PlayStation, Bungie Still Going Ahead with Internal Live Service Team

Could be a Concord 2 announcement soon 🤔

This f***ing live service push will end up wasting the entire generation, so much time and money poured down the drain…

Regardless of thoughts on live service. This does make good business sense.

It's worked out so well for them so far.

Helldivers 2 wasn't really all that successful though. Great launch, no doubt about that, but it has lost 90% of its peak player numbers.

@LifeGirl it was most certainly successful. The initial sales alone made it a huge a success.

@LifeGirl Concurrent players only means those that are playing at the same time. Many will have moved from being daily active users to weekly or monthly active users. The playerbase is still very healthy and engaged. The game did better than Sony's or Arrowhead's wildest expectations.

The writing’s been on the wall for a while now. I just don’t know why they’re doubling down when it’s a free PR win to put out waffle about going back to their roots.

@IOI
Totally agree, it has spoilt the PS5 generation games wise, especially big AAA campaign type games.

@Waa-Laa Concord Folie a Deux?

Why make new games when you can just throw out attempts to be the next fortnite and see if one sticks?

@naruball If they wanted initial sales they'd have made a single player game. They want that 10-20 year revenue pumping cash factory, that's the purpose of making these games. Not flash in the pan one year wonders. Helldiver's succeeded in the way a single player game succeeds. As far as the suits that push this initiative are concerned that's still failure.

And lets not forget Destruction Allstars too - another Live service 'flop' this generation from Sony. As for the cancellation of Factions, I do wonder whether it would have succeeded without a strong 'Single Player' game - after all, both Uncharted and Last of Us MP's were originally sold with arguably the 'best' Single-player games.

Stripping out that Single Player mode (or selling the MP separately if you want to look at it that way) cuts out a LOT of the Fanbase that would buy the game just for the Single Player and I don't know that those 'MP' modes would sell well enough on their own.

I think it could work if they went back to delivering MP modes along with the campaign or maybe go the Free to Play route if MP/Live service only. Their 'successful' games also generally have a solid Single Player offering too

@nessisonett I think the problem is - they know where the money is going (in terms of actual profit vs investment). Once the ROI starts getting too low on single player one-and-done games, investors (and hence Sony) will quickly find other opportunities. It never used to be that way, but Sony has changed a lot in the last 5 years.

I think there's a real reason why XB is moving to 3rd Party publishing... because the money isn't there in the tradtional gaming space (or it's getting too risky... which is why we're getting sequel-itis / remaster-bation). The exception is live service - where if you look at the big wins for MS, it's largely in the multi-platform GaaS category (outside of GP), where they're printing money.

Edit- I thought I could claim authorship of the term remaster-bation; but unfortunately the band Suckerpie beat me to it. The hyphen is all mine however.

These f***ers just don't learn do they? DO YOU WANT KILL PLAYSTATION!!?? BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE DOING HERMAN!!!!

Another day, and more money thrown into the pit that is live service. Wonder what happens when marathon doesnt hit

@Medic_alert something like a steam deck seems like the way to go for the next generation. If Sony don't have competition they'll get greedier.

And if most sales are taking place digitally, and the PS6 doesn't ship with a mandatory disc drive, you're entirely in Sony's hands when it comes to game prices and game preservation.

PCs these days get more games, they get indie games much earlier, they've got mods, and they've got multiple store fronts. With Steam decks they even play well on a TV with a controller now.

If Sony are serious about the live service push they need to stop bringing Bungie into the discussion. Bungie live service model is the worst in the business so as soon as Sony mentions Bungie they lose all credibility in my eyes.

@LifeGirl I tried Helldivers 2 due to all the hype and all the articles played maybe 2 or 3 hours and dropped off it. I can't put my finge ron why though, I guess it just didn't click with me as much as with other people

@Medic_alert Grab a cheap mini pc, hook it up to the big tv and relish in the golden era recently been playing Pure, Split/Second and Scud Race and having a blast, im done with gacha,dlc,roadmaps,season passes,pre order bonus content,subscriptions etc etc.

@LifeGirl how can something that has over 20 million sales not be successful? Player count doesn't change that

Because PlayStation's live service initiative disrupting their pipeline, costing them billions of wasted dollars, and putting a stink on their image hasn't been bad enough this gen...

@themightyant
I know they aren't all bad and yeah the two examples you mentioned are great too. The funny thing though is that those two have been dabbling in the live service business before Bungie came around.

With Helldivers it feels like they were caught off-guard with how successful it was. Then they canceled TLOU Online after years of development. Then Concord...

It just seems like all Bungie has brought to the table for them is more problems, not less... which isn't good considering Bungie are supposed to be the "experts" in this field.

One or two live service games once in a blue moon? Sure.

But don't repeat the mistakes like ol Jimbo again where he greenlight 20+ live service project and even forced 1st party studios like ND, Insomniac, etc to do live service when it's clear their specialty is single player games.

Concord should be Sony reminder to not put a lot of eggs in live service basket.

And i hope Totoki and Nishino put a leash on Hermen neck because that guy also one the biggest reason why we got catastrophical failure like Concord.

shame last of us factions 2 was cancelled i dont like live service games but even i was looking forward to that

I think having a concise team in charge of helping the developers/teams that are making live service games makes total sense. I don't see the anger towards Sony trying to make sure another Concord doesn't happen.

Sony making a few live service games isn't a bad thing. I'm sure after Concord they are actually going to look at the games they have in the pipeline(Fairgames, Marathon, Horizon Monster Hunter game) and make sure they actually are in a good shape.

Them having a legit structure to help those teams and watch over them doesn't mean they'll make more, which some people seem to be thinking. I'm sure the other Heads at Playstation are going to make sure Herman doesn't make another mistake like Concord.

Sony has to get a live service initiative off the ground. The landscape currently demands it. As much as it doesn’t appeal to me, there insistence on pouring resources into this sector is completely warranted.

@Shepherd_Tallon The thing is, these people will be let go if these games fail.

This is going to sound mean but I don't want Bungie interacting with the other studios at all quite frankly when it comes to live service. Keep the disease contained.

@PuppetMaster Leash? I hope they kick him to the curb he's practically destroyed this brand in a single console gen he needs to go

I hope they all crash and burn just like Concord.

Excellent comic legs, Doh'ny.

Even if I were contracted to write satire on Doh'ny pictures I would not have come up with the "SIE Live Service Centre of Excellence".

Inaugural members includes
Sackboii: A big adventure (the always offline version)
Concordia (only for real accordians)
Fairgame$ (games as a charity)
Factions II (in a non-playable state)
Destiny II (the destiny II killer)
Robot Boy (next dlc is ps6-based, coming sooner than you think)
Major League Baseball (available only on GP Ultimate tier)
Gran Turismo 7 (Requires VR2 headset)

@get2sammyb
Nausea or frustration? Really the latter.

But yeah, I totally understand if you're happy about the decisions Sony has been making it might hurt to read how others are distraught by what is and what could have been, and what will come and what would've come. Don't take it personally.

@Keyblade-Dan I wish they fired him too. But they probably gonna give him one more chance while searching for a good replacement.

Funny how Sony always wanted a "Halo Killer" and now that they actually have the original studio they refuse to make one, just as well as they refuse to make a new Killzone or Resistance.
Main thing they cry like babies about CoD on Xbox.

Love to see it! i need more multiplayers to play

"Let's leverage the ruined carcass of destiny 2 into another "live" game that we can quickly run into the ground to satisfy shareholder greed."

Got it.

@NEStalgia yes, ideally a company may want their game to sell 100m copies. But that doesn't happen, now does it? The fact that Helldivers sold so much makes it a huge success no matter how you cut it.

Had it not been a multiplayer game, it wouldn't have sold as much as it did, hence why it outperformed every single first party game ever released.

@naruball But "selling a lot of copies" is still considered a failure on the business angle of live service. The long term perpetual sales of the game is the measure of success in live service. If HD2 sputtered out after a moment in the sun, the business perspective would still be that it didn't work. I'm not denying it was successful, for a time or that it sold well for a time, but I'm saying as a live-service business initiative if that staying power didn't last, it's not going to be seen as a successful initiative.

@NEStalgia I fully understand what you mean. But it still doesn't matter, imho. At the end of the day Sony first and foremost wants their games to make a profit. And that's exactly what this game managed to do. So, it was somewhat of a failure as a live service game, but overall a huge success.

@naruball yeah, see that's the thing, and the main problem with the industry today. They don't want their games to "make a profit". Studios that "make a profit" get closed weekly. They want their games to "meet expectations and projections", and the goal of any game in the live service initiative is that perpetual revenue/sales curve. Especially in live service because the ongoing costs of servers and content need to be justified by continuous revenue, in hd2s case, continued sales. The initial boom for the game looked great, but while it's still populated, I've no doubt corporate is shaking their heads with disapproval that their service didn't cut the mustard for the long term success goals. obviously it's not a failure in the Concord sense, but it's still another failed attempt on the live service success dart board.

Yeah the game is a success by traditional metrics, but the goal posts for the live service titles aren't in the same places.