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Sony's Blockbuster Focus Reminds Me Of Nintendo During N64, And That Could Be Disastrous (Or Perhaps Not)

Which scenario feels most parallel to what's supposedly/seemingly going on with PS?

  • Yamauchi-era N64

    Votes: 1 1.4%
  • Bernie Stolar-era Sega Saturn

    Votes: 3 4.2%
  • Jack/Leonard Tramiel-era Atari Jaguar

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Late '80s/early-to-mid-late-'90s Apple (when Jobs wasn't there)

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Don Mattrick-era Xbox One

    Votes: 12 16.9%
  • Ken Kutaragi-era PlayStation 3

    Votes: 8 11.3%
  • All of the above

    Votes: 1 1.4%
  • None of the above

    Votes: 46 64.8%

  • Total voters
    71
  • Poll closed .
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ACESHIGH

Banned
Sony customers are hypocrites. You don't like those niche games. You buy your console to play fifa gta and COD and that's all right.

Otherwise you would have put your money where your mouth is when it mattered. Sony is giving you what you like and axing the product lines that don't make money
 

Moonjt9

Member
This is all so stupid. Am I the only one who sees the PlayStation blog posting a bunch of small games? All of the games coming out on ps5 right now are indies or non AAA. Seems like a bunch of concern trolling or astroturfing going on these days.
 

VAVA Mk2

Member
HFe3BND.gif
 
Sony customers are hypocrites. You don't like those niche games. You buy your console to play fifa gta and COD and that's all right.

Otherwise you would have put your money where your mouth is when it mattered. Sony is giving you what you like and axing the product lines that don't make money
I don't think they do matter to the majority they have the sales data to back it up obviously and make decisions based on that like company's do ... what's been happening on gaf is not the reality outside these forums

As for the op your polls never seem to cater for the people that are satisfied with Sony only the bad ? .
 
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Some of you guys would be hating sony even they gave you free gold bars with every game purchase, so what difference does it make. You already made your mind up either way. If they were to resurrect Japan studio and announce a days gone sequel, you would only be hating on them for something else next week. We get it! Can we actually talk about some games now? This is boring as shit.
I...I don't hate Sony tho. I play on Sony consoles too so....:/

Its been 6 months and we are still in the middle of a pandemic. Go touch some grass you've been shut-in too long.
I have a better idea, I'll go eat some.

*PlayStation doesn't care about indies*
*Advertises them on State of Play and the PS5 Future of Gaming Show*
Those don't count as Indie Support



I mean more in the way they don't have them much as a pillar like they used to. Particularly the smaller indies, not the big-budget ones like Kena and such.

What I don't get is that everyone seemed to love Sony during the Ps4 era when they...also focused on big blockbusters?
I didn't exactly see people around here going crazy for Concrete Genie and Matterfall.

Ok sure Japan studio closing is sad and I personally really liked games like Gravity Rush, but when people talked positively about the Ps4 it was mostly the big games being mentioned. You know, Bloodborne, God of War, Spiderman, Horizon, Uncharted 4, Ghost of Tsushima, etc.

How is the current Sony any different? People are acting as if they are only releasing games like The Last of Us 2 and God of War now.....when they launched the console with a Demon Souls Remake , a Sackboy Platformer (and another free platformer) and their 2021 includes games like Returnal (hardly a safe, hyper big budget cinematic game) and Ratchet.




Look out tomorrow for:
"Sony now reminds of Pizza Hut when they made that cheeseburger crust, and that's bad"
TBH I prefer the 1P creativity from Sony pre-PS4. I admire most of what they've done with PS4 (and some games like The Order look better than most games coming to market today...tho it sacrificed a lot to achieve it), but I was actually most hyped for Dreams back from that February 2013 show...too bad it took seven years later for it to come out :/.

Likewise when they wore the Vib-Ribbon shirt I was sure they were bringing it back with a new game, not a digital re-release on the PS Store. I like a few of Sony's quirkier IPs over most of their "serious" ones, but among the "serious" ones the ones that had a lot of uniqueness to me were the likes of SoTC, Ico, Bloodborne etc., but chances of new installments there are nil.

In some ways the Sony of today and, presumed going forward, isn't too different, but it sounds like Sony will focus on even LESS big games while shelling out bigger budgets for a sllimmer lineup. That is the potential worry, because what if the IP chosen happen to fall outside of my tastes? I can tell you right now, they are doubling-down on TLOU but I have very little interest in that IP and it's getting arguably the most useless remake of the decade simply to tie in with a new television series which seem like overkill IMHO.

None. They're selling like crazy and we're only 6 months in.

I don't understand all these concern threads popping up. This is happening when PS is selling this good. Imagine what'd happen if they weren't.

Give it a couple years first.
There's a question to be had if sales momentum is mostly a run-off effect from the PS4, which I'd argue a good amount of it is. The thing is, how long will that really last? Now the shortages are creating some pent-up demand but at some point these current-gen systems have to carry themselves on their own.

I don't want to see platform holders start making decisions that could have bad ramifications later on going by historical examples; with Sony in particular it's been a lot of smaller things adding up over the past couple of years and I think some of them are particularly egregious. It's just that a few unfortunate things are happening with them at the moment so that's what I'm going to focus on; when Microsoft was doing some stupid stuff (Halo Infinite showing, attempted price hike on Gold, some of the early messaging on "powah" blowing up in their face with earlier multiplat releases), I think it was fair to discuss those things, too.

Ultimately it's just something to have for sake of discussion.

This is getting really freaking stupid now. Sony is still putting out games at all budget levels.

We've already seen smaller games on PS5. Astro's Playroom, Sackboy, The Pathless, Bugsnax, Destruction All-Stars, Oddworld. That's in addition to the AAA games.

Xbox Series has had, what? The Medium and not much else. So stop this fake PlayStation concern BS.

IIRC, Pathless, Bugsnsnax, Destruction All-Stars and Oddworld are all technically 3P games, not internally developed by Sony. Sackboy is a cross-gen game and its development might've came before an internal shift on a smaller range of bigger AAA 1P games.

There's nothing fake with bringing up legitimate concerns, I think fans would want to think over some of this stuff because doing so also helps keep these corporations humble and honest.

I skimmed your wall of text and I don’t see anything that actually ties your argument back to the statement PS5 is like N64? A whole lot of waffling there

And the idea Sony is only making blockbuster bears no semblance in reality when they’ve had Sackboy, Astroboy, Dreams, Demons Souls and a new Ratchet and Clank as part of their lineup in the past year. They’ve partnered with small devs for exclusivity for games like Oddworld, Kena. They just released a big risky new IP Ghost of Tsushima that delivered in a big way

So nothing in the statement Sony is only doing blockbusters bears any resemblance to their actual release schedule

I think it's actually arguable if Ghosts was ever a true risk: it's got Japanese samurai themes (samurai movies tend to have a lot of appeal in mainstream, I mean there's stuff like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, The Last Samurai, etc.), and it was also open-world. Open-world are some of the biggest games on the market today. It had a pretty easy recipe to success so I don't see how it was particularly risky.

Yes they did put out Sackboy, Astrobot, Dreams etc. but those were all games (especially Dreams) approved WAY earlier, probably before Sony had a shift in executing their renewed focus on a slimmer lineup of bigger-budget 1P titles. I'll say this right now, if Dreams were trying to get approved for funding today, it WOULD NOT HAPPEN. Sackboy was a very small game (more of a tech demo...a feature-rich one but still), Demon's Souls Remastered kind of skirts the edge of being a AAA-type game (in terms of budget it clearly is but its themes may not have as wide a reach as say a Last of Us), and Ratchet & Clank has prior legacy as a AAA platformer/action series working in its favor (and again, the production values to match).

Like I said though, we'll need to wait a little bit before seeing where things really land WRT Sony's 1P direction. The N64 comparison was not meant to be a literal one but just to allude to Sony's supposed focus on a smaller lineup of perceived higher-quality, larger-budget AAA blockbuster-type games. And like I said, it could work out very well for them, but there's ways it could backfire, too.
 

Optimus Lime

(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
Sony customers are hypocrites. You don't like those niche games. You buy your console to play fifa gta and COD and that's all right.

Otherwise you would have put your money where your mouth is when it mattered. Sony is giving you what you like and axing the product lines that don't make money
Why are you posting in this thread? You've already gone off topic by predictably announcing to the world that you own a PC. Why are you in here saying embarrassing, cringy shit like 'Sony customers are hypocrites'?
 

DJTHEGREY

Member
I genuinely don't understand why there is so much hate for sony right now in the hardcore part of the gaming community. Seem like it was all good just a week ago then suddenly nobody likes the direction sony is going.
 

Optimus Lime

(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
I genuinely don't understand why there is so much hate for sony right now in the hardcore part of the gaming community. Seem like it was all good just a week ago then suddenly nobody likes the direction sony is going.
Children think that treating systems as though they are sports teams make them 'hardcore gamers'. It's the same pathology that forces people to never shut up about the fact that they own a PC, or that they will never subscribe to Gamepass. Some of the literature suggests that it's viral and can be transmitted via bite, but that's research that is still in the early stages.
 

ACESHIGH

Banned
Why are you posting in this thread? You've already gone off topic by predictably announcing to the world that you own a PC. Why are you in here saying embarrassing, cringy shit like 'Sony customers are hypocrites'?


Hmmmm... because they, for the most part, are. All this talk about Jim Ryan being pretty much the devil and the guy is just doing sound business giving Sony gamers what they really want and making money in the process. late PS3 and PS4 Sony is very different from the company that got in the console business. They know that multiplats and F2P MTX heavy games bring in the money, not artsy japanese games. And I really like those, but it is what it is.
 
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Optimus Lime

(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
Hmmmm... because they, for the most part, are. All this talk about Jim Ryan being pretty much the devil and the guy is just doing sound business giving Sony gamers what they really want and making money in the process. late PS3 and PS4 Sony is very different from the company that got in the console business. They know that multiplats and F2P MTX heavy games bring in the money, not artsy japanese games. And I really like those, but it is what it is.
So, you believe that you have deep insights into millions upon millions upon millions of people who own Sony systems, and you're able to make declarative statements regarding how 'they' - as a monolith - behave. Is that right? Is that what you're announcing?
 
I think Playstation fans overall should wait and see what the future holds with optimism, right now we have buzzwords. "Blockbuster focus" doesn't mean shit no matter of how you want to spin it. It's not by itself an identifiable philosophy. I won't pretend I know about tech enough to talk about the SSD/cloud stuff in the OP and honestly I'm not for or against the trans-media thing.

Right now, I think there's only one thing that's clear. If you're satisfied with their output on the PS4, then you're probably golden for the PS5. We have no concrete evidence that signals any shift from that. Odds are, you're getting more of the same, maybe better or maybe worse, but pretty much the same kind of games. If you like that, then have no pause with the PS5. They're still a tremendous value proposition and they'll deliver the stuff.

I shitpost a lot on console wars and of course I'm not always serious about, but this time I'm being dead serious. IF you're a Playstation fan and you like their first party output, then you have no reason to be concerned. This recent doom and gloom stuff is overblown. Jim Ryan is not a bad manager or whatever. If you're into stuff like TLOU 2 and GOT, then rejoyce because you'll probably play TLOU 3 and GOT 2. Shit's fine.
 

ACESHIGH

Banned
So, you believe that you have deep insights into millions upon millions upon millions of people who own Sony systems, and you're able to make declarative statements regarding how 'they' - as a monolith - behave. Is that right? Is that what you're announcing?

You can tell by looking at the sales charts or the most played games. Sony would still sell millons of Playstations if they had 40 to 50 games in their catalog

- Sports games (MTX Heavy)
- AAA third party (Ubisoft, Activision, EA, Rockstar, Capcom, Square, WB games)
- Minecraft
- Fortnite
- AAA western first party
- Flavour of the month indie hit on Steam
- F2P MTX heavy online games
- The odd fighting game from Netherrealm studios
- Video streaming services

That's why I think that all the drama on these forums and the internet due to closing Japan studio and the legacy stores is uncalled for. You tubers, forums and game media are loud. But you could have a catalog small as the one above and 90% of Playstation owners would not notice a thing. I really like the old Japan studio games but they never made much money so it was the right business decision to axe them. I am sure those developers will succeed releasing games across many platforms.

And to get back in the discussion from the OP. This cannot be compared with Nintendo at all. Nintendo screwed everything up in the home console market for 2 straight generations. So much that they can't compete with Sony and MS so they had to merge their portable and home consoles as a last resort.
 
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DJTHEGREY

Member
Children think that treating systems as though they are sports teams make them 'hardcore gamers'. It's the same pathology that forces people to never shut up about the fact that they own a PC, or that they will never subscribe to Gamepass. Some of the literature suggests that it's viral and can be transmitted via bite, but that's research that is still in the early stages.

Lol I get that... It's cool if your loyal to a platform. You want it to be great and destroy everything in it's path or whatever... Not my style but do you lol.... My thing is where is the loyalty? What news sparked this sony/Jim Ryan Hate. There is usually some logic to whats going on.... Even if I don't agree with it. You might be right about the viral bite tho 😂
 
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Optimus Lime

(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
You can tell by looking at the sales charts or the most played games. Sony would still sell millons of Playstations if they had 40 to 50 games in their catalog

- Sports games (MTX Heavy)
- AAA third party (Ubisoft, Activision, EA, Rockstar, Capcom, Square, WB games)
- Minecraft
- Fortnite
- AAA western first party
- Flavour of the month indie hit on Steam
- F2P MTX heavy online games
- The odd fighting game from Netherrealm studios
- Video streaming services

That's why I think that all the drama on these forums and the internet due to closing Japan studio and the legacy stores is uncalled for. You tubers, forums and game media are loud. But you could have a catalog small as the one above and 90% of Playstation owners would not notice a thing. I really like the old Japan studio games but they never made much money so it was the right business decision to axe them. I am sure those developers will succeed releasing games across many platforms.

And to get back in the discussion from the OP. This cannot be compared with Nintendo at all. Nintendo screwed everything up in the home console market for 2 straight generations. So much that they can't compete with Sony and MS so they had to merge their portable and home consoles as a last resort.
Again, you have no insights whatsoever into the monolithic consumer behaviour of 'Sony customers'. Your post has about as much validity and worth as someone blaming 'PC users' for the lack of dedicated AAA PC software on their platform due to the overwhelming success of WoW and MTX-riddled F2P games. It's nonsense.

You're doubling down on a point that you have no authority whatsoever to make. And, you are a painfully cliched PCMR sad case anyway, so why are you even in this thread?
 

EverydayBeast

thinks Halo Infinite is a new graphical benchmark
PS5 has energy, every console has a smooth transition we’re getting great exclusives typical Sony DNA.
 

yurinka

Member
Omg, another PlayStation is doomed + Gamepass spam thread full of bullshit and lies?

thicc_girls_are_teh_best thicc_girls_are_teh_best , why didn't you use one of the other gazillion other threads about this topic?

-They are releasing more 1st party games than before, and they are selling more than ever before
-It's a lie they focused or will focus on big games only, look at recent or upcoming games like Astro, Sackboy, Ratchet, Destruction All Stars or all that huge amount of (mostly timed) console exclusives they release every month or show in every event
-3rd party support will keep coming because they are selling more consoles than nobody else did before. From Japan to, since in PS4 any popular dev or publisher, big and small published some exclusive
-The higher pricing for some AAA gets disconted quickly, here in Spain in many places Demon's Souls was 60€ instead of 80€ at launch. The phisical cartridge was the expensive part, so they couldn't price cut them that easily
-Nintendo 64 didn't sell because people had more games they liked on PlayStation, which had a way bigger and more diverse 1st+2nd+3rd party catalog of great games. Exactly the same reason of why last year PlayStation made way more money than Nintendo.
-They didn't close Japan Studio, they downsided its internal development part to focus it into Team Asobi, and the 2nd party publishing part they had in Japan Studio, Santa Monica an co. has now been merged with their global PlayStation Studios publishing team.
-Unlike Gamepass and xCloud, Sony's cloud strategy (well, exactly Sony's game subscriptions) already is profitable and has been it for a while because having a business model that makes sense and because put there games once they already completed their commercial life instead of killing game sales by giving big games day one for free.
-Regarding IPs, Nintendo needs to start creating new IPs. Sony creates many successful new IPs every generation while Nintendo still is focused on the same 8 bit IPs: Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, Kirby, Pokemon and Metroid. But they don't do it, because Nintendo has a smaller number of big exclusive or multi games being released every month, so sales get focused on a few ones. Games that typically aren't new ones like in other platforms because there are only a few ones, so people goes to buy great old games instead.
 
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fallingdove

Member
Just about eye rolled out of my chair reading the OP.

If PS5 is equal to the N64, is Xbox Series equivalent to the Phillips CDi?

Phillips Series X - no games, no future.
 
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