PS4 has been such a phenomenon for Sony published games. No longer do we see them struggling to sell decently compared to Xbox and Nintendo juggernauts, something which happened frequently to amazing Sony games last gen. Super Mario Party on the Switch sold more than Infamous and Infamous 2, Killzone 2 and 3 and Resistance 2 and 3 FFS. The Last of Us ushered in a new focus towards story and characters in Sony studios which has established a reputation for them at the right time as third parties go towards live services but it hasn't been good to gamers.
PS3 had such a fantastic variety of first party and second party games. It was beautiful. FPS games like the Resistance trilogy and Killzone 2 and 3 were very different from other FPS games at the time and still today, with a heavy focus on campaign but a really expansive multiplayer mode. Resistance series had incredible and different weapons from the standard shooter affair, a weapon wheel in the first and last games in the trilogy, medical kits at a time of regenerating health and 64 player multiplayer on Resistance 2 on the fucking PS3. Killzone series had realistic weapons with a sense of weight not present in other military shooters, amazing atmosphere and a fucking jetpack in Killzone 3 which functions like the ones in Anthem, it was glorious. On PS4 we had one shoddy rushed Killzone game for launch, that's the only FPS we got. I don't care for most third party FPS games except Doom and Titanfall 2, but even they cannot replace the PS3 exclusives.
Infamous and Infamous 2 were Sony's superhero games and were a lot more creative than Spiderman which borrows heavily from the Arkham games, which also came around the same time as Infamous. The combat in Infamous can be likened to a shooter but heavily twisted to make it different from other games. Ammo isn't in discrete numbers, its in a continuum. They don't drop from enemies but could be recharged from electrical sources in the environment. There weren't different weapons for rockets, bullets and stuff they were abilities possessed by Cole McGrath. There were some cool stuff like the wave which could blow away enemies not present in shooters. Combat was tactical and required right positioning to not get surrounded by enemies by using the incredible platforming skills and movement abilities of protagonist. Infamous 2 expanded on this by having more variety of standard weapons, kinetic abilities like Half Life 2 to throw object at enemies and special abilities. These were also different based on good and evil playthroughs which provided huge replayability.
The platforming was also really fun and there was so many ways of traversal with fantastic city design and a high skill ceiling was there and while platforming was fun for everyone a skilled player could smoothly traverse an island using various tools at their disposal such as grinding on wires, thrust and teleportation. Compare this to Sony PS4 superhero games, Infamous Second Son was good but rushed and Sony doesn't intend on continuing this amazing series. Spiderman combat has simple movesets and is a counter and beat up combat system with the only skill requirement being correctly timed button presses. Movement is fun but lacking variety and depth. Gravity Rush 2 is the real best superhero game published by Sony this gen and has a lot of really cool gameplay features and traversal but its still not as good as Infamous 2 but the worst superhero game published by Sony is its best selling one and we're getting no more of the amazing ones.
God of War 3 was the pinnacle of the series and among the best games of all time. It was different from nearly anything else on the market and would stand out even more in the current industry but instead we got God of War which while really good suffers from feeling too familiar to other Sony games and doesn't stand out anymore with its RPG mechanics, lack of good boss battles and feel good story to appeal to the lowest common denominator. The old God of War games were fantastic takes on the Greek mythology, and weren't afraid of not appealing to everybody, but the people who understood what those games set to do from a narrative perspective loved the fuck out of them. God of War 3 also had amazing pacing, no walking sections, really amazing puzzles and absolutely the best combat system of its time from a Western developer. God of War on PS4 is a really well made, solid, fun and should I say great game, but rather than challenging industry norms like the older games conforms to them, becoming a lot more like every other game and lost its flair.
Multiplayer shooters like MAG, the best Gran Turismo game ever with Gran Turismo 6, new creative games like LittleBigPlanet and arcade racing games like MotorStorm and Wipeout, PS4 has fewer else no first and second party games like those. Demon's Souls was amazing and daring and while Bloodborne is fantastic its not as good, and not daring to do something new. Sony's first parties have shifted towards narrative open worlds with Horizon, Days Gone and Ghost of Tsushima. They are appealing to more people and are solidly well made games for sure but they don't have the edge they did when they were behind and trying new stuff. I'm growing weary of them, which is sad because I loved Sony games and still love their games on the PS3.
