In addition to shutting down Concord developer Firewalk Studios, the Japanese giant has also closed German developer Neon Koi. This lesser known team was originally purchased as Savage Game Studios in 2022, with the intention of making mobile games. It rebranded as Neon Koi late last year.
But the studio is no more, and its game has been cancelled. Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier says around 38 people will lose their jobs, although Sony is trying “to find placement for some of those impacted within our global community of studios where possible”.
PS Studios bigwig Hermen Hulst made the following statement: “While mobile remains a priority growth area for the Studio Business, we are in the very early stage of our mobile efforts. To achieve success in this area we need to concentrate on titles that are in-line with PS Studios’ pedigree and have the potential to reach more players globally.
“With this re-focused approach, Neon Koi will close, and its mobile action game will not be moving forward. I want to express my gratitude to everyone at Neon Koi for their hard work and endless passion to innovate.”
[source sonyinteractive.com]
Comments 41
Never heard of them.
Unfortunate news for kob losses but a wise decision as they were only gonna lose money trying to make mobile games
Whatever they were making, sure wasn't worth the effort of keeping them around.
Another one bites the dust!
The second video game crash claims another victim.
GET........HULST.........OUT!!!!!
#MAKEPLAYSTATIONJAPANESEAGAIN
And yet Japan Studio and Psygnosis went first. It’s crazy, there were a bunch of talented studios over the years that Sony killed and yet they had studios who hadn’t even released a game.
"I want to express my gratitude to everyone at Neon Koi for their hard work and endless passion to innovate.”
I would have agreed on that if we actually had the chance to see their hard work come true. Either way, wish them the best on their careers.
Herman has been a complete disaster, they need to replace him.
Removed - inappropriate; user is banned
everything_on_fire_this_is_fine.jpg 😋
@LifeGirl It does feel like a slow crash sometimes, self-inflicted at that. 🤷♂️
Don't think the studio and its ideas are completely dead. It's probably a future strategy to do mobile/handheld gaming and the staff will likely be moved to other areas. Otherwise it be a waste of money
Herman's doing a lot of thanking and showing a lot of gratitude to a lot of people today. Just not enough gratitude to, y'know, keep them employed.
Also, side note: referring to Sony as "the Japanese giant" makes me cringe every time. It sounds like an 80s wrestler. IT'S THE JAPANESE GIANT WITH A STEEL CHAIR!!!
Another failure and wasted money from Hermen 🙄
No way Sony CEO and shareholders gonna closed their eyes with Hermen failures.
Six studios have closed under him. Not the best look while also chasing trends.
Damn. And I thought Microsoft was bad about closing their studios. Sony is just pretty crazy lately.
Guy closed 2 studies in 1 day that he purchased all the way back in … last year and the year before that.
Is he getting paid by the pink slip? Probably, it’s the way this broken world works, the only thing that matters is the stock price. 🤑
Sony and Microsoft have ceased the console wars to move to a new kind of war...
How much studios can they buy up and shut down? The amount may shock you!
Sony is run by a bunch of idiots.
This is what happens when you losing billions to concord and all the pressure is on Bungie, cause if Marathon flops there will be more jobs lost. Sony will be stuck making single player games that simply can’t pay themselves back to meaningful profit.
Who thinks Marathon should be a PS5 exclusive? Asking for a friend! HAHA
I don't understand how Sony can fail this badly at mobile attempts. They've been trying at this for over 10 years and have yet to show anything decent on mobile.
@CielloArc we can't know that especially since the people in charge thought concord was worth it
@SheerDisappointment I was more referring to Studio Liverpool, I always forget what their name was after Psygnosis got renamed. Manchester and London Studios getting shut down was horrible too, Manchester were VR only but as we see, they could do with a few solid games on that front. London Studio were a killer, you always knew that given a meaty project they’d make the most of it given what they did with The Getaway, just got pushed into Singstar and VR over the years.
Sony closing two studios in a single day.....so sad for those people to find themselves unemployed right before the holidays.....
@SheerDisappointment I think so yeah, I really wish I was around when Home was big but I went from an uncle’s hand-me-down PS2 in about 2007 to my dad’s PS3 when I saw him every couple weeks so that wasn’t enough time to really play something like PS Home. I spent way more time with the Wii back then while trying to catch up with PS2 games thanks to the incredibly cheap discs you’d get after the PS3 launched. From everything I’ve seen about PS Home, it’s remarkably close to the sort of Fortnite and Roblox servers you get where people just hang out.
I rather like their logo. A shame they never had a chance to get it properly established
Hermen loves his talkative baby Aloy so much.
So, more Horizon?
First time I've actually heard of this studio
if the higher ups in sony know whats best for playstation (their only consistent breadwinner) theyll kick herman hulst out
Sony seem all over the place with their studios at the moment.
I’m not confident in Hulsts leadership or strategy right now.
@Keyblade-Dan also
#MakePlayStationGreatAgain
Yet another studio to add to the Sony kill list. They're getting as bad as EA or Microsoft.
Bring back Shuhei and Layden. 😑
@rjejr At this rate every Sony studio will be shutdown soon. 🤦
Mircosoft and Sony are really heading this way with closures. Didn't surprise me with the new pricing structure of games, it was bound to happen eventually. I buy less new release games now and wait for sales, whereas previously I jumped on board day 1. I imagine there are a lot of gamers in the same situation. That's what happens when games are an additional $20+ on day one, plus consoles are a lot more than what the PS4 and XBox One was. Plus the economy downturn and inflation plays a massive role in all this too, where consumers are spending less.
Pure speculation on my part but I wonder if Neon Koi were working on a mobile version of Concord. Sony, or Hulst at least seemed to think the game was the second coming of the Lord so it wouldn't be a shock if there was a mobile port in the works.
@Major_Player It's significantly less employees than Activision Blizzard, Tango and Arkane 😂😂😂
@ted1317: Interesting Fact:
Sony has closed 4 studios in the last 12 months while Xbox has closed 2 in 8 years....equalling more game developers fired at Sony than at Xbox.
Next time you might want to get your facts straight before you comment and embarrass yourself again and again.
Playstation under Hulst has taken a nosedive.
@Major_Player If you go by employees in their respective gaming divisions, Microsoft have made more than double Sonys redundancies this year alone.
@WiiWareWave Sony could be the first company to go full 4th party, all hardware, no software.
Come to think of it... 😝
That means I can repurpose their logo, right?? 🤔 Don't mind if I do. Did they have a website? It's finders keepers season.
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