Sony would usually make a song and dance about adding a new developer to its roster of teams at PlayStation Studios, but today we turn to an external podcast from Jeff Gerstmann. To be fair, it sounds like Dark Outlaw Games, as it's been named, is very early in the production of a new title, but we now have confirmation that Jason Blundell has been drafted in from the now-defunct Deviation Games to head up a new internal team.
When asked what he's up to nowadays at the end of the podcast (timestamped above), Blundell said: "I've had the amazing opportunity to create a new studio within PlayStation Studios for Sony. The studio is called Dark Outlaws Games." He continues to explain the team has been "working away in the shadows for a while" and "when we have something to talk about", it'll be revealed.
Blundell confirms Dark Outlaw Games is a "new first-party studio" and not an external developer that Sony has chosen to partner with, like we've seen in the past with PS5 titles such as Stellar Blade and Rise of the Ronin. The developer is currently hiring but has been going for a little while now.
As the lead of Dark Outlaw Games, Jason Blundell is best known for his work on the Call of Duty: Black Ops games, especially the Zombies modes. He first began working with Sony as part of Deviation Games, which the platform holder announced a partnership with to create a new IP with all the way back in 2021. This never materialised, but Blundell has continued to work with PlayStation, now fully in-house.
[source youtu.be]
Comments 30
Y not wait to announce this when there's an actual product to show off
I forgot about Jeff Gerstmann. I just assumed he rode off into the sunset.
This will 1000000% be a live service, but Blundell's presence intrigues me. Hopefully, this will actually be a live service that stands out in a unique way and not more generic pig slop.
@RBMango - Hard to know that for sure. His project at Deviation was a third person shooter with a huge focus on coop.
So that's two new studios for Sony built from the ground up, I'm interested to see what they are working on and I'd wager they are single player games this time round.
They probably wanna avoid that in case they close the studio before it even gets any games out there.
About time they announced this studio! I'm personally hoping for an FPS or tactical shooter, a la CoD or Siege. Maybe a SOCOM reboot?
@Drago201 Because it's a well known 'secret' many have known for almost a year, after a few employees put it on their LinkedIn, and he was on a podcast and asked what he was doing.
Can’t wait to see what they’ve been working on! Since there’s no sign of a Killzone sequel, Sony needs another homegrown FPS in their current roster of games
Can’t wait to comment on the article about that studio getting shut down after their failed liver service game flops.
They'll build a studio anywhere except Japan won't they? 😅
Good to hear Sony are investing in their studios still…
Fingers crossed for Sonys amazing single player games please.
If they get shuttered before anything’s announced does that mean they never really existed?
@Contimaloris I enjoy his podcast. It's effectively "old man yells at cloud about video games for three hours" every week. Once in a while, he does an interview like this.
@UltimateOtaku91 It will be a PS6 game, so it's 3 or more years away.
@Pandalulz I used to love Jeff. Back when he was at Gamespot and then Giant Bomb. But I just grew away from them after awhile. Now I get my podcast fix from Sacred Symbols. It would be awesome if Colin had Jeff on or vice versa.
@Contimaloris It's funny, because I sort of did it backwards. I appreciated how ahead of its time GiantBomb was with their focus on video, but I am an old, I don't want to watch things. So when he entered his cranky old man talking to himself phase, I was like, "now... now I can relate."
I guess I should try Sacred Symbols again. I've listened to it multiple times over the years and something about Colin's attitude always ends up turning me off after a while.
Make your bets, will this be closed before or after they release a game?
What, is a podcast the new psblog... whoah
@Keyblade-Dan Build where the type of game you’re trying to develop make sense, I guess?
The name is so edgy, it sounds like the studio will only make emo games.
They could have brought the deviation game inhouse, or this could also be project ooze.
I only played Blops 1, 3, and 5. But if this new studio can create a game that has Blops 1 quality, which i think the best game in Blops series, then i think they will do well. So good luck to Dark Outlaw Games.
@Keyblade-Dan For Japan, right now i think Sony wants to avoid another Japan Studio. So their focus is to support whatever Team Asobi and Polyphony do. But who knows in the future.
Outside that, it seems Sony prefer to do colabs with 3rd party like Kojima, Konami, From Soft, Capcom etc which currently i think the best way to spend money towards Japanese devs because they already provided PS with popular and good quality games.
@Americansamurai1 I wouldn't be surprised if internal politics were involved in Deviation been shut down. I remember it was Jason Blundell and Mark Rubin leading the studio then awhile later Mark left, then gradually the project was cancelled. And yet a decent amount of the staff seemed to have moved into Sony anyway.
@AdamNovice yeah didn't something come out about deviation having bad work culture or something and that they were wasting money without showing any progress or something?
I like the name, be nice to see in time what they have planned. Maybe this game won’t get cancelled. One can hope.
@OldGamer999 that's what we all want and not live service Garbage
@Pandalulz Sacred Symbols is certainly an acquired taste. But take it from me I was all in on many many gaming podcasts and Sacred Symbols is one of the best. Back in the late 2000's I listened to Gamespots On The Spot, many different 1up podcasts, and of course the Giant Bombcast. I've been a patron of Last Stand since it started and I love all of their podcasts. 5 dollars a month is a steal for how much you get. And damn some of the interviews Colin gets are crazy. He's had Ken Levine on twice and did 2 hours with Shuhei Yoshida.
After concord I didn't care about any new sony studio, just put out your games and let gamers decide whether your games/studio is worth it or not.
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