Devin Rardin: The PlayStation live-service direction will only burden its several talented studios, resulting in a few successes and several cancellations.
A "few successes" is all you need. Diablo IV is a live service game whether you want to admit it or not, just an example. The hardcore gamer might not like Sony's push for live service, but there are a hell of a lot of casuals out there. Sony are not putting all their eggs into one basket. They've got plenty of single player games coming.
Playstation and Sony are making Billions in PROFIT every year. I'm not talking about revenue, I'm talking PROFIT. It's too soon to tell if this will be failure. You also have to decide what a "failure" would actually look like in the overall scheme of things. PS5 is breaking records and selling like crazy. We'll see.
The only "gameplay" we've seen from these so-called live service games is Helldivers 2, and that looks freaking amazing. Also, the trailer for Marathon apparently beat out Spider-Man 2 trailer for views and traction after the showcase. Millions are interested. Wait till we see more gameplay for these titles. Stop saying it's all doom and gloom when we don't really know anything. I want to see gameplay gameplay gameplay first before I'm ready to even think anything.
This person must be a multimillionaire because they're a real psychic. Can't believe they'd actually write articles about video games when they don't need to do so
Couple things. I doubt all of them fail. Even though I don't like them. I thought all of then looked up well shty. Far as marathon you can't really compare. Spiderman is exclusive and marathon wont be. Plus you have so many people out there watching and re watching the trailer for marathon trying to figure something out. I just added in the last part as an opinion, but be on multiple devices brings in more people.
Yeah you have a good point. You can't really compare them at all. I was more meaning to say, really, was that Marathon seems to be popular. Helldivers look amazing. And no gameplay for all the others. Too much doom and gloom and predicting the worst, with no real gameplay or knowledge on the games. But you're right
It does not need to be the Next [whatever game you add here]. It just needs to be different. Fun and simple. Apex legends is entirely different from Fortnite. The only common between them is BR.
"The only "gameplay" we've seen from these so-called live service games is Helldivers 2, and that looks freaking amazing. Also, the trailer for Marathon apparently beat out Spider-Man 2 trailer for views and traction after the showcase. Millions are interested."
Helldivers 2 trailer has less than 300k views, Marathon trailer has less than 500k views, and Spider-Man 2 has 9,7m views (Comparing on Playstation's channel on youtube), not really sure where you get your "apparently"-stats, where are these millions you're talking about?
I still don't understand how the "casual" market generates so much profit from live service games. Even as a little kid, if you told me that I could have as many games as I want for $X each, or I could have 1 game but there would be the option to spend infinite dollars on it for cosmetic items and one day the game just wouldn't work ever again, I would have told you to gtfo of my face with the live service.
What marketing or psychological fake out tricks people into playing these types of games?
Well…if and if they fail then they’ll just fall back on single player games, basically what they were doing and probably double down on them because that’s what they are good at. They might have some multiplayer games if they ever do another Killzone or Resistance for example but I don’t think they will do live service roadmaps and the like.
So yeah. If they fail, they’ll learn a lesson and move on…hopefully…unless they adopt Square Enix’s attitude and become stubborn but I doubt it.
fallback happens when they do only live service games. They still have single player games. I suspect Sony is looking for 1 hit game out of 10. They know all 10 games cannot be a hit. They just want one really great GAAS, possibly next Warzone/Fortnite/PUBG etc.
A fallback is when you have two or more things/situations/etc and you put one as the priority over the other. If that one fails, you have the others to fallback on. I.E. you have another plan to fallback on.
So when you say, "fallback happens when they do only live service games." that is not true. If they were ONLY doing live service games, they would have nothing to fallback on in that situation. There would be no backup plan already there for the waiting. They would have to start entirely over developing single player games. The fact they are doing both live service while remaining to do single player games is what keeps them in a situation where they can fallback.
Game are becoming very expensive to make. If you look at their guidance for the future, they want to increase investments in traditional and live service gaming. So in other words they are looking to make money on live service that they can reinvest in single player. If they fail, it would be catastrophic for the entire business model. Wanting Sony to be cut off from the a positive revenue stream is like saying you want them to fail flat out. There is no lesson to be learned hear. There are just fanboys who want the industry to crash and burn if they aren't catered to 100%. If Sony can't get in on Live Services they will be left behind. Even Nintendo got with the program. Companies who can not adapt go extinct.
It's basically more nonsense written before even seeing the results.
I remember gamers were asking Sony again and again to make online games to compliment their high quality, single player games.
"I want War hawk. I want Socom. I want Killzone. I want Resistance. I want Mag. I want online games besides 3rd person, single player games. Etc etc etc. Sony needs to round out their catalog with multiplayer games."
Sony then purchases developers to help with that request while updating to today's seasonal online gaming.
"Sony's wasting time and resources making these games. Sony's going to go all in if they aren't careful and leave single player games behind. Who asked for online gaming anyway? We just want single player games. How come they aren't making RPGs?"
The very thing they asked for is now shunned by these very same people. Since we know Sony's all about trying new things and creating new IPs than ride on the same ones for years, it makes sense that they are giving developers a shot in these online games. Same individuals that seem to wonder why Sony is even taking a risk pushing VR and say why is Sony wasting their efforts on that.
We know the reality is that Sony is not going to leave single player games behind and have many in production. Spider-Man and Wolverine already come to mind. And it's funny that some of these gamers who are shunning Sony taking a crack at it, are asking why Spider-Man 2 isn't multiplayer where you can play as Peter and Miles.
And secondly, we know Sony is looking for other sources of revenue to fall back on just in case. Especially with Daddy Warbucks Microsoft proper buying out the industry. With the possibility of stripping Sony of one of their highest revenue generators in the COD profits they make. Profits used to actually help make a lot of the single player games we play today. That money doesn't come from Sony proper. It doesn't come from Sony Music or Movies or Television. SIE has to make their own money and look for sources of income to stay in the black. If the deal goes through, Sony would have no choice but to cut back on their risk taking and production of many games that are most likely, single player games. These gamers aren't seeing the entire picture. Especially when that bullshit 10 year deal gives Microsoft 100 percent of the profits from other platforms hosting COD.
Lastly, these same individuals seem to forget that Sony arrives at doing some things differently. Sony doesn't sell their big games day one on a service. They sell them over time traditionally. Then look for more added revenue from older games no longer selling. Sony arrived at paying for online differently than competitors as well. Microsoft went from OG Xbox through 360 giving nothing back for paying for online. Sony did theirs and gave back monthly games to play that cost more than what you paid monthly or yearly. PS Now was a stand alone streaming service. But Sony didn't require gamers to pay for Plus to play those games online. Their competitor not only required you pay for another service to play online or bundled together, but made gamers pay for years just to access free to play online games. Even got caught raising the price of one service to force gamers to go with the their other service currently being pushed.
But gamers somehow aren't giving Sony the benefit of the doubt to try their luck with service games that might turn out great for those that play online. Nope. Sony must be tore down before even trying.
I want Warhawk, Socom, Killzone, Resistance, MAG, Uncharted, Last of Us, etc
I want them but I don't want them as live service games because truthfully, all live service games are heartless cash grab pieces of trash. I still play Warhawk a few times per week and the servers are still bumpin whenever you wanna play. You really don't need daily challenges and battle passes and cosmetics to have a fun game. And those things can and do always ruin what could be a fun game.
I wish there was one single good multiplayer game that you buy once, maybe have a couple DLC releases with new maps and modes and weapons, and then you just play it and rank up. Imagine? It's unheard of today
You're talking about Fairgame$. For better or worse, that game looks to be exactly like what one should expect from former Ubisoft people. To me, that's a nonstarter. Never really got into Ubisoft titles besides Rayman and Splinter Cell.
So then...I don't think they're guaranteed failures, but there's something very psychological about service games. Some are allowed to succeed, most are not. Established series have some advantage (pretty much your pick of ABK service title).
I think if you really want this to work, you have three choices:
- new IP, free to play (e.g., Fortnite) - established IP (e.g., Diablo) - subscription (e.g., Final Fantasy XIV)
If they go the sub route, they'd need to scale back the number of projects massively or make them all cheap ($1-3/mo could probably win people over). Most important thing to give yourself a headstart on new content is making the launch experience very robust with a ton to do. That, and doing what you need to do to ensure that your seasonal content is on time. Fortnite was damn good at that.
Not really just looking at the type of game live service games are shows most are destined to fail. Live service games are designed to be a grind and milk the player for as long as possible so there is a more limited player base. If you take a break from a live service game you miss out on items and events and start to get left behind. They require much more time from a person than a single player or normal multiplayer game so at most someone can only really play a few of them a week if they have nothing else to do except gaming. There is also the issue of the genre the live service game is trying to enter. With a single player game you can always finish it or take a break and play a new one. But If there is already multiple successful live service games in a genre it makes it less likely for new ones to succeed unless they are noticeably better because you are directly competing for that person's time. The only way i see Sony being successful with this strategy is if all 12 of them somehow fall into different genres or are amazing enough to beat the best ones out now which i don't see happening.
Of the three current live service games Sony has, all three are successful. Destiny, MLB, and GT7. They also already stated (and is already evident by the three games I listed) that they want games in different genres. The new games they announced are Hell Divers 2, Marathon, Contraband and FairGames. These games are not alike. At all. And that brings us to over half of their Live Service games. If you add in the inevitable MLB games, that pretty much means there is only three more Live Service game to announce at most. One is Last of Us multiplayer, one was apparently cancelled and one is unannounced but may be the Horizon MMO.
So we have Hell Divers 2, Marathon, Contraband, FairGames, GT7, MLB, Destiny, TLOU, Horizon, a Cancelled game, a mobile game, and something announced. And thats it. A few of these are guareenteed successes (or already successful). Sports games, driving games, FPS, Extraction Shooters, and whatever you classify TLOU as.
@Eonjay MLB is one of the only baseball games around so it fits a unique genre. Same thing with GT7 there are no racing games like it and it's not really what i would call a successful live service. The player reviews for it are horrendous and the player count isn't really there. It's mainly the hardcore people who need a racing game to scratch that itch that are still playing it. Destiny 2 came out long before Sony bought Bungie and i would consider Destiny as one of the big established live service games that Sony's upcoming games will have to compete with for people's time.
“Burden it’s several talented studios” Except that most of PS’s talented studios are not making live service and are still making sp games idiot! Yeah ND and Guerilla are making lice service games, but they’re still making so games. Most of PS’s service games are coming from studios that PS acquired, like Haven, Firesprite,and Firewalk.
"However, I predict the direction will only burden its several talented studios, resulting in a few successes and several cancellations.
My guy, this ain't a prediction, it's common sense.
This dumb prediction can apply to every single form of entertainment imaginable. Some products will succeed, some will fail.
You pointing out live service games that failed don't negate how successful the one who succeeded are doing.
There's plenty of single player games that failed to gain an audience. Sony adding diversity to their portfolio doesn't hurt anything when we know single player games out still coming.
A "few successes" is all you need. Diablo IV is a live service game whether you want to admit it or not, just an example. The hardcore gamer might not like Sony's push for live service, but there are a hell of a lot of casuals out there. Sony are not putting all their eggs into one basket. They've got plenty of single player games coming.
Playstation and Sony are making Billions in PROFIT every year. I'm not talking about revenue, I'm talking PROFIT. It's too soon to tell if this will be failure. You also have to decide what a "failure" would actually look like in the overall scheme of things. PS5 is breaking records and selling like crazy. We'll see.
The only "gameplay" we've seen from these so-called live service games is Helldivers 2, and that looks freaking amazing. Also, the trailer for Marathon apparently beat out Spider-Man 2 trailer for views and traction after the showcase. Millions are interested. Wait till we see more gameplay for these titles. Stop saying it's all doom and gloom when we don't really know anything. I want to see gameplay gameplay gameplay first before I'm ready to even think anything.
Well…if and if they fail then they’ll just fall back on single player games, basically what they were doing and probably double down on them because that’s what they are good at. They might have some multiplayer games if they ever do another Killzone or Resistance for example but I don’t think they will do live service roadmaps and the like.
So yeah. If they fail, they’ll learn a lesson and move on…hopefully…unless they adopt Square Enix’s attitude and become stubborn but I doubt it.
Saying they will all fail without seeing them is dumb.
The Heist game looked lame from Haven but who knows maybe even that has a chance, though I wouldn’t bet on it.
Just a tad presumptuous...
games are not out yet, so how do we know ?