I miss the golden age of oddball PlayStation exclusives

Between closing PixelOpus and its refocus on live-service titles, PlayStation is losing the eccentric spirit that helped establish the brand.

[TheColbertinator]

Sony is creatively bankrupt. You'll have more success making lemonade with turnips than see Sony cultivate unique ideas again like in the PS1 era

[blackblades]

Returnal says hey, it's just a creative AAA roguelite which is a indie genre. Anyway apparently the creative part isnt working $ wise no matter if its fun or not. They better off getting 3rd party doing it like they been doing like that food bug game people made fun of. Of course shue is all over that indie scene.

[shammgod]

Returnal will soon be an open world game with a skill tree and 1000 places of interest on the map just like all games.

[jznrpg]

Like MS is creative. The only reason they have Hi FinRush is because they bought a publisher. New AstroBot game is in the works right now. If games don’t sell very well they won’t make more of that game. They not make as many small games but they will still make some neat stuff. Call of the Mountain is “creative” game .

[goldwyncq]

Out of the big three today, only Nintendo can be considered creative. Sony’s biggest games (with the exception of Gran Turismo) are all third person cinematic action adventures with a dark and mature narrative and Microsoft really loves their shooters.

[BehindTheRows]

@goldwyncq

Man, never knew Spider-Man (Sony's BIGGEST game) was a third person action adventure with a dark and mature narrative. Hell, Horizon isn't either, but of course, when one knows little of what they're talking about, it's "all they have is.....".

"Microsoft really loves their shooters". Also spoken like someone truly clueless. All you got out of Xbox was shooters?

Nintendo relies on the same franchises gen after gen (with new IPs sprinkled in here and there — far behind PlayStation in this regard). What exactly are they doing that's so different from gens prior (outside of sticking a handheld and home console on the same device)?

[rlow1]

How original you are. Bringing Xbox into an article about PlayStation

[goldwyncq]

Tearaway is an underrated masterpiece.

[PixelKnot]

Shame not many people played it, because it was easily the best first party game on the Vita for me. It was also a rare game that actually made creative and fun use of the backpad.

[lellkay]

I don't really miss many of these personally. I played Tearaway and thought Concrete Genie was ok, but ultimately they were kind of luke warm. Same goes for the last few Japan Studios games.

I'm more than fine with the current landscape of Sony's first party, for the most part the games are very well made and offer me experiances that routinely rate among some of the best i have had each year.

I say this, however I am very very skeptical of any live service stuff they are persuing.

[locomorales]

Current Sony games sell more, but are less creative. I think about them like Marvel movies: high production values, high sales but boring movies.
To much a product and too little art. Creativity can be found only on indies today, but they don't have resources to make AAA.

[goldwyncq]

True. With a few exceptions like Kojima's games, AAA games nowadays are more product than art.

[BehindTheRows]

Tell us, what’s MORE creative? What is missing? To post these blanket statements you surely have an answer to their “lack of creativity”.

[TheCaptainKuchiki]

Y'all will say that and then refuse to buy the creative games they put out.
Remember how Dreams flopped?
Y'all complain that Japan Studio is dead but refused to play their games (apart from Demon's Souls)
No company can survive with flop games.
What is the point of making games that only 2% people are gonna play?
As a company, the first thing you need to decide is your target demographic.
Very few companies in the world target every demographics of a market (maybe Samsung, they can make very cheap products and also very premium products). That's too costly and less efficient than just 1 or 2 different target demographics.

[Snookies12]

Wonderfully said, that's why I try and go out of my way to grab some of the more niche titles that look promising. Give some support to the developers for more creative ideas. So many amazing series we could still have today if people had supported them more. Definitely grabbing Armored Core for that very reason. I just personally hope FromSoftware realizes that they could utilize Tenchu in the same way.

[TheCaptainKuchiki]

Same for me, I support every space game because even though they used to be very common in the 90s and 2000s, they're now a rarity.
If no one buys them, no one will make them.

[ocelot07]

Though I sort of agree since the ps5 released. They have focused more on sequels like spider man miles Moralas, Spiderman 2, dead stranding 2, GT7, Horizon, God of war.

However they have also released the likes Returnal (new IP), Sackboy Adventures (based on LBP), Rachet & Clank, Destruction All Stars.

Though I do hope they do release more new IP's. At the end of the day as long as the games they release are good then am happy personally.

[raWfodog]

Sequels to great games is par for the course. To not take advantage of sales momentum would be irresponsible. But yeah, new IPs are always welcomed and appreciated.

[RaiderNation]

Meh Im good, thanks. The last few quirky weird games Sony produced werw flops. Id rather Sony focus on AAA games and leave the artsy fartsy stuff to 3rd party/indie developers. Sony is in the business of making high quality, high production value blockbusters designed to reach the greatest number of people. They're not curators of an art museum. Plenty of 3rd party/indie teams out there making those sorts of experiences.

[Levii_92]

Me too, now they have cinematic walking simulators so they can win bs awards at game awards and pretend it’s the oscars or something.

[isarai]

I wish there were more but they aren't gone, Astros Playroom, Returnal, Destruction All-stars, Death Stranding, Humanity, Sackboy a big adventure.

[Gameseeker_Frampt]

I'm just amused by the gamers who are defending this are the same people who attacked Microsoft's Halo/Gears/Forza strategy.

So far this generation, Sony has yet to put out a new first-party IP (Sony bought Housemarque after Returnal released so that doesn't count). In the past, Sony had done a good job at both providing quirky new IPs as well as allowing their big studios to pursue different genres. Hopefully this continues in the future but with both the changes in the market and in Sony management we will have to see if Sony is still willing to take risks with their studios.

[VersusDMC]

Before the release of the PS5 Sony released the new IPs days gone, ghost of tsushima, Death Stranding and recently Returnal. And Returnal absolutely counts as Sony greenlit the project and funded it from day 1. Your reasoning definitely applies to Starfield though as Microsoft had 0 involved with the start of it's development.

And Sony continues to support new IPs like Kena, FIST, Tchia, Stray, Sifu, Humanity, etc...

And why doesn't Nintendo get this lack of creativity smoke? They shamelessly released 3 Pokemon games in a 12 month period...Diamond and pearl (19 Nov 2021), Arceus (jan 2022) and Scarlet/Violet(18 nov 2022)

[Gameseeker_Frampt]

Don't forget Horizon: Zero Dawn with your list of new IPs. I didn't count Returnal since it wasn't first party at the time and Sony has almost always funded Housemarque IPs. While Sony has historically funded new second-party IPs, they have also funded new first-party IPs at the same time but now that has currently ended. Spider-Man MM, Ratchet and Clank 9, MLB The Show, Horizon Forbidden West, God of War Ragnarok, Gran Turismo 7, Spider-Man 2 - nothing new here and most of them repeating the cycle of releases started in 2017. We are getting the 3rd Spider-Man game in 5 years ffs.

Nintendo absolutely struggles with developing new IPs and have been soundly beaten by Sony at it ever since 1997. What Nintendo does have though is a diversity in its first party line-up that Sony currently lacks. BotW, Super Mario Odyssey, Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros Ultimate, Metroid Prime, Splatoon, Animal Crossing, Xenoblade Chronicles, and Fire Emblem are all completely different game genres.

[shammgod]

It will never happen again

[GhostScholar]

That’s the only thing I don’t like is that most of their exclusives are great but they’re just the same over the shoulder 3rd person adventure crying simulators. I’m not saying the games aren’t good because they are, but I really wish they’d do more stuff like astro bot. That to me is the best ps5 game and showcases the controller better than any other game they have