Replaced by someone who is also not liked within the community in Justin Truman

I didn't initially remember his name, but as soon as I saw his face, I immediately remembered us being pissed at him for sunsetting content in Destiny 2. Then he also championed to "not overdeliver" when it comes to live service business philosophies. Hard to say if he's going to be an improvement lol.

With Sony having more control over Bungie it was expected for them to kick the guy although in the situation Bungie, Destiny 2 and Marathon are I don't see how the new guy is going to have any impact. At least not in the near future, if he is still there after the Marathon release. 

If Marathon fails hard, or releases to a lukewarm reception, Bungie will be in a really bad position.
Even as Sony already announced it is transitioning to become a PS Studios studio, that would really make Sony step in and do whatever they think is necessary to try to bring it back up.

Just a random thought but with the news that Sony is selling their EVO % it makes a lot more sense why they didn't show Tokon characters in Las Vegas lol. Obviously the main reason still being that they want the most eyes watching the reveals and the spot for Tokon was after the first finals with a viewers media of only 40k people.

That said as for the move itself I think it's a great move in the perfect moment, EVO fulfilled its mission. SIE has been recruiting people with experience organizing esports events since last year, the media used the news to imply the move as part of their service strategy and they were right but didn't know the service would be a fighting game, not a shooter. Tokon will most likely get its own tour and the money from sponsors will go 100% to Sony contrary to the EVO 50%. Because Sony will be not only an EVO sponsor but also is a minority owner of the new owners all the Sony presence (Inzone, PS, Crunchy, Tokon next year, etc) will still be there for less money. The PS5 units used at EVO are also used for CEO and Combo Breaker. PS5 is also used for MK events, Arc Sys events, Red Bull events and the EWC so PS5 will still be the standard for competitions (yes profesional don't like it but hey Blink Respawn was on pc and it was a worst tournament than any tournament using PS5 lol). Inzone was also used in the Tekken finals.
There is also "bad" factors like EVO 25 losing around 2,000 participants in comparison with EVO 24, completely normal, SF and Tekken aren't brand new anymore. The highest twitch viewer count I saw was 90k which isn't bad but isn't great either in comparison with other EVO editions. After EVO 25 I was wondering what kind of move they would do, it looks like selling was the plan and it was at the perfect time. 

Just finished Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter demo on Hard. Put over 10 hours in it, excited for the full game.

This is the best thing for Bungie... further integration into SIE being even more so.

There's now an opportunity for Bungie to go back to 1 or 2 SP games, which I think will be of benefit to everyone.

Yeah, we need more singleplayer games. That is Sony's bread and butter. Their best and most beloved games tend to be stuff like God of War and The Last of Us and Uncharted. Yeah, some of those have some multiplayer components but I've never heard a single soul saying that was why they got those games. People play God of War and The Last of Us and Uncharted for their singleplayer, then hop into multiplayer to keep the buzz going.

Honestly I'm even sort of at the point where I'm wondering where all the games are from Sony. They have their ups and downs, for sure, but this does seem like an exceptionally long time without a whole lot of news or updates or announcements on first party titles. Ghost of Yotei is looking amazing but what else do we even know about in the immediate-ish future? we know about Wolverine and Naughty Dog's space game which I forget the title to but we have no idea when either are coming out. 

What is Insomniac doing other than Wolverine? What is Santa Monica doing? Why AREN'T we getting bi-or-tri-yearly entries in the Jak and Daxter, Sly Cooper, and Ratchet & Clank series'? Are we getting a Horizon 3? 

PArt of me is glad for the lull because I'm one of those weirdos who feels that gaming as a whole is the best it's ever been due to the spectrum of games in terms of scope, style, and genre, and it's nice to get a break, but this is the first time I've personally worried for Sony's output. Even at their worst (early PS3 days) I always felt like there was something promising or exciting on the horizon. Even during their other lulls it always felt like a calm before a storm. Even when the memes about PS4 having no games were prevalent I usually thought it was being a bit silly because I could always think up a handful of titles I expected in the next year or two that I Was excited for. But right now? Ghost of Yotei is the only game on their slate I'm at all excited for that we have seen anything significant of. which is fine on its own but it's also been...how long since Sony's last major game? 2023? Did they even release anything first part of major significance in 2024?

*Checks Metacritic*

oh right, t hey won Game of the Year with Astro Bot. Uh, okay maybe ignore me a bit (I thought that game was overrated as hell, too, but I do not want to invoke the storm upon me since I also just admitted I found the new Donkey Kong boring and repetitive in another thread, which is triply weird because I LOVE platformers, I LOVE donkey Kong, and I LOVE 95% of what AStro referenced). 

But still, with exclusivity not really being a thing anymore, I'm having a bit of an issue. So much of my life I've always found exclusives to consistently be the most interesting games of every generation with a few exceptions (Dark Souls, Skyrim, Red Dead/GTA). Each year my favourite game is almost always an exclusive title, be it Nintendo, Sony, or even Microsoft. I dunno, the gradual dissolution of the concept of exclusives outside of Nintendo makes me worried that the medium as a whole - at least at the AAA level - is going to become an amorphous blob of gray and brown again just like in the PSWii60 era. Which I look back and cringe about. Holy crap so much of that generation sucked. Nintendo had some great games with colour and heart but holy shit it took Sony way too long to do anything interesting on the PS3 and I've always disliked most of the Xbox exclusives from that era, and when they did finally add some colour it was all Kinect garbage and...

...ugh, I'm just ranting again. I don't want the medium to lose its identity. I love indies but I don't want to HAVE to go to indies to experience something wonderful. I wanna see goofy, silly, FUN Games like Ratchet & Clank with big budgets and support. I want more experiments like Death Stranding even if I'm not a fan. I want to see God of War be some weird blend of bloothirsty carnage and heartfelt storytelling. I want fun and if specifically sony and microsoft aren't producing exclusives to sell their consoles I worry so much of the identity and creativity and heart that defined those consoles will melt into sludge. 

I'm worried every game will be made with the care and love of AI Slop. I loveNintendo but I don't want them to be the only bastion of joy in my life. I need Sony to step up their game because Nintendo/Playstation as a 1-2 punch has been a staple of my life since I was a kid. I need that creativity back. I need those two sides to the same coin. I need them to get their head out of their collective ass.

Oh right, and I guess Returnal's spirirtual successor is coming out next year, too. That should be good. 

Sword of the Sea has some phenomenal haptic feedback. 

I would go for the platinum if it wasn't for the speed run trophy lol. 

The wait is killing me! Lost Soul Aside is almost here!

In terms of what is announced, yeah it's not a lot. But that's just Sony these days, few projects are being announced so far in advance. At the very least, we should be looking forward to Firesprites horror narrative game (until dawn 2) and the 2.5D God of War next year. Add on Wolverine and Saros, and we at least have 4 SP experiences from Sony next year. I guess Tokon would count since it should have a SP aspect to it.