The Scoop on PlayStation
E76: PlayStation announced a variety of new and exciting projects.
Good morning gamers! Last week was a very busy week for Sony and the PlayStation brand. The company held their annual investor briefing, hosted a Q&A with Jim Ryan and announced a new State of Play. Lot’s of very exciting details were discussed so here’s what you might have missed.
A State of Play is being held on June 2nd as part of the Summer Game Fest lineup. The event will focus on reveals from third-party partners, plus a sneak peak at several games in development for PlayStation VR2.
PlayStation Productions plans to expand their iconic PlayStation IPs into more movies and TV shows. Sony Pictures CEO Tony Vinciquerra announced during the briefing that alongside the The Last of Us (HBO) and Twisted Metal (Peacock) TV shows that are currently in development, they’re also working on TV adaptations for the Horizon Series (Netflix), God of War (Amazon Prime Video) and Gran Turismo (no streaming partner announced yet). According to Deadline, Sony is trying to onboard Neill Blomkamp, the director of District 9, to direct the Gran Turismo series.
PlayStation PC has been seeing impressive success with Horizon Zero Dawn selling 2.4m units, Days Gone selling 850k units and God of War selling 971k units. The Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection is still primed to release on PC in 2022 and the PS5 exclusive Returnal has been found on the Steam database suggesting that it will be the next major PlayStation game making the leap to PC. Jim Ryan estimates that more than half of PlayStation’s major IPs will be on PC and Mobile by 2025.
PlayStation Studios plans to evenly allocate their investment budget 50/50 between new IPs and existing IPs by 2025. Jim Ryan also confirmed that more acquisitions are coming and that PlayStation has two unannounced live-service games being released this year. Their plan is to grow inorganically by capturing more of the overall market share through strategic M&As and by expanding more aggressively across PC and Mobile.
CD Projekt - Q1 Results
CD Projekt shared their financial results for Q1 2022. The financial results indicated that revenue is up 9% year-over-year and that operating costs are down 10% year-over-year. The net profit for CD Projekt Group doubled from Q1 2021, which was mainly attributed to the launch of Cyberpunk 2077 on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.
The Witcher’s next game has entered the pre-production phase. According to Piotr Nielubowicz, the Chief Financial Officer, “We have recently wrapped up the research phase, which means the project has now progressed to pre-production and we’ve begun to capitalize development expenses related to this new game”. The Witcher team includes over 100 developers with a focus on Unreal Engine 5.
Cyberpunk 2077 first story expansion details have leaked online. According to Nihas on Reddit, a data miner found the details added into the game files during a recent game patch. The expansion will feature seven new main missions, new locations, new side quests and more.
Esports Corner
🥇 Congratulations to Royal Never Give Up for winning the 2022 Mid-Season Invitational.
The Panda Cup has been announced and it is Nintendo’s first officially licensed North American Super Smash Bros Ultimate and Melee circuit. The circuit will include multiple events throughout the year and will conclude with the $100,000 Panda Cup Finale in December. 32 players will get the opportunity to qualify for the finals based on their performance from the various circuit events and online qualifiers.
The International 10 has been awarded a Sports Emmy for “Outstanding Esports Championship Coverage”. The Valve event beat out many heavy hitters from the esports industry such as League of Legends Worlds (Riot Games), the Overwatch League Grand Finals 2021 (Blizzard) and the WePlay AniMajor. The International 10 was won by Team Spirit who took home a record-setting $18 million prize. Their Grand Finals match against PSG attracted more than 2.7 million global viewers.
The PGL Major Antwerp was a huge success becoming one of the largest esports events ever. The CS:GO Major accumulated more than 68 million watch hours, peaked at 2.1 million viewers and more than 20,000 people attended the grand finals to watch FaZe Clan defeat Navi. Additionally, ESL has announced the IEM Rio Major will take place in October 2022. As Brazil’s first ever CS:GO Major, the event sold out within an hour of the tickets going on sale.
Gaming Roundup
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II has officially revealed their key art. The full Warzone 2 map, including POIs has also been leaked online.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor was announced during the Star Wars Celebration, coming in 2023. It is set five years after Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.
Obi-Wan Kenobi is available as a skin in Fortnite alongside his items. The Fortnite release coincides with the new Obi-Wan Kenobi series on Disney+.
Dead Space creator Glen Schofield’s sci-fi horror The Callisto Protocol will no longer be set in the PUBG Universe and will have its own “story and world”.
Gotham Knights creative director Patrick Redding took to Discord to address the backlash over the characters biographies and abilities.
The Quarry is set to be released in two weeks but the online multiplayer will only be added via an update on July 8th.
Daybreak Games has canceled their Marvel MMO Project to focus and invest in multiple other projects including DC Universe Online.
Madden NFL 23 will reportedly release in August and it will feature AI improvements and new features in franchise mode.
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