Friday, November 22, 2024

Sony Commits to Releasing ‘Major’ Single-Player Games Every Year From 2025 Onwards — So What’s It Cooking? – IGN

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Sony’s high-profile live service struggles have seen the cancellation of Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us multiplayer game and, most recently, the disastrous release and then un-release of Concord, which resulted in the closure of its developer, Firewalk. Amid the turmoil, Sony has reaffirmed its commitment to major single-player games.

Speaking during an investor call, Sony’s finance and IR chief Sadahiko Hayakawa said that while it has no major first-party games coming out before the end of its current financial year ending March 2025, the company plans to “continue releasing major single-player game titles every year from next fiscal year onwards.”

So, what major single-player games does Sony have in the works? In the same financial call, Hayakawa pointed to Sucker Punch’s Ghost of Yōtei, the sequel to 2020’s smash hit Ghost of Tsushima. Ghost of Yōtei, due out at some point in 2025, would certainly qualify as one of Sony’s “major” single-player games.

Sony is also set to publish Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding 2: On the Beach as a PS5 exclusive at some point in 2025, so that’s at least two next year.

Looking further ahead (or to unannounced 2025 releases), Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 developer Insomniac has its Wolverine game in the works. That one’s yet to receive a release window. We know God of War developer Sony Santa Monica has something cooking, and Guerrilla looks set to round out the Horizon trilogy with another single-player adventure, although that is reportedly a long way in the distance. Naughty Dog, too, has multiple single-player games coming down the pipe.

Elsewhere, we know Days Gone developer Bend has a new IP up its sleeve, as does LittleBigPlanet and Dreams maker Media Molecule. Returnal developer Housemarque is working on something new, as is Bluepoint Games and Firesprite. Polyphony is no doubt hard at work on Gran Turismo 7, and following the success of Astro Bot, all eyes will be on Team Asobi to see what it does next.

That’s a lot in the works at PlayStation Studios to come over the course of the next few years, or however many years the PS5 has left in it before Sony releases the inevitable PS6. And throughout it all, Sony’s live service push continues, with Guerrilla’s Horizon Online, Bungie’s Marathon, and Haven’s Fairgame$ all in development.

Meanwhile, Sony continues to do deals with external developers that see single-player games launch first on PS5. For example, it partnered with Square enix for Final Fantasy 7 Remake, 16, and 7 Rebirth, Shift Up for Stellar Blade, Game Science for the record-breaking Black Myth: Wukong, Team Ninja’s Rise of the Rōnin, and Bloober’s Silent Hill 2 Remake.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

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