Sony acquires FireSprite Studios

smroadkill15

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smroadkill15 on 13 September 2021

Great acquisition! It's good to see Sony investing more into VR.

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Dallinor on 13 September 2021

DonFerrari said:

the-pi-guy said:

Kadokawa's gaming division isn't huge, but they do have a few teams that make RPGs and anime games. It doesn't really make them a huge amount of money, but they seem to be pretty intent on keeping and even expanding it.

We do Know that Sony is investing on anime and games based on anime/novel/manga and if i`m not wrong they are partnering with Kadokawa a lot. So who knows if that may turn into their game arm becoming a joint venture or full sale.

Yes they are, Sony bought a 1.93% stake in Kadokawa back in February.

The two companies are in a Capital Alliance Strategy.

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src on 13 September 2021

twintail said:

src said:

My logic with FROM is that Kadokawa is not really in the gaming business.....its pretty much just FROM by revenue and they haven't made any clear moves of expanding. And their gaming business doesn't add much to their bottom line either.

Imo, and I think FROM kinda knows this, FROM is a studio that could become a leader in the RPG genre, up there with Bethesda and CDPR, however they are often quite behind in tech and it seems they haven't grown as quickly as they should be.

Combine that with the variability of publisher fishing, IP ownership, I think FROM with be a whole different beast under a AAA gaming publisher.

I get what you're saying, and anything is possible of course.

But Kadokawa also owns Spike Chunsoft. Gaming might not be the greatest money maker, but its an industry they seem ok to be in, even if partially.

I checked their 2020 FY report:

Games were $166M for the year, $27M profit.

That's 8% of their total, 14% of their operating profit. Forecast for next year is a -16% decline. Looks like they pretty much rely on FROMs output.

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PotentHerbs on 14 September 2021

twintail said:

I get what you're saying, and anything is possible of course.

But Kadokawa also owns Spike Chunsoft. Gaming might not be the greatest money maker, but its an industry they seem ok to be in, even if partially.

Kadokawa Corporation also makes anime where Sony is starting to make a big push.

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Zkuq on 14 September 2021

Since this keeps popping up in the latest threads, I'll drop my two cents here as well: Since FireSprite seems to have been almost a second-party studio to Sony anyway, no one's really losing out on anything because of this, so I'm fine with this. Additionally, seems like a solid acquisition for Sony, so there's isn't much to be unhappy about here. From a gamer perspective, I might say that I don't really care about this acquisition.

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src on 15 September 2021

Most of Kadokawa's business comes from mangas and light novels. It doesn't make sense for Sony to buy them. They are cheap but the only worthy asset is the game business.

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Manlytears on 15 September 2021

src said:

Most of Kadokawa's business comes from mangas and light novels. It doesn't make sense for Sony to buy them. They are cheap but the only worthy asset is the game business.

Anime and Mobile gaming. Kadokawa is an extremely close partner with Sony, and yes, in the big business of Anime creation (especially with the increase in the streaming market) and Mobile game (especially gacha games) they have a big market in common.
Forget Fromsoftware (which is just icing on the cake), Sony buying Kadokawa, or at least securing a strong partnership, makes a lot of sense in many markets for both companies.

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src on 15 September 2021

Manlytears said:

src said:

Most of Kadokawa's business comes from mangas and light novels. It doesn't make sense for Sony to buy them. They are cheap but the only worthy asset is the game business.

Anime and Mobile gaming. Kadokawa is an extremely close partner with Sony, and yes, in the big business of Anime creation (especially with the increase in the streaming market) and Mobile game (especially gacha games) they have a big market in common.
Forget Fromsoftware (which is just icing on the cake), Sony buying Kadokawa, or at least securing a strong partnership, makes a lot of sense in many markets for both companies.

Not anime. Nearly all their money comes from LN and manga publishing.

Something Sony do not want to get into. Like I said, I can see a gaming partnership or Sony buying the gaming department. Don't expect a merger.

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DonFerrari on 15 September 2021

twintail said:

Manlytears said:

Anime and Mobile gaming. Kadokawa is an extremely close partner with Sony, and yes, in the big business of Anime creation (especially with the increase in the streaming market) and Mobile game (especially gacha games) they have a big market in common.
Forget Fromsoftware (which is just icing on the cake), Sony buying Kadokawa, or at least securing a strong partnership, makes a lot of sense in many markets for both companies.

The problem with buying Kadokawa is that they operate over 50 subsidiaries. They don't just publish light novels and manga, but children's books, magazines and literature, too. Their other businesses contain school development and operation, marketing consultancy with JPN-CHN businesses, education software, travel planning, ICT consulting and data analysis.

Sure, there are aspects to Kadokawa that would fit into Sony's portfolio easily, but Kadokawa would have to be willing to let go of those individual revenue streams.

A spin-off is possible, but very unlikely.