First-party PlayStation games go through 'rigorous' vetting process before Sony will fund them

Games are expensive to make, and because Sony wants to keep its operating margins high, the company says that it has become more selective on which games it will greenlight moving forward.

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Despite breakout best-selling hits like Helldivers 2, Palworld, and Balatro to name a few, 2024 was a tough year for gaming. In a bid to reduce spending, practically every publisher and developer in the games industry had laid off thousands of workers. Projects were also cancelled as companies took write-down losses.

Sony wasn't immune to some tough lessons in 2024. Concord came and went, a flummoxing multi-hundred-million-dollar failure that was shut down within 2 weeks. PlayStation laid off staff, with management commenting: "We have to run a sustainable business."

Now fast-forwarding to the present day, PlayStation Studio Business Group CEO Hermen Hulst lays out what to expect for 2025 and beyond. Essentially, Sony is more carefully picking which games it will greenlight and fund into development.

In a recent interview with Famitsu, Hulst says that each greenlit project goes through a rigorous review process.

"In forming a strong portfolio, the Studio Business Group is focused on rigorously selecting games that provide great experiences to players," Hulst said.

This isn't the first time we've heard Hulst speak this way about PlayStation's vetting process--In 2023, he also said that Bungie is applying a similar method to help Sony pick which live games to fund.

"We also work with Bungie on a rigorous review process across the 12 live services we're working on," Hulst said at the time. Sony has since reduced its live service roadmap by half.

Sony's game plan is basically the same: live services + singleplayer games, with live games releasing across PC, PlayStation, and potentially even other platforms.

Here's what he said about the game projects under Sony Interactive Entertainment's current lineup:

Going forward, we will continue to focus on developing live service titles along with the story-driven single-player titles that our players want.

We are learning a lot as we establish the ability to develop high-quality live service titles within SIE. HELLDIVERS 2 attracted many players through continuous content provision, and achieved results that support the potential of live service titles.

Creativity and great games come from everywhere. We develop content within PlayStation Studios, but we also actively collaborate with external development studios. It is important to have a wide variety of games in our portfolio that can be enjoyed by all types of players.

To provide fresh joy and experiences to PlayStation players, we are constantly reviewing the contents of our portfolio and considering expanding the genres that are in demand and introducing new types of games.

Our aim is to publish games from the world's best creators, both internal and external, and we have had a lot of success by working closely with external development studios.