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[Yoboman]

From about 2012 onwards Sony has had one of the most aggressive turn around in reputation and quality of their games development. As a whole they really managed to capitalise on PS4s success and make a name for themselves

Even smaller studios like Sony Bend and Suckerpunch managed to come out and make themselves big players in the AAA space

The one exception to this seemed to have been Japan Studio, whose output flat lined during the generation. Better associated now with attaching their name to projects from the likes of From Software and Bluepoint than creating games like Ape Escape or Siren

If you compare the output of studio Japan on PS3/PSP/Vita to now it is night and day. As fans we kind of sat around all gen wondering what they are working on. The biggest news to come from them this gen is that they went and lost their marquee man, Fumito Ueda

This is not to say they needed to copy the template of the Western studios or even be creating AAA games but they needed to do something to keep competitive with the ever improving Nintendo output in Japan. And when Sucker Punch goes and releases a game about Japan that outshines everything you’ve done this gen and is successful in Japan question marks should arise

I think Sony should be expanding and improving their Japanese output. But the previous leadership of Japan Studios were lethargic, resting on their laurels and needed replacing and expanding around that group would have been pissing away money

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Japan doesn't understand the world market.

Sony shouldn't be expanding and improving their Japanese output. Sony should be expanding and improving their N American + European output.

 

[Termite]

Hot take? It's the entirely correct take.

To add to the points you made, Japan Studio were allowed to make a potential AAA franchise in Gravity Rush, forming Team Gravity to do so. After a promising start, they delivered one of the worst first party Sony games of the decade in Gravity Rush 2, and it bombed as a result. Bad sales could be excused if the team had promise, but the game was just rotten, so poorly designed and programmed - a ton of art and music talent supporting nothing from a game design standpoint.

From that point on they had blown their shot and were doomed.

 

[Yoboman]

I’d also point out their quality has been so anemic they couldn’t even put together a patch for Bloodborne

 

[Killer Sakoman]

99% of Japanese developers do not understand the market. They have zero confidence in their culture and think the western customer isn't intetested in their art. Thus, they hesitate to invest in AAA projects.

 

[Aion002]

One simple counterpoint: Sony probably didn't allow them to produce new games and/or higher budget projects.


Think about it, Sony had the creator of Silent Hill and Kojima ready to make a Silent Hill type of game that most gamers want.... What Sony did? Paid Kojima to make Death Stranding (which I like a lot), that was a shot in the dark.


I think that Sony deliberately choose to kill their japanese main studios... Blaming the devs is just terrible.

 

[kyliethicc]

The best game Japan Studio made in the last 8 years is Astro Bot Rescue Mission. Team Asobi made it in 18 months. Only like 25 devs. It has a 90 metacritic, sold well, and is Sony's best VR game. Then they made Astro's Playroom quickly and everyone who's played it on PS5 enjoyed that one too. Astro Bot has become a new popular PlayStation character. Nothing else made by Japan Studio in the last 8 years has actually been made on time, and sold well, and got good reviews, and also created a new successful character / franchise worldwide. That's why Sony is just focusing on Team Asobi now. They're talented, profitable, and produce.

PS4 lifecycle was series of failures for Japan Studio (other than Asobi):
- Knack 1/2 - bad reviews, medicore sales
- Gravity Rush 1/2 - poor sales (and this team has made nothing new since 2017)
- Last Guardian - 10 year dev cycle, over budget, low sales, dev hell so bad they fired Ueda and hired outside help to finish it

Everything else to come out of Japan Studio was only co-developed with other studios doing most of the work: Bloodborne was From Software, Everybody's Golf was Clap Hanz, Shadow of the Colossus and Demon's Souls Remakes were Bluepoint, etc. Japan Studio were just XDev really, helping external devs make 1st party games.

Sony are smart to focus on Team Asobi. They have a bright future with Astro Bot on PS5 & PSVR2.

 

[Azurro]

I'm in agreement. I love Japanese games, they are the main ones I play but even before 2012, it's been since the start of the PS3 generation when Sony realized it was impossible to keep the third parties as full exclusives due to the rising costs that they implemented a strategy of creating high quality first party games.

As you mentioned, title output was meagre and inconsistent and had more than a decade to actually create high quality, attractive IP, and the best they could do was be a support studio for From Software and Bluepoint Studios. From what I understand the headcount wasn't exactly small, so imagine, what a waste of resources for 10 full years. Literally no one else in the industry would tolerate that kind of low productivity, so this latest move to consolidate around team Asobi was the best thing they could have done.

I feel sad for the fans of Gravity Rush or The Last Guardian, but outputting 2 or 3 low selling titles in 10 years is just not sustainable. Hopefully Sony is able to grow them or partner with emerging Japanese studios and help them develop, like Insomniac or Sucker Punch.

 

[Keihart]

Kinda offmark to exemplify with suckerpunch since arguably their PS3 output was in the exact same scale of production than PS4. Japan studio no shit was stagnated in PS4 since it apparently was even having trouble greenlighting new games, it is a failure in management and not really the talent there. While i think that restructuring it was something that needed to happen, the way they are going about it it's only digging them further into obscureness.

The studio did a lot of outsourcing and production during last gen and the only real team working there to produce games where Toyama's and Asobi, and even then, after GR2 Toyama's team wasn't even able to get a new game off the ground. I think they were cornered after and during GR2 development to aim for something more mainstream which they realistically never aimed to be.

I think there is a misunderstanding going on with the new management in strategies with sony's games now, they are going for the mainstream with blockbuster thus see no value on the niches unless it's third party stuff, but the reality of games it's that niches need to be nurtured and they can become pretty secure sales in the future as nintendo has proven several times already. There were so many lost opportunities, Siren was the biggest horror game since Silent Hill and RE and somehow they decided to shove it after the episodic and westernization experiment, Gravity Rush obviously was not going to be mainstream ever yet they decided to make it bigger and raise expectations instead of keeping low expectations while it got refined, because there was a niche that liked it already out there. Patapon was super original and loved, yet, shelved after the psp and got a remaster at best. The list goes on honestly, never actually betting on the niche tittles and trying to push the big blockbuster angle on a studio that never did so but was good at creating endearing IPs that inevitably found their niches only to be buried and never see the light of day again.

There also the stupid monster hunter chase with Freedom Wars and Soul Sacrifice, what a goose chase that was.

 

[sublimit]

From about 2012 onwards Sony has had one of the most aggressive turn around in reputation and quality of their games development. As a whole they really managed to capitalise on PS4s success and make a name for themselves

Even smaller studios like Sony Bend and Suckerpunch managed to come out and make themselves big players in the AAA space

The one exception to this seemed to have been Japan Studio, whose output flat lined during the generation. Better associated now with attaching their name to projects from the likes of From Software and Bluepoint than creating games like Ape Escape or Siren

If you compare the output of studio Japan on PS3/PSP/Vita to now it is night and day. As fans we kind of sat around all gen wondering what they are working on. The biggest news to come from them this gen is that they went and lost their marquee man, Fumito Ueda

This is not to say they needed to copy the template of the Western studios or even be creating AAA games but they needed to do something to keep competitive with the ever improving Nintendo output in Japan. And when Sucker Punch goes and releases a game about Japan that outshines everything you’ve done this gen and is successful in Japan question marks should arise

I think Sony should be expanding and improving their Japanese output. But the previous leadership of Japan Studios were lethargic, resting on their laurels and needed replacing and expanding around that group would have been pissing away money

You forget one "small" detail though. None of Japan Studio's games had even 1/10 of the budgets that their Western studios had.

 

[itshutton]

I suspect the “reallocation” and downsizing is to free up overheads and operating expenses for something else. Either a studio acquisition or third party partnerships. Clear the dead wood.

 

[Yoboman]

One simple counterpoint: Sony probably didn't allow them to produce new games and/or higher budget projects.


Think about it, Sony had the creator of Silent Hill and Kojima ready to make a Silent Hill type of game that most gamers want.... What Sony did? Paid Kojima to make Death Stranding (which I like a lot), that was a shot in the dark.


I think that Sony deliberately choose to kill their japanese main studios... Blaming the devs is just terrible.

That really doesn’t make sense though. They’ve always had funding and Sony was particularly wide open with the wallet for new ideas last gen

And even if they weren’t getting AAA funding, surely we would have seen a bunch of smaller games coming from the studio?

More likely they had a bunch of games canned because they weren’t coming together. Which would it be that surprising after the technical disaster of The Last Guardian needing to skip ahead a gen to run functionally? Or the likes of Knack being masthead games of the studio last gen

And Kojima is an interesting point. Note how he partnered with a Sony Western studio rather than Studio Japan. That should be a testament to their current reputation

 

[Keihart]

That really doesn’t make sense though. They’ve always had funding and Sony was particularly wide open with the wallet for new ideas last gen

And even if they weren’t getting AAA funding, surely we would have seen a bunch of smaller games coming from the studio?

More likely they had a bunch of games canned because they weren’t coming together. Which would it be that surprising after the technical disaster of The Last Guardian needing to skip ahead a gen to run functionally? Or the likes of Knack being masthead games of the studio last gen

And Kojima is an interesting point. Note how he partnered with a Sony Western studio rather than Studio Japan. That should be a testament to their current reputation

Games didn't get greenlit at all after GR2 and that was already doing wonders budget wise with how big the team working on it was.

 

[kyliethicc]

You forget one "small" detail though. None of Japan Studio's games had even 1/10 of the budgets that their Western studios had.

Prove it. Source for this claim?

The Last Guardian took 10 years. I bet it cost more to develop than say, Ghost of Tsushima did.

One simple counterpoint: Sony probably didn't allow them to produce new games and/or higher budget projects.


Think about it, Sony had the creator of Silent Hill and Kojima ready to make a Silent Hill type of game that most gamers want.... What Sony did? Paid Kojima to make Death Stranding (which I like a lot), that was a shot in the dark.


I think that Sony deliberately choose to kill their japanese main studios... Blaming the devs is just terrible.

Death Stranding was clearly 100% Kojima's decision, Sony did not make him not make a Silent Hill game. Thats a ridiculous idea.

And Polyphony Digital and Team Asobi are both Japanese. Sony is not "killing" their Japanese studios that actually make good games.

 

[jm89]

We need to find out who greenlit fucking knack 2. How do you waste resources creating that? Knack is not a bad game but how does that happen?

 

[Keihart]

Prove it. Source for this claim?

The Last Guardian took 10 years. I bet it cost more to develop than say, Ghost of Tsushima did.

I bet it was, Shu was on record talking about how much of an investment that game was. Probably the last big game they ever got to make considering how GR2 was made (not that i think GR2 needed to be a big budget game)

 

[Varteras]

I agree with you. Outside of Team Asobi, Japan Studio had not been producing for the company. Shadow of the Colossus, back in 2005, was the last time they developed a big hit. Critically or commercially. LocoRoco was about the closest they came after that and that was merely a year later.

Toyama and his team were brought over from Konami after the original Silent Hill and spent over two decades never replicating that success. Siren and Gravity Rush never managed to catch on and Sony was done with giving him anymore time and money. He was brought on to do big things for PlayStation and he never succeeded.

The team that brought us Ico and Shadow of the Colossus has been gone for some time now and The Last Guardian, while good, was a weak finale to the "Ico Trilogy" that didn't even come close to its predecessors. That was after nearly a decade of development.

The core team was just simply NOT what it was back in the days of The Legend of Dragoon and Ape Escape. Instead we got two Knack games because Mark Cerny, while he clearly understands hardware and tools, doesn't seem to have a clue on how to make great games these days or what PlayStation fans wanted.

Asobi was the only part of Japan Studio driving interest and conversation around PlayStation. AstroBot Rescue Mission is one of the highest rated VR titles to date and the highest for PSVR. Many have compared it to ""an experience like playing Mario 64 for the first time". Even Astro's Playroom, a simple pack-in title for PS5, had greater reception than any Japan Studio-developed title (outside of Asobi) in over a decade.

Many of the games people associate Japan Studio with weren't even developed by them. You don't get to be a big, multi-team studio when only one of them is producing something that helps your platform. Downsizing Japan Studio and focusing them around the one team doing well is the same call I would have made at this point. Trim the fat, give Asobi all the resources, and see what they can do. Regrow the studio over time with an emphasis on teams producing results and not simply chasing passion projects for one guy.

 

[Azurro]

Of course it is, their output was terribly low and their titles sold very little compared to the investment. I love japanese games and it's what I mainly play, but Japan Studios needed to be doing games of the quality and sell potential of something like RE2 Remake rather than artsy games that took forever to do like The Last Guardian that don't sell, terrible games like Knack 1 and 2 or games of middling quality like Gravity Rush that don't sell. It just didn't make sense to keep them around for that kind of output.

 

[Aion002]

That really doesn’t make sense though. They’ve always had funding and Sony was particularly wide open with the wallet for new ideas last gen

And even if they weren’t getting AAA funding, surely we would have seen a bunch of smaller games coming from the studio?

More likely they had a bunch of games canned because they weren’t coming together. Which would it be that surprising after the technical disaster of The Last Guardian needing to skip ahead a gen to run functionally? Or the likes of Knack being masthead games of the studio last gen

And Kojima is an interesting point. Note how he partnered with a Sony Western studio rather than Studio Japan. That should be a testament to their current reputation

Did they? Do you honestly believe that Gravity Rush 2 or TLG had a third of Ghost of Tsushima budget?

See this from 2013:

Speaking with PlayStation Lifestyle, Moore compared the way Sony Japan Studio works to Naughty Dog and Sony Santa Monica Studio.

He explained, “As a developer, Naughty Dog’s mandate is to make AAA blockbusting Hollywood crushing titles, and it’s the same for Santa Monica – whereas our mandate at Japan Studios is to make games that nobody else can see on another console.”

“It’s kind of crazy in our studio because it’s a bunch of insane people coming up with strange ideas,” he added, “We’re kind of left alone to come up with what we want. We’re obviously tracked, we do have green-light meetings and stuff like that, but because we have smaller teams and smaller budgets to work with there’s less risk, so they allow us to be more creative.”

Sony Japan Studio tasked to create games not possible on other consoles, says dev

Sony Japan Studio has a long line of innovative and fresh ideas under its belt, and it comes from Sony's top brass lett…

www.vg247.com

Sony made them take this approach... And they got fucked, because the biggest ps4 games are triple A games. Playstation is now know because of that... Sony basically tossed them under the bus.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Hideo Kojima, derided the Battle Royale genre a year or two ago.

He doesn't understand the magic that Western developers do. He, and most of Japan, is a dinosaur.

 

[Yoboman]

You forget one "small" detail though. None of Japan Studio's games had even 1/10 of the budgets that their Western studios had.

Did Japan Studios even embark upon creating a game of such scale?

Sony supported a bunch of handheld devs like Sony Bend and Ready at Dawn to scale up into AAA development

There is no evidence that they ever even tried to make such a game

And if they did questions need to be asked why it never happened and it comes back to their capabilities again

And even if they were only focused on mid sized development, it’s not like they were out making big hits on smaller budgets anyway

 

[Aion002]

Prove it. Source for this claim?

The Last Guardian took 10 years. I bet it cost more to develop than say, Ghost of Tsushima did.


Death Stranding was clearly 100% Kojima's decision, Sony did not make him not make a Silent Hill game. Thats a ridiculous idea.

And Polyphony Digital and Team Asobi are both Japanese. Sony is not "killing" their Japanese studios that actually make good games.

Polyphony is not part of the Sony Japan Studios and Team Asobi is just a fraction of what their sony japan studios were.

Death Stranding just shows Sony's priorities.

Also... TLG was not in development for 10 years being worked on...

 

[jm89]

Polyphony is not owned by Sony and Team Asobi is just a fraction of what their japanese studios were.

Death Stranding just shows Sony's priorities.

Also... TLG was not in development for 10 years being worked on...

Polyphony not owned by sony. Whaat?

 

[Fbh]

I'm inclined to agree.
I still think it's sad they closed, as they definitely made some of the more unique Sony games. But about the only truly great thing they made last gen without partnering with another dev (From Software for Bloodborne, Fumito Ueda for The last Guardian, etc) was that Astrobot VR game, and that's the team that got to stick around

You forget one "small" detail though. None of Japan Studio's games had even 1/10 of the budgets that their Western studios had.

I'd be willing to bet unless it's some main entry in a flagship franchise from Square or Capcom, most japanese games don't come close to the budget of a western Sony exclusive.
And yet I'd take many other japanese games over most Japanstudio games.

Stuff like Yakuza 0, Fist of the North Star, Nier Automata, YSVIII, Persona 5, Bayonetta 2, etc (arguably DQ11 too) don't exactly scream TLOU2 tier AAAA budget and I'd take them over everything Japan studio made last gen aside from Bloodborne (which FROM and Miyazaki are still largely responsible for) and The Last Guardian (which had a Strong Fumito Ueda style and design, and absolutely horrible performance).

Hot take? It's the entirely correct take.

To add to the points you made, Japan Studio were allowed to make a potential AAA franchise in Gravity Rush, forming Team Gravity to do so. After a promising start, they delivered one of the worst first party Sony games of the decade in Gravity Rush 2, and it bombed as a result. Bad sales could be excused if the team had promise, but the game was just rotten, so poorly designed and programmed - a ton of art and music talent supporting nothing from a game design standpoint.

From that point on they had blown their shot and were doomed.

I didn't think GR2 was bad, but it was definitely disappointing.
I love the world, art direction and music in the franchise, and Kat is a great character. But the mission design, sidequests and story were all a let down. I was so hyped for it too because 1 had a ton of potential that I thought it couldn't quite reach due to having to be a Vita launch (or launch window) game. But then almost every issue I had with the game was still there in the sequel.

 

[Aion002]

Polyphony not owned by sony. Whaat?

I mean... It's not under Sony Japan Studios division... I am sorry I am dumb... A little more today.

 

[Yoboman]

Did they? Do you honestly believe that Gravity Rush 2 or TLG had a third of Ghost of Tsushima budget?

See this from 2013:

Speaking with PlayStation Lifestyle, Moore compared the way Sony Japan Studio works to Naughty Dog and Sony Santa Monica Studio.

He explained, “As a developer, Naughty Dog’s mandate is to make AAA blockbusting Hollywood crushing titles, and it’s the same for Santa Monica – whereas our mandate at Japan Studios is to make games that nobody else can see on another console.”

“It’s kind of crazy in our studio because it’s a bunch of insane people coming up with strange ideas,” he added, “We’re kind of left alone to come up with what we want. We’re obviously tracked, we do have green-light meetings and stuff like that, but because we have smaller teams and smaller budgets to work with there’s less risk, so they allow us to be more creative.”

Sony Japan Studio tasked to create games not possible on other consoles, says dev

Sony Japan Studio has a long line of innovative and fresh ideas under its belt, and it comes from Sony's top brass lett…

www.vg247.com

Sony made them take this approach... And they got fucked, because the biggest ps4 games are triple A games. Playstation is now know because of that... Sony basically tossed them under the bus.

So they were sitting in a room thinking of ideas that never got made into games?

That’s exactly the sort of mismanagement that I take issue with

And I’d argue that approach was a good description of them prior to 2013. But what about the 9 years since? They missed the boat on the biggest upswell of Sony first party popularity ever

 

[sublimit]

Did Japan Studios even embark upon creating a game of such scale?

Sony supported a bunch of handheld devs like Sony Bend and Ready at Dawn to scale up into AAA development

There is no evidence that they ever even tried to make such a game

And if they did questions need to be asked why it never happened and it comes back to their capabilities again

And even if they were only focused on mid sized development, it’s not like they were out making big hits on smaller budgets anyway

There is no evidence that they did as well as there's no evidence that they did not.
We can't know for sure if their studio directors ever pitched Sony some bigger projects and they were denied from the higher ups.

Only someone inside Sony (or inside Japan Studio) could know about this and obviously they can't talk about it.

What we do know however is they never got a chance at a AAA budget regardless if they asked for it or not.

 

[Varteras]

Considering that Asobi is the only part of Japan Studio left and that they were a small team that managed to pull off some great things, I really think leaning on the "well Sony didn't give the other teams more money" is really reaching to shift blame. You clearly don't need a AAA budget to create great games that either sell well or at least drive conversation about your platform. We don't really know what the budgets were anyways. What we do know are the results and there are teams out there who are smaller, working with less money, and creating games getting a lot more attention than Knack and Gravity Rush.

 

[sublimit]

Prove it. Source for this claim?

The Last Guardian took 10 years. I bet it cost more to develop than say, Ghost of Tsushima did.

The Last Guardian was developed by a very small team within Japan Studio. It wasn't even developed all this time since there were times when the development had completely stopped.

It's budget wasn't even remotely comparable to the budgets that SSM,ND,Insomniac,etc had for their games

 

[Aenima]

Polyphony is not part of the Sony Japan Studios and Team Asobi is just a fraction of what their sony japan studios were.

Death Stranding just shows Sony's priorities.

Also... TLG was not in development for 10 years being worked on...

Polyphony is owned by Sony.
And staff from japan studio is moving to Team Asobi. Making team Asobi big is the right move, they are a gem full of talent.

 

[Aion002]

So they were sitting in a room thinking of ideas that never got made into games?

That’s exactly the sort of mismanagement that I take issue with

And I’d argue that approach was a good description of them prior to 2013. But what about the 9 years since? They missed the boat on the biggest upswell of Sony first party popularity ever

Discounting remasters:

Soul Sacrifice Delta, Oreshika, Freedom Wars, Destiny of Spirits and Knack in 2014.

Bloodborne in 2015.

Tomorrow Children, TLG and Everybody's Golf in 2016.

Knack 2 and No More Heroes Allowed 2 in 2017.

Deracine and Shadow of the Colossus in 2018.

Demon's Souls Remake in 2020.

Basically after 2017 they became a support studio...

 

[Meesh]

One simple counterpoint: Sony probably didn't allow them to produce new games and/or higher budget projects.


Think about it, Sony had the creator of Silent Hill and Kojima ready to make a Silent Hill type of game that most gamers want.... What Sony did? Paid Kojima to make Death Stranding (which I like a lot), that was a shot in the dark.


I think that Sony deliberately choose to kill their japanese main studios... Blaming the devs is just terrible.

This opinion kinda fascinates me, deliberately killing their Japanese studios? To what end? Why?
Is the market seriously that stale?

 

[Aion002]

This opinion kinda fascinates me, deliberately killing their Japanese studios? To what end? Why?
Is the market seriously that stale?

People in charge doesn't believe that the studio is worth investing.

Japan is Nintendoland, Sony western studios are highly praised and sell a lot, the PlayStation brand is the biggest video game brand outside of Japan, so it does make sense that they decided to prioritize others over the SJS.

Just my opinion...

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

.

 

[martino]

 

[Ten_Fold]

They haven’t made a game that sold really well, sure GR is a cool series but the games was meh and the budget for GR2 didn’t seem high. TLG had a big budget but that game was wack, they got good ideas it’s just not done right imo. I would’ve liked them to work with bluepoint to bring back legend of dragoon an turn it into a series or something with a big budget. Anyways Sony doesn’t seem to interested with investing in Japanese games, you’ll have better luck with Microsoft at this point.

 

[Calverz]

The playstation branding, theme, ethos is becoming more and more western. I used to think playstation was a cool japanese brand. Especially in the early ps1 days. Now i just see it as almost as american as xbox. Its a shame. Feels like its souls is disappearing into the ether.

 

[jm89]

TLG had a big budget but that game was wack

 

[Clear]

Internal studios/teams are expensive to run, so they need to be productive.

Objectively they've not lost anything of value. They still own all the IP, and the reclaimed funds can be redirected towards external development which may be more efficient and cheaper. Especially if they expand into China.

 

[Woggleman]

Japan itself has shifted from consoles to mobile and handheld. Sony had no choice but to go elsewhere.

 

[EDMIX]

99% of Japanese developers do not understand the market. They have zero confidence in their culture and think the western customer isn't intetested in their art. Thus, they hesitate to invest in AAA projects.

Agreed and Agreed. Its why I was so happy that Sega bought Atlus. They are one of the few publishers that seek to keep things very Japanese in terms of their titles that take place in the east. They tried with Yakuza 1 to appeal to the west and after with Yakuza 2 they simply kept the Japanese voice overs and more so continued to release their titles that took place in the east with very little changes.

I have nothing against Capcom, Konami, Square etc, but they seem to be dead set on appealing to the west with many of their key IP, Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Metal Gear Solid, any of the resent Final Fantasies. It almost becomes this joke that of all the fucking teams, SUCKER PUNCH makes a AAA JAPANESE SETTING game.

So I'd say Sony as a publisher seems to have no issue supporting those concepts, but those teams in Japan in general seem to really want to appeal to the west and funny enough some of Sony's teams in the west want to make Japanese setting titles, ironic. You have to wonder what happens to a country to have this obsession with creating designs of people that look nothing like them and this desire to have settings in any place but Japan. Japan has a whole history of seeking to appeal to the west that is much deeper then this and I'd say semi OT and a topic for a different thread.

 

[b6a6es]

Completely agree.

Sony's slow shift to western audiences started a long time ago, probably around the PS4's release or when the Vita was killed.
They started investing more in western studios, and of all AAA games released for the PS4 since its release, most of those were developed by western studios.

And the people that question whether the budget was really small, c'mon. We all know the difference in marketing and visual polish between AAA budget games and smaller/medium budget games, there's no need for a spreadsheet.

Unless it’s a game that been literally in development for 10 years (shifting development to next gen PS4 since it was nearly impossible for PS3), that had AAA Quality to it despite having an indie style gamdplay

TLG costed a fortune, and i bet its closer to TLOU budget !

 

[01011001]

Prove it. Source for this claim?

The Last Guardian took 10 years. I bet it cost more to develop than say, Ghost of Tsushima did.

well it was also a better game, so...
but no, I bet the budget was lower. super mall team, lots of development pauses

 

[EDMIX]

The best game Japan Studio made in the last 8 years is Astro Bot Rescue Mission. Team Asobi made it in 18 months. Only like 25 devs. It has a 90 metacritic, sold well, and is Sony's best VR game. Then they made Astro's Playroom quickly and everyone who's played it on PS5 enjoyed that one too. Astro Bot has become a new popular PlayStation character. Nothing else made by Japan Studio in the last 8 years has actually been made on time, and sold well, and got good reviews, and also created a new successful character / franchise worldwide. That's why Sony is just focusing on Team Asobi now. They're talented, profitable, and produce.

PS4 lifecycle was series of failures for Japan Studio (other than Asobi):
- Knack 1/2 - bad reviews, medicore sales
- Gravity Rush 1/2 - poor sales (and this team has made nothing new since 2014)
- Last Guardian - 10 year dev cycle, over budget, low sales, dev hell so bad they fired Ueda and hired outside help to finish it

Everything else to come out of Japan Studio was only co-developed with other studios doing most of the work: Bloodborne was From Software, Everybody's Golf was Clap Hanz, Shadow of the Colossus and Demon's Souls Remakes were Bluepoint, etc. Japan Studio were just XDev really, helping external devs make 1st party games.

Sony are smart to focus on Team Asobi. They have a bright future with Astro Bot on PS5 & PSVR2.

Agreed 1000%.

This is a hard truth I think many don't want to really acknowledge, Its like shit, I like many of the games they put out, I like MANY games this forum disagrees with, but I don't just pretend me liking it must justify low sales and for it to continue to exist.

One simple counterpoint: Sony probably didn't allow them to produce new games and/or higher budget projects.

? Well yea, for good reason, if their other fucking titles suck and have low sales, why would they reward them with MORE MONEY?

I think that Sony deliberately choose to kill their japanese main studios... Blaming the devs is just terrible.

Nah, I think they made a choice based on the history of low sales and under performing teams. If not the actual team making the game, then who is to blame? How come other teams at Sony are able to make big successful titles, small budgets and big budgets? We have many, many examples of small budget titles at Sony becoming big success.

If we can reward a team like Asobi, I see no reason to them pretend a team can't be blamed for low sales of a game they created. So I see nothing wrong with a team being held accountable, this is the reality of game development. We can't just keep passing the buck to everyone else but the actual fucking team in charge of their games. Its even harder to make this argument with so many other successful Sony teams.... like Asobi. Why are they getting someone promoted? How come that team isn't closing down?

I mean.....you don't think maybe thats a little weird that the things happening at Sony Japan are not happening to ALL THE TEAMS IN JAPAN?

SlimeGooGoo "Sony's slow shift to western audiences started a long time ago," Sony has always catered to multiple regions. So it "started" with PS1.....

You also have to question why the fuck Ghost Of Tsushima exist......a game about Japan..... sooooooo I don't think this has to do with a "shift to western", I think this SOLELY has to do with Sony Japan under performing. Again folks, why is Team Asobi having one of their developer promoted? It would be like saying Sony is shifting away from racing games causes the closing down of Evolution (then ignores Destruction allstars, GT Sport and GT7 being made).

Soooooooo are you sure its not simply about THOSE TEAMS in general under performing?

Why remake Demon Souls?


Why make Bloodborne?

Shit, why Buy Crunchy Roll or make Ghost Of Tsushima or even have a deal with Final Fantasy? For a company that seems to be shifting away from Japan, they seem to invest in a lot of Japanese shit.....

 

[jm89]

Japan itself has shifted from consoles to mobile and handheld. Sony had no choice but to go elsewhere.

I can understand not wanting to create games for the japanses audience, but there is a thirst for japanese games in the west. This gen we have seen a resurgence from japanese publishers like capcom and sega, and alot of that has to do being successfull outside of japan.

I know sony generally let there studios have a bit of freedom, but maybe japan studio needed some intervention? But hard to say without knowing the internals of what went on within japan studio.

 

[Woggleman]

Even legendary Japanese publishers like Konami are moving far away from what they used to be. One of last year's best games based on feudal Japan was made by a western company. The landscape is changing and they are keeping up.

 

[Zekra Dezivad]

You forget one "small" detail though. None of Japan Studio's games had even 1/10 of the budgets that their Western studios had.

You don't have to have budget to make games that sell though. Also, higher budget doesn't means higher sales too.

 

[sublimit]

You don't have to have budget to make games that sell though. Also, higher budget doesn't means higher sales too.

I didn't say that it's a "requirement" for high sales but you can't compare on a fair ground the sales of games that had much bigger budgets with smaller ones.

Also due to their smaller budgets they were never promoted as much as their Western games. Which makes sense but it's also another reason why you can't compare them with the sales of their Western studios.
I'm not saying that Sony just throwed them out to die (like some people mistakenly believe) but it's a day and night difference with the marketing they spend for their "big hitters".

Also as i had said in another thread some time ago, sales isn't everything in a company's portfolio. A studio that brings critical acclaim for being different and has games that are "out of the box" offer a much needed variety and is of crucial importance to differentiate them from the competition.

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

You also have to question why the fuck Ghost Of Tsushima exist......a game about Japan..... sooooooo I don't think this has to do with a "shift to western"

It always felt to me like a game set in Japan targeted at western audiences.

Also, there's really no correlation between where a game is set with its target audience.
It might help boost sales in a particular country, but there's really no correlation (e.g. Assassin's Creed and Dead Rising)

Sony has found a formula for making (cinematic) games, and also has found an audience willing to pay for those games.
This audience is not Japan. And all of their recent changes reflect that shift of focus (e.g. 'O' to 'X')

 

[EDMIX]

Also due to their smaller budgets they were never promoted as much as their Western games

Also due to them under performing they got those budgets.....

t it's a day and night difference with the marketing they spend for their "big hitters".

Yet those "big hitters" are teams that are proven to move huge units, those they market those teams that have had success.

They marketed the shit out of Driveclub and Evolution still got closed down, so that has nothing to do with just Japanese studios or something. Putting LOTS of money behind something doesn't mean it will be good, lots of marketing doesn't guarantee more sales and they literally have several teams that make "out of the box" titles that clearly are not getting restructured like this.

Team Asobi exist..... It hurts many of these points because clearly the game isn't some fucking massive AAA title, GHOST OF TSUSHIMA exist, a very, very Japanese game, so I don't see this whole "western games" argument making a lot of sense considering. They can continue to have lots of variety by the teams that continue to actually pull off successful titles. Sony Japan wasn't the only team putting those games out you know...

SlimeGooGoo "felt to me like a game set in Japan targeted at western audiences." I disagree greatly. Its a game set in Japan, about the Japanese, with audio options to switch to Japanese and even consulted with the Japanese. I see no evidence that its simply a setting, but its target is the west. You'd have to make that argument and give the points.

"Also, there's really no correlation between where a game is set with its target audience" nah, I disagree. Someone very much can have a game set in a location to cater to a target audience. Shit, if any correlation would exist, it literally would be that. You have entire departments that exist in studios literally for that very idea.