbusters are king, risks are more calculated, investing in sequels is safer than producing new IP and games become more formulated to a specific standard that's proven to sell. Your analysis is flawed though. You're assuming Sony are making the decisions, when in reality its the market. Those 63 games sold more than those 139 games. So are they losing out on console buyers who would have purchased a console for Warhawk, Singstar or Folklore? Or are they gaining customers because a single title like Spiderman can now move over 20 million units? Their new IPS during the PS4 included: Horizon- GG biggest game ever GOT- SP biggest game ever Spiderman- IG biggest game ever Along with the likes of Bloodborne, Death Stranding, Days Gone and Until Dawn. Not 'Horizon and a few VR titles'. |
Yes but they are slowing down because more of an emphasis is being placed on making big AAA blockbusters and less of an emphasis on smaller titles. Other publishers aren't having this same problem. Is there any reason Last of Us 2 or Ghosts should have taken as long as they did? No way. Also, the average cost of a AAA title is between 60-80 million, not 100+. I don't know of anyone outside of maybe Rockstar who consistently spends over 100 million to make their games and they subsidize that with heavy emphasis on GaaS and continued spending.
The game industry has always been like the movie industry and there have always been proven formulas that sell that publishers push developers to use in their games. It's not some new movement and it exists in every single entertainment industry. Even Sony said a year or so into the PS4 gen that most games they create don't make money, but the big ones offset the smaller ones. This works the same way as a movie studio using the profits from a blockbuster to fund smaller projects. Does it make business sense to just stop doing those smaller projects and focus only on big blockbusters? Sure I guess. But you get less content as a consumer.
One of the things people have praised most about Sony since I've been a member here is their variety. They lost a lot of that during the PS4 era and if these sources are right, will continue to do so. That's a good thing? Personally I like the idea of companies producing a varying level of content. I don't see any flaw in my analysis. My point was that Sony is focusing less on creating new IP's and are releasing less games. Basically they are going from a place where their studios made big AAA titles and smaller scale stuff with new IP's sprinkled into both, to a place where their studios all make big AAA blockbusters solely and they rely on moneyhatting third party games for the smaller stuff. The sources Schreier spoke to shed light on why that is and the numbers themselves confirm it. Yes, you're right, AAA games are more expensive and take longer to make but that was never disputed.
As for the market dictating Sony's decision, nah not at all. For starters the PS4 sold way more than the PS3, not surprising considering the competition the PS3 faced vs what the PS4 faced. So when you're selling 30+ million more consoles, you'll sell a lot more games. And in the case of games like Spider-Man and GoW, they were heavily bundled especially during the holidays. But the market isn't dominated by those types of games. Those games are a flash in the pan, they come and they go. Does anyone even talk about Ghosts or LoU2 anymore? Not really, no. And they were huge AAA titles that took 5-6 years to make and just came out last year. The industry is dominated by evergreen titles. Nintendo titles, GTA, Fortnite, etc.
