Sony: why we're launching new IP this late in the console cycle
Sony was one of the few major publishers to launch brand new core IP at this year's E3 show, debuting Quantic Dream's Beyond: Two Souls and showing more of Naughty Dog's The Last of Us.
(Beyond: Two Souls, PS Vita, PS3, Sony, The Last Of Us)
"It is absolutely critical [to create new ideas]," he told MCV."
"We've always felt that the strength of our platform has been a kind of symbiotic relationship between the platform being created and strengthened by new experiences. And then that reinforcing the strength and one hopes the longevity of the platform overall."
Which is why I own a PS3. New IPs FTW. Getting tired of playing the same game franchises over and over again. Want something new, fresh.
Personally I own a Ps3 for third party titles. Unfortunately after many of them being announced as exclusives they actually went multiplatform such as FF13, Assassins Creed, DMC4 etc : /
@ shoddy And you have a knack for making ridiculous assumptions and attacking people over silly things. Of course I own God of War and MGS4 (btw MGS4 is 3rd party). But I never bought a Ps2 back in the day for sony's first party line up but rather titles such as DMC, GTA, Silent Hill, MGS, and Medal of Honor. PS3 simply does not have the same strong third party support as last generation hence 'the multiplatform gen'.
Well Antoine I don't really understand why you would purchase a ps3 for the 3rd party stuff. Xbox 360 has consistantly has won head to head battles with ps3 on multi console 3rd party software releases, with better graphics and performance??? Your logic here escapes me. I own my ps3 for the 'exclusive' software and blu ray movie playback. Occasionally I'll purchase a multi console release game for my ps3 but only if lensoftruth . com declares it the victor in a head to head with Xbox 360. Which boils down to most all multi-console release gaming being done on my Xbox and PS3 'exclusive' gaming on my ps3.
I wish. But they let those IPs fall into the hands of Activision. Sony should have at least MATCHED the bid put up to Insomniac/ND for those IPs....with all the respect they had for them, I'm sure they would have sold it to Sony instead.
But nope. Sony let legendary IPs turn into a dead franchise (Crash) and a plot to sell expensive pieces of plastic DLC to kid(s' parents) (Spyro).
i will also buy a playstation system because it gives me the one thing the other two don't and thats VARIETY, and the fact that they are the only publisher out of the big 3 who ACTUALLY releases new IPs.
i just this past sunday traded in my 360 elite because i havent touched the thing since playing gears 3. MS just doesnt provide me with the VARIETY i want in my exclusives. they keep retreading out the same 3 exclusives that i'm not really interested in, and forcing this kinect garbage down our throats.
with the next round of consoles coming i'll be picking up the new PS for sure, but i will not be purchasing the next MS system because i know it will be halo, forza, and fable over and over.
the wii u i'll pick up about a year after it launches i want a nice VARIETY of games to play thats more to my liking.
I give Sony props for doing what they are doing since based off of E3 it seems Sony is one the few publishers willing to risk creating a new IP late in the generation. Unlike Nintendo
nintendo will never take a risk. they will publish new IP's but never develop them unless its wii-u sports.
they didnt even develop last story, xenoblade or pandora's tower. regardless im glad those games are coming but when is Miyamoto going to use his magic on something new?
and if they are going to keep rehashing mario and zelda why not take a different twist? oh well
New ips start on ps3 and form the foundation for the awesome sequels that will be on the ps4. I can only imagine how a new starhawk, lbp, uncharted, etc.... will be omn the ps4.
Money talks, fans talk, people change their minds.
If developers saying "this is the last one" was true 100 percent of the time, we wouldn't have a lot of great games and Metal Gear would have ended at least 2 games ago lol
@ Soldierone: Kojima doesnt just do it for the money, he doez it because with each game, a wide array of possible storylinez can branch out of the series. If it was just money, someone else would make it, while Kojima collects royalties and konami simply gets paid.
I'm actually disappointed they don't release them as launch titles for the next gen. I mean it's not like they're being released this year, and next year all rumors point to a PS4 release on the holiday period.
Seeing new games like Watch Dogs and 1313 in action, it will be amazing to see what developers like NG can pull on a next gen hardware.
The strategy doesn't make sense to me because of the lack of sales from Sony exclusives outside a few of them but it works for them I guess and they could continue the series on their next machine thus creating hype for a platform.
Time will tell if it works out for them. I would decrease the exclusives a bit and up the marketing budget but that's coming from an economics major lol.
You know, sales wise, the same can be said about any of the companies. Besides Halo, Forza, and Gears, what games on 360 really sell well?
Really, the fact that Sony is still releasing new IP's on PS3 completely destroyed the sales argument. Why? Because despite making little to no money on the PS3, Sony still puts out awesome AAA IP's. People try to say that sales will result in better quality games and services. Well. Why is it that Microsoft, despite being the only console manufacturer to yield a huge profit, still has yet to put out a single AAA IP worth a crap since Gears, and has turned XBL into nothing but an ad spamming updated version of the WP7 OS. In the 360 owner's case, those "sales" are going to nothing more than time exclusive DLC and getting Kinect crap shoved down their throats. Destroys the entire purpose in the end.
Sony has always been about providing new exclusive AAA experiences combined with the third party ones to make a gaming machine that provides core gamers with the thing they want most: core games. Point? Sales don't mean crap in the end, and articles like this prove it.
What do you call selling well? The overwhelming majority of PS3 exclusives sell a million or more; those that don't still reach high enough numbers to have made a profit.
You being an economics major, you should understand something as basic as supply and demand. In this case, Sony fans want more and varied exclusives, and Sony supplies them. As long as Sony keeps up with the supply, the fans won't go anywhere.
Here's an even simpler concept: you gotta give the people what they want. Sony folks want games. Lots of em, of all types. Sony delivers. As long as they do that, they will be fine.
Supply and demand indeed and when you make exclusive games that don't reach even 5% of your install base that isn't demand.
The prior person said sales don't mean crap which is really funny because last time I checked Sony is a business and sales do matter maybe not to the consumer but to a bleeding company such as Sony it means a hell of a lot.
All I said was they could knock off a few exclusive games that under-perform and use better marketing money which is a true case because the competition kills them in that area.
This allegiance to a corporation is getting out of hand I swear.
And again, I ask you what you consider to be good sales? Apparently, the exclusives are doing well enough to justify sequels and their own continued existences, so they can't be flat-out bombing like you and others would like people to believe.
As for "games that don't reach even 5% of your install base," that's called VARIETY. Not everybody's gonna play Atelier, or GT5, or Uncharted, or Resistance, or Killzone, or White Knight Chronicles, or Heavy Rain, etc. But you'll have somebody that will buy EVERY Atelier, both WKCs, Ar Tonelico, Valkyria Chronicles, both Disgaeas, and so on.
People demand a variety, so they get the variety; the sales other consoles see in one or two franchises are split up among dozens, but the sales are still about even. And the people that want the games buy them, and these people rarely seem to be disappointed. Sure, plenty of people who don't even own a PS3 complain about how lackluster the exclusive library is, going on about "quality over quantity," but the majority of those that actually put time into the games enjoy them, and there's no lack of quality to be found... unless you mean "quality" sales, and base that on only the big sellers like Halo.
Which is obviously what you're doing. If a game doesn't sell as much as Call of Duty or Halo, then to you and other anti-Sony posters, it didn't sell well and is a waste of time.
But not only do most games never come anywhere near those sales, it's not necessary for all games to do so, and titles with wider appeal like Call of Duty SHOULD sell that much, as opposed to a niche title like Atelier Totori.
Example: Catherine sits at a little over half a million sales worldwide, but the developer has stated that these sales are great. They reached their target; 8 million copies would have been nice, but it was necessary for the game to be considered a success. And this was multiplat.
In fact, ATLUS' best selling game, Demon's Souls, hasn't even hit 3 million, but it's considered an overwhelming success. None of the Persona games have reached a million, but their sales are looked upon favorably.
So, again, I ask, what do YOU consider good sales? Sony seems to be satisfied enough with the sales of these games that they keep making more; but since you're an economics major- unlike ANYBODY working for Sony- I guess you would know better than they would.
***"Sony seems to be satisfied enough with the sales of these games that they keep making more"***
This^ is all that needs to be said.
If Sony as a company keeps investing in new games it is safe to say that Sony is satisfied with the return.
What people need to realize is that most games don't make it past the 3 million sales mark and that's including MULTIPLATS. So to expect an EXCLUSIVE to even sell 3 million copies let alone Gears, Halo, and CoD numbers is a ridiculously high expectation.
Apollo said he doesn't understand Sony strategy of releasing new games, well people also don't understand Microsoft's strategy of timed DLC.
In Sony's case people claim that Sony's exclusives don't sell. In Microsoft's case people claim that timed DLC has an insignificant/no impact on anything meaningful. Yet both Sony and Microsoft continue to do what they do so obviously they are satisfied with what they are gaining from it.
Even if Sony's sales on exclusives are below expectations does it really matter? What does poking fun at the sales numbers even do? Would you rather Sony not release games at all? I don't understand that at all.
imiagin what the game would look like if they kept working on it until ps4 they never told us it existed etc i wonder if it will be like when the ps3 1st launched and every new site will be like "omg its crap" etc or if it will still get the same praise? either way im glad sony keeps pumping out these new IP's sure the xbox has better online but for me, a single player guy, you cant beat the ip's sony has sure halo is awesome cant wait for no4 looks amazing, gears is decent all thought there is allot of things that dont make sense like flooding the dock on gears 3 the leaver to let the water in is........on the bottom of the deck beside the part your trying to open in real life that = stupid and u would probs be killed with the rush of water running in. fable is also decent but they are really the only exclusive games on the xbox that come out regulary (i REALLY think MS missed a huge opertunity for infinate undescover 2, magna carter 3 and lost oddesy 2, MS u own the ip's USE THEM!!!!)
Sony is a corporation that is always looking to the long term results of actions they take today. that is why there are people out there that don't understand it's actions. For example Microsoft is more interested in quick profit and how they can maximize quick gains in their portfolio. That is why MS will abandon a project if profits aren't realized in the short term. The Xbox one is a great example of abandoned hardware as well as those cell phones the Kin one and two, they weren't even for sale for 2 weeks when MS axed them.
Imagine owning an MS Kin phone and finding out that they became unsupported, abandoned hardware after you bought it. That doesn't make for a future loyal customer.
But, Sony supporting the PS2 years after the release of the PS3 will garner plenty of loyal, return customers.
Sony is just awesome despite what people say about Playstation. That is the reason i'll always keep coming to Playstation for my games. I will however play games from other platforms. As a gamer I can recognize good games on any platform.
True, third party runs the demand for exclusive RPGs on PS3.
It seems to be suiting them fine with games like the Disgaea, White Knight Chronicles, Atelier and Tales series, Folklore, 3D Dot Game Heroes, Valkyria Chronicles, Demon's Souls and the upcoming masterpieces Ni no Kuni and FF Versus XIII (that will be out despite what people have been calling "vaporware").
a new PS2 IP by the name of "God of War" was released about 8 months before the PS3 dropped. "God of War II" came out in 2007, on the PS2. The PS3 had been out for 4-5 months. It's no surprise to me that Sony would release new IPs on the PS3, even if PS4 is right around the corner. They don't just give up on their previous console after releasing a new one. They know not everyone makes the jump right away. I was still buying PS2 games even after buying my PS3.
Well I'll admit the Last Of Us looks great and I have it pre-ordered already. The Beyond: Two Souls game didn't interest me one bit. To be fair though, these games were started years ago. It would be foolish to start building a game right now and intend it to be on current hardware.
Sony has the studios to do things like this, hopefully it wont cause them to have a lackluster launch lineup like with the PS3. Obviously its taking a risk, new IP's usually sell better at a launch, but I have a feeling Last Of Us will hit the 3-4 million range with no problem. Beyond: Two Souls probably wont have that kind of success, but I could see it pushing close to 1 million.
A lot of people were intrigued by Heavy Rain, I know I was, but after actually playing through it, I definitely wont be buying into Two Souls.
I think people were majorly split, either you loved it or hated it. I didn't like it, I tend to like to be involved with actually playing through a video game and Heavy Rain was definitely not a video game like I'm used to.
If you are into it, good for you. Just from where I'm standing its clearly a niche title and genre.
You would figure that sequels are cheaper since they already have the engine setup and often use the same assets? I always figure that the reason why mediocre selling ps3 exclusives games get sequels is because it wouldn't cost the much since everything is in place already. I think that if the game sells great then there is more money for the sequel.
You think that we are going to only have 1 Gran Turismo this gen??
What games have you all seen this gen that was a very significant leap from one game to the next?
Now - Join us on Filmwatch as we celebrate the release of Star Trek Into Darkness this month with a must-have collectible for Star Trek fans! | Promoted post
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"We've always felt that the strength of our platform has been a kind of symbiotic relationship between the platform being created and strengthened by new experiences. And then that reinforcing the strength and one hopes the longevity of the platform overall."
Which is why I own a PS3. New IPs FTW. Getting tired of playing the same game franchises over and over again. Want something new, fresh.
This is the multiplatform generation
Why not get more than multipat games if you can?
I guess your standard is low.
Gran Turismo
LittleBigPlanet
God of War
inFamous
Sly Cooper
Twisted Metal
Killzone
Ratchet & Clank
WipEout
Starhawk
Those are the series I own a PS3 for, and why I'll be getting a PS5
What just skipping on the PS4?
Also remember Dust 514, which is Free to Play!
And you have a knack for making ridiculous assumptions and attacking people over silly things. Of course I own God of War and MGS4 (btw MGS4 is 3rd party). But I never bought a Ps2 back in the day for sony's first party line up but rather titles such as DMC, GTA, Silent Hill, MGS, and Medal of Honor. PS3 simply does not have the same strong third party support as last generation hence 'the multiplatform gen'.
Don't put words into peoples' mouths next time.
Btw, Antoine I completely agree with you.
This gen is of Multiplats, which is not a bad thing at all.
And Sony has been pretty notorious with their announced "exclusives" going Multi-platform this gen.
And if you any of you feel like commenting on my "hateful" opinion, please go take a look:
http://gamercards.exophase....
I don't care if it's the end of the cycle, the beginning, the middle....new IPs are still a part of gaming.
I wish. But they let those IPs fall into the hands of Activision. Sony should have at least MATCHED the bid put up to Insomniac/ND for those IPs....with all the respect they had for them, I'm sure they would have sold it to Sony instead.
But nope. Sony let legendary IPs turn into a dead franchise (Crash) and a plot to sell expensive pieces of plastic DLC to kid(s' parents) (Spyro).
i just this past sunday traded in my 360 elite because i havent touched the thing since playing gears 3. MS just doesnt provide me with the VARIETY i want in my exclusives. they keep retreading out the same 3 exclusives that i'm not really interested in, and forcing this kinect garbage down our throats.
with the next round of consoles coming i'll be picking up the new PS for sure, but i will not be purchasing the next MS system because i know it will be halo, forza, and fable over and over.
the wii u i'll pick up about a year after it launches i want a nice VARIETY of games to play thats more to my liking.
GLAD I GOT MY PS3!!!
they didnt even develop last story, xenoblade or pandora's tower. regardless im glad those games are coming but when is Miyamoto going to use his magic on something new?
and if they are going to keep rehashing mario and zelda why not take a different twist? oh well
If developers saying "this is the last one" was true 100 percent of the time, we wouldn't have a lot of great games and Metal Gear would have ended at least 2 games ago lol
Seeing new games like Watch Dogs and 1313 in action, it will be amazing to see what developers like NG can pull on a next gen hardware.
Time will tell if it works out for them. I would decrease the exclusives a bit and up the marketing budget but that's coming from an economics major lol.
Really, the fact that Sony is still releasing new IP's on PS3 completely destroyed the sales argument. Why? Because despite making little to no money on the PS3, Sony still puts out awesome AAA IP's. People try to say that sales will result in better quality games and services. Well. Why is it that Microsoft, despite being the only console manufacturer to yield a huge profit, still has yet to put out a single AAA IP worth a crap since Gears, and has turned XBL into nothing but an ad spamming updated version of the WP7 OS. In the 360 owner's case, those "sales" are going to nothing more than time exclusive DLC and getting Kinect crap shoved down their throats. Destroys the entire purpose in the end.
Sony has always been about providing new exclusive AAA experiences combined with the third party ones to make a gaming machine that provides core gamers with the thing they want most: core games. Point? Sales don't mean crap in the end, and articles like this prove it.
You being an economics major, you should understand something as basic as supply and demand. In this case, Sony fans want more and varied exclusives, and Sony supplies them. As long as Sony keeps up with the supply, the fans won't go anywhere.
Here's an even simpler concept: you gotta give the people what they want. Sony folks want games. Lots of em, of all types. Sony delivers. As long as they do that, they will be fine.
The prior person said sales don't mean crap which is really funny because last time I checked Sony is a business and sales do matter maybe not to the consumer but to a bleeding company such as Sony it means a hell of a lot.
All I said was they could knock off a few exclusive games that under-perform and use better marketing money which is a true case because the competition kills them in that area.
This allegiance to a corporation is getting out of hand I swear.
You kinda left out the Developers of that equation.
Developers want demand, but SOny cant really give them that, and PS3 owners, arent really giving them that either.
As for "games that don't reach even 5% of your install base," that's called VARIETY. Not everybody's gonna play Atelier, or GT5, or Uncharted, or Resistance, or Killzone, or White Knight Chronicles, or Heavy Rain, etc. But you'll have somebody that will buy EVERY Atelier, both WKCs, Ar Tonelico, Valkyria Chronicles, both Disgaeas, and so on.
People demand a variety, so they get the variety; the sales other consoles see in one or two franchises are split up among dozens, but the sales are still about even. And the people that want the games buy them, and these people rarely seem to be disappointed. Sure, plenty of people who don't even own a PS3 complain about how lackluster the exclusive library is, going on about "quality over quantity," but the majority of those that actually put time into the games enjoy them, and there's no lack of quality to be found... unless you mean "quality" sales, and base that on only the big sellers like Halo.
Which is obviously what you're doing. If a game doesn't sell as much as Call of Duty or Halo, then to you and other anti-Sony posters, it didn't sell well and is a waste of time.
But not only do most games never come anywhere near those sales, it's not necessary for all games to do so, and titles with wider appeal like Call of Duty SHOULD sell that much, as opposed to a niche title like Atelier Totori.
Example: Catherine sits at a little over half a million sales worldwide, but the developer has stated that these sales are great. They reached their target; 8 million copies would have been nice, but it was necessary for the game to be considered a success. And this was multiplat.
In fact, ATLUS' best selling game, Demon's Souls, hasn't even hit 3 million, but it's considered an overwhelming success. None of the Persona games have reached a million, but their sales are looked upon favorably.
So, again, I ask, what do YOU consider good sales? Sony seems to be satisfied enough with the sales of these games that they keep making more; but since you're an economics major- unlike ANYBODY working for Sony- I guess you would know better than they would.
This^ is all that needs to be said.
If Sony as a company keeps investing in new games it is safe to say that Sony is satisfied with the return.
What people need to realize is that most games don't make it past the 3 million sales mark and that's including MULTIPLATS. So to expect an EXCLUSIVE to even sell 3 million copies let alone Gears, Halo, and CoD numbers is a ridiculously high expectation.
Apollo said he doesn't understand Sony strategy of releasing new games, well people also don't understand Microsoft's strategy of timed DLC.
In Sony's case people claim that Sony's exclusives don't sell. In Microsoft's case people claim that timed DLC has an insignificant/no impact on anything meaningful. Yet both Sony and Microsoft continue to do what they do so obviously they are satisfied with what they are gaining from it.
Even if Sony's sales on exclusives are below expectations does it really matter? What does poking fun at the sales numbers even do? Would you rather Sony not release games at all? I don't understand that at all.
You would rather less games and more marketing....What?
Imagine owning an MS Kin phone and finding out that they became unsupported, abandoned hardware after you bought it. That doesn't make for a future loyal customer.
But, Sony supporting the PS2 years after the release of the PS3 will garner plenty of loyal, return customers.
It seems to be suiting them fine with games like the Disgaea, White Knight Chronicles, Atelier and Tales series, Folklore, 3D Dot Game Heroes, Valkyria Chronicles, Demon's Souls and the upcoming masterpieces Ni no Kuni and FF Versus XIII (that will be out despite what people have been calling "vaporware").
Suikoden VI.
Microsoft = services
Nintendo= casual games and classic franchise's
Sony= New IPs and loads of exclusives.
XperiaRay
"God of War II" came out in 2007, on the PS2. The PS3 had been out for 4-5 months.
It's no surprise to me that Sony would release new IPs on the PS3, even if PS4 is right around the corner.
They don't just give up on their previous console after releasing a new one. They know not everyone makes the jump right away. I was still buying PS2 games even after buying my PS3.
Sony has the studios to do things like this, hopefully it wont cause them to have a lackluster launch lineup like with the PS3. Obviously its taking a risk, new IP's usually sell better at a launch, but I have a feeling Last Of Us will hit the 3-4 million range with no problem. Beyond: Two Souls probably wont have that kind of success, but I could see it pushing close to 1 million.
Heavy Rain says Hi!
I think people were majorly split, either you loved it or hated it. I didn't like it, I tend to like to be involved with actually playing through a video game and Heavy Rain was definitely not a video game like I'm used to.
If you are into it, good for you. Just from where I'm standing its clearly a niche title and genre.
You think that we are going to only have 1 Gran Turismo this gen??
What games have you all seen this gen that was a very significant leap from one game to the next?
haters gonna hate..while all xbox can do is making the same games every years...sony always release new IP'S every year
no wonder it owns the 360 in sales worldwide
Xbox has nothing.
PC ... well, if these comes to PC, it'll be the superior version for sure.