PlayStation will keep making ‘big, spectacular’ games, says studios boss

Sony remains highly committed to the creation of story and character-based games, according to new PlayStation Worldwide Studios boss Hermen Hulst.

The platform holder announced in November that Guerrilla Games co-founder Hulst had taken charge of PlayStation‘s 14 internal studios, while the role’s previous incumbent, Shuhei Yoshida, is now leading a new initiative nurturing external indie developers.

And Hulst has told GamesIndustry.biz that the company behind the Uncharted and God of War series has no intention of moving away from blockbuster story-based games as it prepares to launch PlayStation 5 in 2020.

“We are very committed to the types of games we’ve been making at Worldwide Studios for the last decade: big, spectacular experiences with story and characters at the core,” he said. “We will keep making these games, because we love to make them.

“And as a brand we are eager to branch out and start including and curating a new generation of developers, that create new and different experiences for a new generation of gamers.”

Hulst also believes we may currently be experiencing “the golden age” of gaming. “There has never been this diversity of experiences — from massive AAA online games that explore future worlds, to deeply personal Indie projects that explore the human condition,” he said. “As PlayStation, we need to provide a platform that includes all those different voices, all those different experiences.”

Sony said in May that the strength of key first-party franchises has increased between the PS3 and PS4 generations based on sales and review scores.

Individual titles in the God of War, Uncharted and The Last of Us series have all shipped or sold more than ten million units on PS4, something not achieved during the PS3 era.

And PS4 exclusives Horizon: Zero Dawn and Marvel’s Spider-Man have sold over 10 million and 13 million copies respectively.

Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan recently said the company has no current plans to imitate Xbox’s Game Pass strategy, which sees Microsoft release all first-party games on its subscription service at launch.

“The nature and scale of some of the first-party games that we are making leads us to think that, right now, it’s better to spend energy on making sure that the launch of those games is a massive entertainment event,” he said in November.