Is the secret to Sony’s future success in its past? (Sony)
What should be a time of celebration for PlayStation is overshadowed by a lacklustre year and a surprisingly uncertain future.
In June 2023, during Microsoft’s legal battle with the Federal Trade Commission, over its acquisition of Activision Blizzard, it made the surprising admission that it had lost the console war to Sony.
Admittedly, Microsoft was doing all it could to paint itself as a helpless underdog, to help push the acquisition through, but when looking at the state of both companies, it’s hard to argue that Microsoft was wrong.
The PlayStation brand is on top of the world right now, at least from a financial perspective, with the PlayStation 5 more than doubling sales of the Xbox Series X. But with Microsoft seemingly throwing in the towel, Sony has no one to surpass, which creates more problems than you’d imagine.
For the record, Microsoft hasn’t entirely given up on making Xbox hardware, with its plans including a new handheld and a next gen device (which may be the same thing). However, there are signs it’s acknowledged it can’t beat Sony on that front.
Not only have we seen prominent Xbox exclusives, like Sea Of Thieves and the upcoming Indiana Jones game, go multiplatform, but Microsoft is openly advertising how you’ll no longer need an Xbox console to play its games.
As controversial as this has been for dedicated Xbox owners, it’s a logical direction for Microsoft, that could well be beneficial in the long-run. As such, it’s clear Xbox is no longer playing by the same rules as Sony, whose own future plans for hardware are far less defined.
Sure, the PlayStation 6 will be a thing at some point, but the few vague comments Sony has made about it only suggest it’ll be a technological improvement over the PlayStation 5. An Xbox handheld, by comparison, sounds more appealing just by virtue of being able to play Xbox games on the go.
Unless it offers anything more substantial than better graphics, it’s difficult to imagine anyone but the most diehard of Sony fans putting money down for a PlayStation 6. Especially if consoles do get more expensive thanks to Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs.
People will point to how well the PlayStation 5 Pro has reportedly sold, but it was only ever designed as a niche product. Only those who want the best possible visuals will have shown an interest while the average gamer or parent looking for a birthday/Christmas gift understandably scoffed at its £700 asking price.
We’re inclined to agree with former PlayStation America boss Shawn Layden, who believes the race for more advanced and powerful gaming consoles has ended.
‘It has plateaued,’ Layden told VGC in an October interview, ‘We’re at the stage of hardware development that I call ‘only dogs can hear the difference.’ … Jacking up the specs of the box, I think we’ve reached the ceiling.’
Sony cannot solely rely on the specs of new hardware. They need to either have some distinct gimmick (even something simple like the rumoured PlayStation 5 handheld would go down a treat) or, as Layden has suggested, ‘compete on content’ i.e. offer enticing exclusives that people will want to buy a new PlayStation console for.
Or, in other words, what they had been doing during the PlayStation 4 generation, that drove them to new heights of success, and then inexplicably stopped doing halfway through this generation.
The strategy of ‘just make good games’ is one of those ‘no duh’ statements, but when you look at Sony’s current output, it’s easy to assume the company’s grown allergic to making *any* kind of new games.
At the time of writing, the only first party exclusive scheduled for 2025 is the long awaited Ghost Of Tsushima sequel, Ghost Of Yōtei.
Beyond that, there’s Insomniac’s Wolverine game, which still lacks a release date three years after its reveal, and two more cracks at the live service multiplayer shooter genre in FairGame$ and Bungie’s Marathon reboot, but it’s hard to be optimistic about either of them considering what happened to Concord.
This comes after an extremely quiet year for the company, which has mostly relied on remasters, re-releases, and second and third party output. The only wholly original first party PlayStation exclusives fans have enjoyed this year were Astro Bot and Concord, and one of those you can’t play anymore.
Yes, there was also MLB The Show 24 and Lego Horizon Adventures, but those are available on other platforms too. It’s actually baffling that Sony has no other major releases for the Christmas period, with both Microsoft and Nintendo managing better.
It makes what should be such a celebratory year for the PlayStation brand feel so lacklustre, especially when Sony has given PlayStation owners little reason to have faith in its gaming future.
Its plans to capitalise on the live service games space seem to have ended before they began. Remember when it promised 12 such games by 2026? That claim has aged horrendously, with most of those projects rumoured to have been quietly cancelled.
In addition, Sony was constantly talking about breaking into the mobile games space, but that doesn’t seem to have worked out either. One mobile studio it bought got shut down alongside Concord developer Firewalk Studios and aside from a LittleBigPlanet endless runner, Sony’s yet to announce or release any mobile titles.
To a casual observer, you’d think Sony was in dire financial straits, but it really isn’t. In fact, right now it’s contemplating spending billions to acquire the developer behind Elden Ring.
PlayStation owners are understandably frustrated with how little Sony’s offering at the moment, and it’s doubtful the PlayStation brand can keep relying on just one exclusive a year, sandwiched between remasters of games barely a decade old.
The hope is that Sony has secretly rethought its strategy. In an earnings report from Sony last month, senior vice president for finance and IR Sadahiko Hayakawa had this to say: ‘We intend to build on an optimum title portfolio during the current mid-range plan period, that combines single-player games, which are our strength and which have a higher predictability of becoming hits due to our proven IP, with live service games that pursue upside, while taking on a certain amount of risk upon release.’
A generous reading of this is that Sony is going to return to what had worked out well for years and refocus on single-player games and not get too hung up on pumping out as many live service games as it can.
If that’s the case, then the ongoing silence is more understandable. It’s taking time to build up a new portfolio of games; ones it ideally can tease via a dedicated showcase next year.
It certainly needs to give PlayStation owners something. 2025 will no doubt be a big year for Nintendo, with the Switch 2’s launch, and Microsoft has a handful of first party releases it’s at least aiming to have out in 2026, including the long-awaited Fable reboot.
With any luck, this awkward time for Sony will prove to be just a momentary bump in the road, and hopefully there’ll be more to celebrate next year other than just birthdays and expensive new console models.
Hopefully, Ghost Of Yōtei won’t be all Sony has for 2025 (Sony)
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