• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

PlayStation Is Putting $300 Million More Into First-Party Games, and Aiming for 'Multiple Platforms'

Dolodolo

Member
That is your view.
By putting their games on PC, and seeing people buying their games, it would make them focus more on putting their games on PC.

If you are a business person, your main objective is to maximize your profits. Holding your assets for too long, would not generate them money.

MS makes double money from PC and Xbox, due to day1 price.

Because old games go on sales fast. Day1 games go on sales late. So you maximize your profit in those first 6 months.

Just selling 4m copies on steam, is enough to recoup production cost. They get $180m at $45, after 30% cut. That covers the cost of the game. Whatever they sell on their platform would be pure profit.
They will sell all these games on their console and lock people into their ecosystem and then they will sell another 2 million copies on PC as a bonus.

What can't you understand here?
These games literally beat back several times on consoles, and bring Sony long-term revenue.
 

kingfey

Banned
Horizon didn't make it obvious to me because they had just ported Death Stranding to PC (a game that uses the same engine, so the bulk of the work was probably done in a way). Same goes for Days Gone with it being a UE4 game.

Uncharted and God of War actually shows Sony going out of their way to port games that were never developed with the PC in mind. Two huge IPs for Sony as well.

I'll be surprised if Spider-Man doesn't get a port soon.
Honestly Sony is a corporation. They want money.
They won't sit down, while MS is selling their games day1 on PC.
They will also want to get some of those profits.
 
Drip feeding the games on pc, is still 2 platforms, plus with the push they are apparently doing with GAAS titles, I'd be surprise if they didn't push them titles to be same date as playstation and pc.

Live-service games will most likely definitely be Day-and-Date between PS and PC, because you don't want to alienate the competitive community on a given platform which can cut into revenue and player counts. TLOU2: Factions might be the first such game to do Day-and-Date between both.

But the single-player, non-GaaS titles? Still strongly doubt those are Day-and-Date or have any perceptibly shortened stagger between PS and PC. Revenue increases from just doing more live-service games would be enough while not risking brand identity when it comes to 1P exclusives on console. Plus there's no telling how much of a negative impact 3P revenue could suffer from a portion of the core base shifting to PC if the single-player story-driven epics are Day-and-Date on PC.

Honestly Sony is a corporation. They want money.
They won't sit down, while MS is selling their games day1 on PC.
They will also want to get some of those profits.

But if Sony mess up their brand image when it comes to 1P single-player, story-driven AAA games acting as marquees for the PS brand (and ensuring at least some sizable portion of core gamers stay in the PS ecosystem who also buy many 3P games and MTX, pay for PS+ etc.), they could cut into overall PlayStation division revenue without being able to make up enough of the difference from the additional PC sales of those specific 1P titles.

They have to be very careful in that regard, IMHO. The live-service GaaS titles, though, they can be a lot more liberal in terms of keeping stagger times much shorter between PS & PC, or just eliminating those altogether. It might come down to the type of live-service GaaS title, however.
 
Last edited:

Wulfer

Member
So which was it? Sony was pissed MS announced this direction first and refused to follow or Sony has been asleep at the wheel for 8 eight years?

Either way it doesn't matter they gave MS a large head start. MS was working to link it's systems and ecosystem since the second year of the Xbox One announcement. MS isn't playing with 8 developers anymore their a third of the industry.

Sony has it's name and brand of gaming it should be a good fight.
 
Last edited:
Live-service games will most likely definitely be Day-and-Date between PS and PC, because you don't want to alienate the competitive community on a given platform which can cut into revenue and player counts. TLOU2: Factions might be the first such game to do Day-and-Date between both.

But the single-player, non-GaaS titles? Still strongly doubt those are Day-and-Date or have any perceptibly shortened stagger between PS and PC. Revenue increases from just doing more live-service games would be enough while not risking brand identity when it comes to 1P exclusives on console. Plus there's no telling how much of a negative impact 3P revenue could suffer from a portion of the core base shifting to PC if the single-player story-driven epics are Day-and-Date on PC.
1 year delay for PC would be pretty safe for Sony. They are already fine with that for their timed exclusives.

Anyone willing to wait one year just to play on PC is not who Sony wants owning a PS5 in the first place, it's better for them that the unit goes to someone more invested in their ecosystem.

What I think Sony is missing out on is the crossbuy potential if they open their own store on PC (they can still keep the games on Steam and let people chose if they value that or not).
 
Last edited:

kingfey

Banned
They will sell all these games on their console and lock people into their ecosystem and then they will sell another 2 million copies on PC as a bonus.

What can't you understand here?
These games literally beat back several times on consoles, and bring Sony long-term revenue.
They won't sit down, while MS is doing day1 games infront of their eyes.
You think Sony would say "Oh, MS is making money from those day1 sales. Oh well, I will wait and hold on to my IPs, and would sell them after 3 years ".

That is a bad business for them. The longer Sony is able to wait, the more sales MS would generate.

Sea of theives and FH4 are on weekly top 10 steam alot of times. That is alot of sales for MS. Now imagine Day1 sales for MS.
 

Dolodolo

Member
That is old Sony.
This is new Sony.

They are doing PC ports. That actions breaks down their lockdown ecosystem.

The moment you do PC port, is the moment you lose that leverage.
Where do you get it from?

Literally no person in their right mind would wait a few years to play the game they want to play.

They collect all profits from their console.

After 2+ years, they release the game on PC.

People there buy the game and want to play the sequel.

He can wait another 2+ years for a sequel after it's released, or buy a console and be stuck in their ecosystem.

Sony has literally made the perfect multi-threaded money-making scheme, and you are suggesting that they go the way of the Xbox, which is literally buying up publishers in order to have at least some competitive advantage.

Sony is fine
Nintendo is great

This is Microsoft that needs to prove something to someone, especially when their main priority right now is the game pass.

This is literally the thing that the company is going to bet everything on.
And Of course, of course, this thing should be on any device.

Even on your watch.
Different strategies and different success stories
 

Dolodolo

Member
They won't sit down, while MS is doing day1 games infront of their eyes.
You think Sony would say "Oh, MS is making money from those day1 sales. Oh well, I will wait and hold on to my IPs, and would sell them after 3 years ".

That is a bad business for them. The longer Sony is able to wait, the more sales MS would generate.

Sea of theives and FH4 are on weekly top 10 steam alot of times. That is alot of sales for MS. Now imagine Day1 sales for MS.
How much money does Microsoft make?
Do we have sales data for their games by platform?

Or will you shove me the number of players?)

Microsoft literally doesn't share any sales.

You are talking about some kind of success.

What success?
Forza game service?
Game-service Sea of Thieves?

Microsoft literally needs to compensate a little bit for shoving their games into a subscription because right now it's a losing investment in the future.
 

kingfey

Banned
But if Sony mess up their brand image when it comes to 1P single-player, story-driven AAA games acting as marquees for the PS brand (and ensuring at least some sizable portion of core gamers stay in the PS ecosystem who also buy many 3P games and MTX, pay for PS+ etc.), they could cut into overall PlayStation division revenue without being able to make up enough of the difference from the additional PC sales of those specific 1P titles.

They have to be very careful in that regard, IMHO. The live-service GaaS titles, though, they can be a lot more liberal in terms of keeping stagger times much shorter between PS & PC, or just eliminating those altogether. It might come down to the type of live-service GaaS title, however.
The brand recognition for their IPs would make sense.

But in business world, time is key.

If you aren't using your strongest Ammo, then you won't be able to utilize them at later stage.

Every day Sony doesnt capitalize of this opportunity, it gives MS time to gain market share on steam.

MS 2023-2026 is a big year for them.

Avowed, fable, elder scrolls 6, starfield, perfect dark, new Doom, Call of Duty games. These are few big hits of MS, which would be day1 on steam.

If they wait by that time, MS would be way a head of them.
 

kingfey

Banned
Where do you get it from?

Literally no person in their right mind would wait a few years to play the game they want to play.

They collect all profits from their console.

After 2+ years, they release the game on PC.

People there buy the game and want to play the sequel.

He can wait another 2+ years for a sequel after it's released, or buy a console and be stuck in their ecosystem.

Sony has literally made the perfect multi-threaded money-making scheme, and you are suggesting that they go the way of the Xbox, which is literally buying up publishers in order to have at least some competitive advantage.

Sony is fine
Nintendo is great

This is Microsoft that needs to prove something to someone, especially when their main priority right now is the game pass.

This is literally the thing that the company is going to bet everything on.
And Of course, of course, this thing should be on any device.

Even on your watch.
Different strategies and different success stories
MS doesn't need to prove anything. Their games are top 10 on weekly steam sales. That actions speaks of what they can do on steam.

We will see whether Sony decision is good or not in 3 years from now.

By that time, we would know who will have more market share on steam.
 
People won't buy pc to play few console exclusives.
Forum kids have no clue, what sells, and what doesn't.
People buy consoles, because it's easy to use.
Tell average Joe to buy a pc, because he can play last of us 3 on pc. They will laugh at your face.

It's more about in a few years time, will you be able to say to average Joe. "Hey have you seen the new Steam Deck , it can play both Last of Us 3 AND the next Elder Scrolls/Call of Duty etc" and if that changes things.
 

kyliethicc

Member
Who the fuck cares.

My goodness, these companies don’t look at business like fanatics do. They look for gaining revenue YoY for their shareholders, nothing more.

These threads always turn to shit with this dick vs that dick. Always.
Celebrate In Love GIF by HBO Max
 

Dolodolo

Member
MS doesn't need to prove anything. Their games are top 10 on weekly steam sales. That actions speaks of what they can do on steam.

We will see whether Sony decision is good or not in 3 years from now.

By that time, we would know who will have more market share on steam.
Again. Show me the sales figures for Microsoft games and the breakdown by platform.

Not this sales chart bullshit.

Horizon FW hasn't climbed the sales charts for three months, and what's in it for me?
I do not care. I'm waiting for sales information.

Let Microsoft show the performance of their games.
The number of copies sold.

We literally have two examples, and both are games-services.

Where is Halo? How many people bought a new Halo for company?
Where are the Gears? Less than ten thousand players. Are you not funny?

Success stories.
Sony will release game services on the PC, don't worry.

But, single blockbusters? Forget
 
Last edited:

Midn1ght

Member
The Nvidia list maybe had some proper leaks and a few good guesses, but is full of bullshit and lies. Basically fan wishes or guesses and rumors copypasted.
I'll agree that some might be placeholder and what not, but the leak is real, Nvidia themself admitted it.
No need to argue forever about it thought, I believe most Sony games will come to PC and you don't.
I'll gladly take the "L" if I'm wrong, let's wait and see. :)
 
So which was it? Sony was pissed MS announced this direction first and refused to follow or Sony has been asleep at the wheel for 8 eight years?

Either way it doesn't matter they gave MS a large head start. MS was working to link it's systems and ecosystem since the second year of the Xbox One announcement. MS isn't playing with 8 developers anymore their a third of the industry.

Sony has it's name and brand of gaming it should be a good fight.

Sony doesn't have to follow every single thing Microsoft does, especially if some of those things would negatively impact their brand or revenue streams.

1 year delay for PC would be pretty safe for Sony. They are already fine with that for their timed exclusives.

Well, some of them, anyway. There were some full-on console exclusives that were Day-1 on PC like SFV.

Anyone willing to wait one year just to play on PC is not who Sony wants owning a PS5 in the first place, it's better for them that the unit goes to someone more invested in their ecosystem.

That's an interesting way to look at it.

They won't sit down, while MS is doing day1 games infront of their eyes.
You think Sony would say "Oh, MS is making money from those day1 sales. Oh well, I will wait and hold on to my IPs, and would sell them after 3 years ".

I mean it's a balancing act at the end of the day. They would rather maximize sales on the console where they can maintain 100% of the profit (at least with digital sales), vs. cut into that for sales on a storefront where they pay a 30% tax and where overall sales volumes may not even be enough to offset that change in balance.

Since Microsoft stopped providing console software sales a long time ago there's no way to use their own 1P software performance post-2015 to see the rate of software sales between Xbox & PC Day-1 Parity vs. Xbox-only or PC ports well after Xbox exclusivity. Sony has to get that data themselves and the safest way to test getting that data would be using a live-service GaaS title as Day-1 on both platforms, and a (notably) smaller 1P single-player game Day 1 on PS & PC (say something like a Jak & Daxtar Remastered collection, or a new LBP).

Release those, see how the performances are. If they're satisfactory, they can do more and go from there. If they're disappointing on either end (particularly the 1P single-player game), then scrap those plans.

That is a bad business for them. The longer Sony is able to wait, the more sales MS would generate.

By this logic, Nintendo should be in a desperate fit to bring their games to PC. They're missing out on so many extra sales and they're a business too!

Sea of theives and FH4 are on weekly top 10 steam alot of times. That is alot of sales for MS. Now imagine Day1 sales for MS.

You must mean in terms of sales, because in terms of active players I never see either of them in even Top 25 on the regular.
 

kingfey

Banned
Again. Show me the sales figures for Microsoft games and the breakdown by platform.

Not this sales chart bullshit.

Horizon FW hasn't climbed the sales charts for three months, and what's in it for me?
I do not care. I'm waiting for sales information.

Let Microsoft show the performance of their games.
The number of copies sold.

We literally have two examples, and both are games-services.

Where is Halo? How many people bought a new Halo for company?
Where are the Gears? Less than ten thousand players. Are you not funny?

Success stories.
Sony will release game services on the PC, don't worry.

But, single blockbusters? Forget
MS games are on steam weekly sales. That should be enough indication, how well they sell on steam.

I am not gonna argue with nonsense sales, like break down.

If that metric isn't what you want, then you know nothing about steam.
 
So which was it? Sony was pissed MS announced this direction first and refused to follow or Sony has been asleep at the wheel for 8 eight years?

Either way it doesn't matter they gave MS a large head start. MS was working to link it's systems and ecosystem since the second year of the Xbox One announcement. MS isn't playing with 8 developers anymore their a third of the industry.

Sony has it's name and brand of gaming it should be a good fight.
Do you realise that MS ended up having to start releasing their games on Steam because they just don't seem to be able to get their PC store right or even make it relevant in the PC space?

Same goes for Gamepass being a success on PC. If they just have 25m subscribers split over XBox/PC/xCloud something ain't going exactly right, the bulk of users are probably on Xbox (if they aren't then it's even more worrisome as it would mean they are having a hard time converting even Xbox gamers into the service).

Where exactly is the head start at?
 
Last edited:

Dolodolo

Member
By this logic, Nintendo should be in a desperate fit to bring their games to PC. They're missing out on so many extra sales and they're a business too!
This person literally guesses on the coffee grounds in the second thread about Sony, about the crazy success of Microsoft in the future.

In the future, a meteorite may fall.
There could be a third world war.
What the fuck am I supposed to think about the future?

I think now, and now Sony and Nintendo are the leaders in the console market, and Microsoft is catching up.

All. THE END
 

Dolodolo

Member
MS games are on steam weekly sales. That should be enough indication, how well they sell on steam.

I am not gonna argue with nonsense sales, like break down.

If that metric isn't what you want, then you know nothing about steam.
You're not going to argue about the success story, and you're literally telling me about sales charts without giving a specific number of copies.

And yes, once again.
Your success stories are game-services that Sony will be happy to release on the first day on PC. Nobody argues with this.
 

kingfey

Banned
I mean it's a balancing act at the end of the day. They would rather maximize sales on the console where they can maintain 100% of the profit (at least with digital sales), vs. cut into that for sales on a storefront where they pay a 30% tax and where overall sales volumes may not even be enough to offset that change in balance.
People double dip. You gain 2x sales by putting in on 2 platforms.

Also, PC is extra money for them, on top of console sales. That 30% tax means nothing, when they can gain extra 70% on top of 100% sales on their console.

Game sales do strong, when they sell at $60, compared to $30.


Since Microsoft stopped providing console software sales a long time ago there's no way to use their own 1P software performance post-2015 to see the rate of software sales between Xbox & PC Day-1 Parity vs. Xbox-only or PC ports well after Xbox exclusivity. Sony has to get that data themselves and the safest way to test getting that data would be using a live-service GaaS title as Day-1 on both platforms, and a (notably) smaller 1P single-player game Day 1 on PS & PC (say something like a Jak & Daxtar Remastered collection, or a new LBP).
Xbox one has nothing to do with this era.
Everyone knows that gen is a failure for MS. And they learned their lesson. They have more devs now, which will make alot of games for them.

Last year, they released Fh5, halo infinite, Psychonauts 2, age of empire 4, and flight simulator for console. Aside of flight simulator and Psychonauts 2, every other game will bring extra revenue from Steam.

This is just MS games, without bethesda, and their other studios. Now imagine bethesda +activision+Blizzard +MS studios. That is alot of xbox games, which will drop day1 on steam. And each sales will bring revenue for MS.


Release those, see how the performances are. If they're satisfactory, they can do more and go from there. If they're disappointing on either end (particularly the 1P single-player game), then scrap those plans.
Forza horizon 4 and sea of theives were dominating steam weekly charts. That is how well those titles sell.
Getting steam weekly sales, means you have to bypass all other games. And doing that for alot of weeks, since release means the sales are pretty strong.


By this logic, Nintendo should be in a desperate fit to bring their games to PC. They're missing out on so many extra sales and they're a business too!
Nintendo sold 45m copies of Mario Kart at $60. They don't need to put their games on PC, when they have strong sales like that..

MS and Sony do permenant price cuts, which will lower the revenue those games bring in the long term. Last of us 2 is $40, despite being released in 2020.

Nintendo doesn't do that. So they see more revenue sales from their 1st party.

You must mean in terms of sales, because in terms of active players I never see either of them in even Top 25 on the regular
Active players is for fanboy kids.
Companies care more about sales for platforms like steam.

Active players only matter to MS when its on gamepass. Since that tells them how many gamepass users play their games.

So being top 10 weekly steam sales, means tons of money.
 

kingfey

Banned
You're not going to argue about the success story, and you're literally telling me about sales charts without giving a specific number of copies.

And yes, once again.
Your success stories are game-services that Sony will be happy to release on the first day on PC. Nobody argues with this.
Look here. Copy sales in the long term means nothing.
Games get price cut. That affects long term revenue.
Good revenue happens, when the game has good price sale, and is selling alot.

The first 2 year sales is more important for the company, since it will bring alot of money for the next installment budget.
 
Their main source of revenue are those PS+ subs, digital revenue from PS store and royalties. That's their business. First party sales are only a fraction of their actual gaming business.

We know this because they released the splits themselves.

70.5m units of PlayStation software for the Quarter -
14.5m units of first party games for the Quarter -
Digital Software Ratio 71%
47.4m PS+ Subscribers
106m Monthly Active Users

What's more important? 14 million first party sales in their biggest quarter with HFW and GT7 which they can only replicate once every year, maybe once every two years? Or 47 million users paying $60 every year?

They have 106 million active users on PS platforms. THAT is their moneymaker. A first party game that takes 5 years to come out and then sells an extra 1-2 million on PC is pennies compared to their main business which is making those 106 million users feel prioritized.

Insane reading a first party console manufacturer literally come out and say we are going multiplatform. If they want to go multiplatform, they should go third party.
Exactly. People forget these companies are more than just selling games. Sony knows that if their games were multiplatform they would sell more. I'm sure they figured that out even before releasing their first console, lmao.

It's about what's going to give them the most money as all corporations. Sony is a hardware manufacturer. They will always want to sell consoles.
Consoles are the only place where you can be subscribed to their services. This is their target audience. It's not the 2 million Horizon copies sold on PC where a lot of them were double dipping basically..even Jim Ryan once mentioned how important that crowd is for the pc game releases.

I also imagine these gaas games will be getting some great crowds on PC. I'm almost sure some will be released on PC day one...and that could be their triumph. Not saying a lot of people will buy a PlayStation because Sony will release their online games on PC day one...but it's definitely a market they will explore. It's like I can imagine free skins if you're a ps plus subscriber and stuff like that, not available on PC. It's Sony...they will do this lmao.
 

MiguelItUp

Gold Member
I felt like this was all a given especially when Sony nabbed up the studio that's known to do amazing ports. They're certainly not gonna slow down with PC support.
 
Last edited:

Dolodolo

Member
Look here. Copy sales in the long term means nothing.
Games get price cut. That affects long term revenue.
Good revenue happens, when the game has good price sale, and is selling alot.

The first 2 year sales is more important for the company, since it will bring alot of money for the next installment budget.
Look here

5+ million copies at full price, on console (Payback already)

10-15+ million copies for an average of $25-30 (Return to profit)

Adding the game to your subscription (Additional financial bonuses)

Full price PC release, or $50
2-3 million copies

Look here 2:
Sea of Thieves is a service game with microtransactions played by many friends

Forza Horizon is a service game with microtransactions that many friends play

Secret 3:
Sony will release games-services on the first day on PC.
Microsoft doesn't have any blockbusters that are financially successful on the Steam platform.
Only game-services and the nostalgic Halo Master Chief Collection.


I follow only your logic.
 

Dolodolo

Member
I felt like this was all a given especially when Sony nabbed up the studio that's known to do amazing ports. They're certainly not gonna slow down with PC support.

This is a support studio, not just a ports-pc studio. They just recently had a vacancy for a producer of AAA projects
 

ResurrectedContrarian

Suffers with mild autism
I own a PS5 as my main "current gen" console, but man do I hate Sony's western studios and devs.

I'd be happy to see even more from the team behind FFVII remake, more From Software exclusives like Bloodborne, etc, but I only feel less and less invested in the system the more they build out this extremely poor Western identity.
 

bitbydeath

Member
the stdio helps with PC ports, it doesn't make them alone.

and no, very soon all new Sony games will release soon after the console versions if not on the same day. everything points clearly to that conclusion
So you’re expecting Sony to buy more studios to help port them quicker?
 

OsirisBlack

Banned
Sony doesn't have to follow every single thing Microsoft does, especially if some of those things would negatively impact their brand or revenue streams.



Well, some of them, anyway. There were some full-on console exclusives that were Day-1 on PC like SFV.



That's an interesting way to look at it.



I mean it's a balancing act at the end of the day. They would rather maximize sales on the console where they can maintain 100% of the profit (at least with digital sales), vs. cut into that for sales on a storefront where they pay a 30% tax and where overall sales volumes may not even be enough to offset that change in balance.

Since Microsoft stopped providing console software sales a long time ago there's no way to use their own 1P software performance post-2015 to see the rate of software sales between Xbox & PC Day-1 Parity vs. Xbox-only or PC ports well after Xbox exclusivity. Sony has to get that data themselves and the safest way to test getting that data would be using a live-service GaaS title as Day-1 on both platforms, and a (notably) smaller 1P single-player game Day 1 on PS & PC (say something like a Jak & Daxtar Remastered collection, or a new LBP).

Release those, see how the performances are. If they're satisfactory, they can do more and go from there. If they're disappointing on either end (particularly the 1P single-player game), then scrap those plans.



By this logic, Nintendo should be in a desperate fit to bring their games to PC. They're missing out on so many extra sales and they're a business too!



You must mean in terms of sales, because in terms of active players I never see either of them in even Top 25 on the regular.
Day and Date will definitely happen for SOME games your example is a perfect case. A competitive multi player games as a service game. If anyone and I mean anyone believes Sony is going to kill their own brand by dropping their big exclusive single-player games day and date on pc then you're not being objective or honest with yourself. Look at history SFV and PHG both were, in fact, same-day releases and I also believe the Show was but that was more of a licensing thing. All of the single-player games come out a year or much later. I would expect certain games (Horizon,God of war, Uncharted) to show up a year or two later. There are a few games (I won't mention names) that I would never expect to see.

Having all three consoles I kind of don't really like the whole Intellectual Properties arms race that were seeing right now. No ones really even addressed the elephant in the room. Where does Microsoft and Sony buying all of these developers leave Nintendo?
 
Last edited:

bitbydeath

Member
Well, if they continue at their pace of 3 or 4 PC ports per year I assume they can afford, maybe from time to time calling another porting studio like the one they had for GoW or Iron Galaxy (the one for U4+ULL).
3 or 4 sounds a bit high, they’ve only had 1 so far this year right?
 

kingfey

Banned
Look here

5+ million copies at full price, on console (Payback already)

10-15+ million copies for an average of $25-30 (Return to profit)

Adding the game to your subscription (Additional financial bonuses)

Full price PC release, or $50
2-3 million copies
Add those on day1, and you will get the same sales. Except, you wont lose money due to long term sales. Then wait for 2 platforms to do the sales on the long term. You get more money, than what you listed.

Look here 2:
Sea of Thieves is a service game with microtransactions played by many friends

Forza Horizon is a service game with microtransactions that many friends play
Its a game. Doesnt matter if its MTX, MMo, or whatever genre it is. People buy games to play it. If someone buys these, then they buy it to play it. The buying price is the same as SP game.

Microsoft doesn't have any blockbusters that are financially successful on the Steam platform.
This is just pure fanboism. Please knock off of this senseless talk.
MS literally bought bethesda. They own elder scrolls, doom and all other bethesda games. They are also buying activision and blizzard. This means Call of duty would be MS IP.

If that is not blockbuster sales, then I dont know what you consider a block buster sales.

The entire topic is that Sony would gain aditional money from PC, just like MS is gaining.

1 key benifit for day1 sales, is that it will have long term sale, just like the console version. You will also get people to double dip on those games.
I own hzd and god of war on both steam and PS. I will also buy uncharted series PC version, despite owning the PS version.

That is what Sony will get.

Steam/PC are different platform. They arent on console market. Steam alone has 120m active users. That is healthy amount of users, which will bring alot of money for both MS and Sony.
 

Dolodolo

Member
ts a game. Doesnt matter if its MTX, MMo, or whatever genre it is. People buy games to play it. If someone buys these, then they buy it to play it. The buying price is the same as SP game.
In this world, nothing really matters.
We are all mortal my brother

We literally have a controversy about the release of single blockbusters on PC on the first day, and you cite as an example the success of game-services that Sony will release on PC on the first day anyway.

If you like to believe in something, then please believe.
 

Three

Gold Member
Day and date PC releases? That would be a first right? When have sony ever launched a first party game simultaneously on both platforms? Which game will be the first they do it to?
Not really depending on what it is. They had been doing that for a while with SOE but stupidly sold most of it off during the start of the PS4 gen. Now they're going back into it strangely.
 

Baki

Member
$308M could translate to an additional 1,500 developers (average cost, including overhead being $200K/year). That’s quite a substantial increase in headcount.
 

PhaseJump

Banned
All the analysis in this thread. Can anybody quantify the benefits toward marketing budget cost saving and the ROI from having same day releases, or is that too far down the rabbit hole for biased fucktard console warriors to fathom in their circle jerking?
 
People double dip. You gain 2x sales by putting in on 2 platforms.

Also, PC is extra money for them, on top of console sales. That 30% tax means nothing, when they can gain extra 70% on top of 100% sales on their console.

Game sales do strong, when they sell at $60, compared to $30.

If they put all of their games Day 1 on PC though, they lose the value of double-dipping because some of the players who may've bought it on console at launch and then on PC years later, could just choose the PC version and be done with it. Even if Day 1 on PC could remove certain bonus content and enhancements that late ports afford.

They also would need to be able to guarantee they can sell a significant portion of copies on PC to make up for the loss of potential 3P revenue (and their cut from that revenue) of players who decide to go PC for those Sony 1P games instead of picking up a PlayStation...and there are WAY more 3P games released a year than any number of games Sony (or any platform holder) can release in that same time frame.

So even if a platform holder like Sony gets a majority of their 30% cut from games priced at $30 or $40, if that still equates to 100 million units of 3P software sold that year, they make a lot more versus potentially reducing that 3P revenue and selling say an extra 8 million units combined on PC for 1P Day-1 games. Say that by them doing all 1P, single-player story-driven games Day 1 on PC, Sony lose 10% of their core console market but 30% of division revenue (lost 3P sales, lost subscription revenue, lost DLC & MTX purchases in their ecosystem due to lost sales, etc.).

That would take a typical FY of say $24 billion down to $16.8 billion. Let's say Sony typically generate 1/6th of their division net profit off revenue; that means they're now short $1.2 billion (maybe somewhat less than this in practice, but still over a billion). They get let's say an extra 10 million sales combined all 1P single-player story-driven games Day 1 on PC, and let's just assume those are all at full price. Cool, that's $600 million. Valve gets their 30% cut; now that's $420 million.

$420 million in extra profit from those 1P single-player games Day 1 on PC, vs. $1.2 billion profit lost from adopting that specific strategy. That's almost 66% less profit. Not a good trade whatsoever.

Xbox one has nothing to do with this era.
Everyone knows that gen is a failure for MS. And they learned their lesson. They have more devs now, which will make alot of games for them.

Quantity of games is never really the problem, the question is the quality. And more specifically, as MS are a platform holder, which of those games will rise up and be a leading example for the industry to follow in terms of some or multiple aspects of game design? More sheer amount of games can give you more chances at such quality but in no way guarantee any of them will actually hit that type of quality.

As well, more devs means more overall management and it's not really a matter of talent at question with Xbox, but their management capabilities over their teams. They are still struggling very clearly at demonstrating that management has improved.

Last year, they released Fh5, halo infinite, Psychonauts 2, age of empire 4, and flight simulator for console. Aside of flight simulator and Psychonauts 2, every other game will bring extra revenue from Steam.

Maybe, but that depends on player communities and what portion of them are "whales" or big spenders. All of those games you listed already have much smaller average player communities than the bigger PC live-service GaaS titles, and I doubt they have a higher density of whales compared to those games, either. So needless to say while they probably generate some money it is not as much as the more popular games.

This is just MS games, without bethesda, and their other studios. Now imagine bethesda +activision+Blizzard +MS studios. That is alot of xbox games, which will drop day1 on steam. And each sales will bring revenue for MS.

Yes that's correct, and maybe that approach works for Microsoft. My point is, that approach very likely won't work for Sony without causing some notable decrease in overall console sales and spending in the PS ecosystem. And unlike MS, Sony isn't a $2.5 trillion company that has a gaming division which is only a paltry amount of their total revenue, wherein the other divisions can more than cover any softening of revenue and profits for.

Sony needs console gaming and the full PS ecosystem (which includes console as the root) a lot more than Microsoft needs console gaming and the Xbox ecosystem, and it's been that way for several years now. So I wouldn't expect Sony to more closely mirror MS's approach for any 1P games that aren't easily identifiable as live-service GaaS titles, and even there, they may be a bit selective (i.e in the off-chance they ever did a Parappa live-service game (not saying they will or that I'd even want THAT type of direction for Parappa, but it's an example), it may probably not be Day 1 on PC and just be something for PlayStation).

For the 1P single-player games, especially marquee story-driven content, their approach will more closely mirror Nintendo's, then you might get PC ports much later for some or all of such titles (eventually). They won't really risk Day 1 PC for any of those.

Forza horizon 4 and sea of theives were dominating steam weekly charts. That is how well those titles sell.
Getting steam weekly sales, means you have to bypass all other games. And doing that for alot of weeks, since release means the sales are pretty strong.

Well I'm looking through the Top 10 right now and I don't see FH4 or Sea of Thieves in there for any point in 2022 so far.

Like I said I'm sure the games are doing pretty decent sales on average, but I would in no way say they are dominating Steam sales charts, let alone concurrent players.

Nintendo sold 45m copies of Mario Kart at $60. They don't need to put their games on PC, when they have strong sales like that..

Well even when their games weren't reaching those types of sales they never brought them over to PC. Also not all Nintendo games reach the level of sales Mario Kart does. Metroid Dread definitely hasn't, nor will it, should they consider porting that to PC since there's no chance in hell that game gets to even 25 million let alone 45 million?

MS and Sony do permenant price cuts, which will lower the revenue those games bring in the long term. Last of us 2 is $40, despite being released in 2020.

Most AAA games, including Sony's, do the bulk of their sales on launch day and within the first couple of weeks. That's just how the AAA market tends to work. Only some of Nintendo's games are excused from that type of model, and even some of Sony's have managed to show more evergreen properties these days (such as Miles Morales, which sees big sales spikes whenever PS5s are in stock despite also being available on PS4).

Also even at $40 that is still a lot of revenue Sony is bringing in, whether physical or especially digital.

Active players is for fanboy kids.
Companies care more about sales for platforms like steam.

Well MS are the ones who introduced MAU into the conversation years back, and in terms of solid numbers MAU and such metrics (such as "lookalikes") are the only ones MS present publicly when talking gaming revenue (aside from general revenue figures per sector).

Also their GamePass sub numbers are basically another form of measuring active players, you can't be implying sub numbers are also junk for fanboy kids too, right?

Active players only matter to MS when its on gamepass. Since that tells them how many gamepass users play their games.

Except it doesn't. Or at least, we don't know for certain if it does because Microsoft doesn't provide enough data. It could be millions of cumulative players, but those might not all be 100% unique players, just player instances that log on each day over a period of days, weeks or months.

Basically the way it is on Steam when a lot of companies mention MAU. Then you look at concurrent player counts (something MS does not provide through GamePass) and you get a better picture of how popular a game really is in terms of the core mainline community, when a certain level of players can be maintained over the long-term period.

So being top 10 weekly steam sales, means tons of money.

Except I just mentioned (and checked for 2022 at least so far) that MS games are rarely, if ever, in the Top 10 weekly sales on Steam. They do decent on Steam on average but I suspect any that do pop into Top 10 and aren't brand new releases, manage that through sales discounts or specific events.
 

Midn1ght

Member
We’d probably know by now if there was. That said, 2-3 per year would be more accurate, pending the possibility of delays.
They announced God of War PC less than 3 months before its launch so there's still room for an announcement in the next couple months.

Uncharted hasn’t been dated yet. We may get a date in June. It’s still listed as 2022 though.
No official date indeed but June 20, 2022 was leaked by Epic: The Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection PC release date has leaked
They might have pushed it back of course.

I agree that 3-4 games per year is as high as they'll go with on PC. Depends also if they're willing to release older games as well (Last Guardian, Infamous, Shadow of the Colossus, etc...)
 
Last edited:
Day and Date will definitely happen for SOME games your example is a perfect case. A competitive multi player games as a service game. If anyone and I mean anyone believes Sony is going to kill their own brand by dropping their big exclusive single-player games day and date on pc then you're not being objective or honest with yourself. Look at history SFV and PHG both were, in fact, same-day releases and I also believe the Show was but that was more of a licensing thing. All of the single-player games come out a year or much later. I would expect certain games (Horizon,God of war, Uncharted) to show up a year or two later. There are a few games (I won't mention names) that I would never expect to see.

Having all three consoles I kind of don't really like the whole Intellectual Properties arms race that were seeing right now. No ones really even addressed the elephant in the room. Where does Microsoft and Sony buying all of these developers leave Nintendo?

100% on to something with this point; all these acquisitions DO affect Nintendo, but people want to pretend that Nintendo doesn't rely on 3P software. Even though that's a big reason the Switch has been doing so well: 3P software, particularly from Japanese developers (but also certain Western teams as well).

I don't know when the narrative suddenly changed that 3P doesn't matter for Nintendo when the Wii U primarily failed due to lack of 3P support, despite having a lot of the same 1P games the Switch now has. Kind of feels like a way for some people to excuse dreaming up acquisitions and conveniently ignore the impact on Nintendo out of the conversation, and that kind of feels cheap.
 

bitbydeath

Member
They announced God of War PC less than 3 months before its launch so there's still room for an announcement in the next couple months.


No official date indeed but the date was leaked by Epic: The Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection PC release date has leaked
They might have pushed it back of course.

I agree that 3-4 games per year is as high as they'll go with on PC. Depends also if they're willing to release older games as well (Last Guardian, Infamous, Shadow of the Colossus, etc...)
Thought that was the NVIDIA “leak” for a second there lol.

We’ll have to wait and see but it should be dated by now, unless they’re planning on doing a “it’s out right now!” thing during their next showcase.
 
Last edited:

Relique

Member
Sigh. Someone should tell them they are in the business of selling consoles and console royalties. Releasing your games on other platforms is counterproductive.
This is a really outdated way of thinking. It's pretty clear going by the numbers of consoles sold from PS1 to PS5, going up or down 10-15% from gen to gen, that growth in the console space is limited. Unless find some magical way to hit a very low price point like the PS2 did they aren't seeing those numbers again. Yet these dev costs keep doubling. They've been lucky that everything they put big money behind has sold really well but that could easily change. Look at what happened to Eidos/Crystal dynamics recently after a couple of duds, even though Guardians is an excellent game.

It's becoming more important than ever that each game is very profitable to absorb all this risk. After they've milked every dollar from a game on the PS ecosystem there is nothing wrong with putting it on PC. People who think that those are lost console sales are delusional. The bottom line is that some people who will buy a game will never buy your console for it, they will simply play something else. I have 200 steam friends and I bet you any money that most of them would not buy a PS5 for God of War 2 or Spiderman 2 or whatever even if it was widely available at $300, but they'd pick it up on PC especially if there is a sale. That's just reality.
I just can't see sony releasing their big single player games at launch on PC. Does anyone see sony releasing Spider-Man 2 or Wolverine on PC day and date with PS5? I don't. Maybe I'm wrong though.
I think we're a ways from day and date releases. For a while I think they'll continue to release the backlog of older games. I do see a future where things come out on PC day and date, especially multiplayer games that rely on microtransactions or riskier titles like Returnal that aren't guaranteed megahits. I do believe they will always hold stuff back for PS to keep the ecosystem more attractive, either by keeping things completely exclusive or delaying the PC release by a year+
Honestly Sony is a corporation. They want money.
They won't sit down, while MS is selling their games day1 on PC.
They will also want to get some of those profits.
Pretty much this. They have to mitigate the risk by any means they can. Can't just keep putting all the eggs in one basket. No one knows how the console space will look like in 20 years.
 
Top Bottom