Sony’s London Studio has often worked on accessory-based games for PlayStation systems, and its recent efforts have been on PlayStation VR. Now, it appears the studio is gearing up for a PS5 project that’s going to have online play, but it’s not clear if it will be a VR game.
A listing on the studio’s site says it needs an online gameplay designer who will work on a PS5 project. The listing specifically mentions online multiplayer, as well as working with narrative and mission leads, so there will apparently be some sort of story content that could work alongside the multiplayer. The specifics on what kind of game it is are otherwise pretty much nonexistent, however.
We do know that London Studio is working on making VR content work for PS5, at least as far as past games go. A patch released shortly after the PS5’s launch added improvements to Blood & Truth, which originally launched for PS4’s PSVR. It added higher frame rates and resolutions as well as better textures while still using the original headset and an adapter on the new console.
We do know a PS5-exclusive version of PlayStation VR is coming, as Sony has revealed some details on its controllers and single-wire design already. Presumably, investing in hardware like that would mean Sony also wants its own development teams making games for it, and London Studio is the plausible choice for the job, but it could also surprise us.
Prior to its work on toy-based and VR games like EyeToy and SingStar, the studio created the Guy Ritchie-style crime game The Getaway: Black Monday. A traditional, controller-based video game, it didn’t receive great reviews, but Blood & Truth shows London Studio still has a knack for crime stories.
Warning: Full spoilers follow for Godzilla vs. Kong.
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Godzilla vs. Kong is now in theatres, and on HBO Max, and given that it’s smashing pandemic box office records, it appears that audiences around the world have been eagerly anticipating this long-awaited rematch. In the lead-up to the film, the marketing campaign encouraged people on social media to declare who they were rooting for in the big showdown. Were you Team Godzilla, or Team Kong? Of course, that was the big question going into the film. Which of these Alpha Titans would emerge the definitive victor? But now that the film is out, it seems to be concerned with something else entirely. Godzilla vs. Kong is the first MonsterVerse movie where one of the monsters is the actual main character — the hero. It just so happens to also be the monster who loses the fight.
By any metric of runtime or structure, Godzilla vs. Kong is a Kong movie through and through. He’s the first character we see after the opening logos, and the last one we see right before the end credits. He’s featured across the whole film’s narrative, while Godzilla seems to pop in about once every 20 minutes or so. Kong has a supporting cast of humans who actually interact with him and matter to his journey, while the characters loosely affiliated with Godzilla are kept at a distance from him. Taken without any outside expectations regarding franchise crossovers or the history of these monsters, the film as presented clearly positions Kong in the role of protagonist and Godzilla in the role of antagonist.
Despite this, the film also acknowledges that the matchup between these two monsters is not on equal terms. The first battle is in the water, definitively Godzilla’s domain, and Kong is left completely winded after a fight where he required the military’s help with depth charges to survive Godzilla’s assault. The second battle in Hong Kong has Kong put up more of a fight, but not only does he have to use the dorsal fin axe he found in the Hollow Earth to stay in the game, but he spends a lot of the battle on the defensive, fleeing from Godzilla’s atomic heat beam. Across the film, Kong is the underdog, but unlike many movies like this, he doesn’t triumph against his rival. Godzilla beats Kong to near death, and leaves him unable to pick himself up (before getting some help from his human pals). If Kong is our hero, why does he lose? Because defeating Godzilla was never his endpoint.
When we first encounter Kong on Skull Island, he’s fast asleep. It’s an appropriate visual to introduce him to us. Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) may talk about Kong as a rival Alpha to Godzilla, but that doesn’t really mesh with Kong’s portrayal here. He’s a complacent ruler, lazily going about his days, and although he does throw trees at his prison walls, he doesn’t seem to be attempting to escape with any real urgency. Kong is a king without a purpose, his only relationship being with Jia (Kaylee Hottle), a deaf girl and the last of the Iwi natives who shared the island with him. He may be a friendly protector to Jia, but unlike Godzilla, who pursues his goals in this film with ruthless abandon, Kong starts off without much motivation beyond being reactive.
This changes when Kong arrives in Antarctica and learns that more of his kind may be in the Hollow Earth. We know from his solo film that Kong was the last of his species on Skull Island back during his adolescence, and the potential to uncover his origins is apparently a call he cannot resist, even more so than his burgeoning rivalry with Godzilla. Consider his encounter with the anti-gravity well and the floating rocks, where he sees a statue of a giant hand pointing out to him, and he takes a leap of faith towards it. He may not find any other Kongs in the Hollow Earth, but he does discover the history of his species and his place within the wider world. Kong craves a real home, a connection to his past, in a manner more human than any other Titan in the MonsterVerse.
Even then, Kong still believes he can challenge Godzilla for his role as Alpha Titan, in a battle he was never going to win. In fact, Kong losing the title fight is of prime importance to understanding why Kong is the hero of the film. After all, Godzilla may be an antagonist to Kong, but he isn’t the villain. If anything, Godzilla in this franchise is above our conception of morality, acting as a protector of the Earth, yet also steadfast in maintaining his dominance above all other living beings. He only attacks when something threatens the hierarchy of nature. Like the human characters in Godzilla: King of the Monsters who had to accept their place in the natural order and work alongside Godzilla to save the planet, Kong needed to be humbled for his subsequent alliance with Godzilla to have meaning.
That alliance comes in the form of the two Titans taking on MechaGodzilla, a synthetic monstrosity built by the corporation Apex that represents the last gasp of the outdated philosophy of mankind’s attempted dominion over nature. Naturally, it backfires, resulting in the deaths of all the Apex characters and a remnant of Ghidorah’s consciousness taking over the mecha. It’s important to note that when MechaGodzilla starts battling Godzilla, Kong is under no obligation to intervene. He’s far enough from the fight that he could flee, and leave Godzilla to his fate. Yet a plea from Jia, a human child who could easily be far beneath Kong’s notice if he so chose, convinces him to join the fight. Kong’s arc concludes by aligning himself with humanity, accepting the very same humility that we once did, and he is rewarded not just with a new home in the Hollow Earth, but a new purpose as an ally to the Titan he once considered his enemy.
Kong, hero.
He may not end the film as the new Alpha, but Kong proves while holding up MechaGodzilla’s severed head that even if you aren’t the most powerful force in the world, you can still have victories all the same.
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Carlos Morales writes novels, articles and Mass Effect essays. You can follow his fixations on Twitter.
Sony’s consistent output of critical and commercial smash hits is undoubtedly a key factor in PlayStation’s rise from the ashes after the troubled launch of the PlayStation 3. By doubling down on beloved franchises like Uncharted, a revived God of War, and more recent hits like Marvel’s Spider-Man and Ghost of Tsushima, Sony’s stable of first-party studios has become synonymous with chart-topping, award-winning games.
But a new report from Bloomberg suggests that Sony’s upper management primary focus on blockbuster games that are ‘too big to fail’ comes at the expense of riskier, more inventive projects. If the picture painted is an accurate one, Sony may be losing a key facet of its identity that’s not only been a hallmark of the company since its earliest days, but is also directly responsible for some of PlayStation’s biggest hits over time.
Jason Schreier’s report covers a handful of allegedly canned or altered projects among Sony’s suite of first party studios, like a The Last of Us remake that changed hands several times, a Days Gone sequel that will never see the light of day, and more. It’s certainly fascinating to learn about the projects that have and haven’t materialized from a company that’s been notoriously quiet in recent years, but the report points towards a company and leadership ethos that leaves little room for a bedrock of gaming, experimentation.
The most damning example comes from what we learned about the development studio properly spinning up to be its own team within the Visual Arts Service Group, a Sony team that pinch-hit and assisted other Sony studios cross the finish line with their games. Rumors have abounded for years that they would be continuing the Uncharted franchise, but Schreier’s report states the team was allegedly working on a Last of Us remake that never got the support it needed there, and has since been moved to Naughty Dog. While the lack of support is troubling enough, The Last of Us – a benchmark of excellence at Sony – isn’t a game that screams the need for a remake eight years on, and in the wake of a perfectly good remaster.
A quality-over-quantity approach isn’t inherently a bad thing, of course, and Sony’s output of successful first-party releases this past generation is a big reason why people buy PlayStations. But as the Horizon Zero Dawns and the God of Wars became the focal point of PlayStation’s first-party stable, there was less and less to keep players entertained in between. That led to the odd showings in the later years of the PS4, where Sony trotted out the same group of exclusives for years at PSX, State of Play, and E3 showcases.
While almost every new Sony first-party launch has been coupled with a record-breakingsalesheadline, and later end-of-year accolades from around the industry, the report suggests that the quality bar came at the expense of games and potential franchises that weren’t hits right out of the gate. While Days Gone didn’t necessarily review as favorably as other Sony first-party games, it amassed a dedicated fanbase and was reportedly profitable. Developer Bend Studio has shown its dedication to the game, with consistent patches and post-launch support to improve the tech issues critics noted. But even despite all that, the years of marketing pushes it got, and all the work Bend did to create its Freaker horde tech and establish this world, Bloomberg reports a Days Gone 2 was not “seen as a viable option.”
In the case of Days Gone, it’s a particular shame because there was clearly a gem of an idea buried underneath its issues. Bend’s reverence for motorcycle movement made the vehicle a joy to ride, its Freaker hordes are both frightening and thrilling to tackle, and Sam Witwer delivered a strong performance as Deacon St. John. Game franchises can come back from shaky starts, especially when there’s a solid foundation. Just look at Assassin’s Creed, which debuted to middling reviews but found its footing with the fantastic Assassin’s Creed II. And even within the halls of Sony you can find sequels that drastically improved upon the first. Uncharted 1 was well received at launch, but Uncharted 2 crystallized what the series could accomplish on a spectacle and design scale in a way the first just couldn’t. Sequels are meant to be improvements, and it’s a shame Days Gone may never get to be proof of that.
The decision was reportedly enough to cause team members to leave while Bend was assigned to help Naughty Dog on both a multiplayer game and a new Uncharted, which led to fears “they might be absorbed into Naughty Dog, and the studio’s leadership asked to be taken off the Uncharted project.“
(The merits and timeliness of a Last of Us remake are another debate entirely, but it’s of course worth noting that a more modernized version of one of Sony’s most beloved games hardly counts as much of a risk as a brand new franchise would. More so, the alleged lack of funds or trust in the SVAG team feels emblematic of the larger problem – why should Sony bet on a new team, even if it’s working on a known property, when they can simply put it in the hands of one of their most successful teams? And sure, that might, on paper or in a boardroom, make sense, but then how does that new team find a chance to succeed?)
And if a project that, from the outside, seemed as sure a thing as a Days Gone sequel can’t move forward, how much room is there for new ideas, and risks that can lead to the next The Last of Us or God of War? Of course, these games were risks themselves! It’s almost a folly to think any one publisher can produce only hit after hit without some stumbles along the way, or experiments that, even if they don’t work on first blush, may lead to greater success down the road. It’s worrying to read about a laser focus on these big projects alongside something like first party studio Media Molecule’s Dreams, a creation-suite that, as Bloomberg notes, never quite got the marketing it deserved. Its dedicated audience is certainly there, but in an era where creation platforms like Minecraft, Roblox, and more become some of the biggest games in the world, it’s disheartening that Sony didn’t try to push Dreams into that stratosphere.
The Sony Japan Studio restructuring is further proof that Sony is hedging all its bets on only its most unflappable blockbusters. With the reorganization of Sony Japan to be focused around Team Asobi, undoubtedly due to the success and acclaim of Astro Bot Rescue Mission and Astro’s Playroom, the development house that has led to some of Sony’s most eclectic, memorable experiences is singularly focused on the series that sells consoles… or convinces players to buy into the innovative DualSense. Seemingly gone are the smaller, but no less worthy games like Gravity Rush, Ape Escape, Shadow of the Colossus, and the talent behind those franchises. The only, truly small-scale studio that exists within Sony these days is Pixelopus, the Concrete Genie devs whose latest game was certainly a charmer, but didn’t necessarily capture the same mindshare as Days Gone did in the same year. Does that studio’s creative wit have a place in modern-day PlayStation? I truly don’t know, and as a fan of their work, that worries me.
Despite all the worrying signs, the PS5 continues to sell out, the first party studios Sony is paying all its attention to are seemingly thriving and have massive sequels like the next God of War, Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, and Horizon Forbidden West on the way that are, again, probably too big to fail. And PlayStation series seem to be of wider importance to Sony than ever, with Uncharted, The Last of Us and Ghost of Tsushima on the docket for film and TV adaptations. There is clearly a long, healthy life ahead for many of these series, and it would be hypocritical to say that I can’t wait for the sequels, both announced and assumed, to come.
But PlayStation has historically never rested on safe bets. Through its stumbles and successes, the lineup of PlayStation exclusives across the generations is marked by risks, some that worked and some didn’t, but all of which proved the company’s ethos of putting intriguing game experiences first. What the new report shows, more than anything, is the picture of a company more concerned with the bottom line and capitalizing on what’s already worked, rather than blending in new, bold steps to find renewed success elsewhere. It’s why, in the wake of the report, a video of former PlayStation Worldwide Studios chairman Shawn Layden has been circulating widely on social media.
Talking about Vib-Ribbon at E3 several years back, Layden said “A personal favorite of mine that really embodies the PlayStation spirit. It wasn’t a multi-million seller, but that’s not the point. Vib-Ribbon was unafraid to go against the tide. It was courageous in its ambition, and it brought a completely new experience to gamers. It’s an incredible time to be part of the PlayStation family… After all, guys, it’s all about the games, isn’t it?”
It’s a broad statement, and of course, I’m sure Layden would agree, it’s equally about the people making those games, and the audiences who play them. But the spirit of what he’s saying rings so true: Vib-Ribbon wasn’t an exception to the rule but rather emblematic of it. Would it be released today, though? It sure would feel like an exception. Creating art within a commercial space will also have to conform to some amount of oversight, but it seems that art disconnected from a guaranteed, monumental win doesn’t even have the room to be imagined in the first place. And with the loss of space for those ideas to grow, it’s natural to worry that some of the PlayStation legacy will be lost, too.
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Jonathon Dornbush is IGN’s Senior News Editor, host of Podcast Beyond!, and PlayStation lead. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush and check out his new Persona 5 podcast.
Breath of the Wild is my favorite Zelda game of all time, but it is a strange and special case for me. This game helped me get a job, make a name for myself, and carve out an entire section of my gaming career. With 17.5 million views on my Breath of the Wild content across two YouTube channels and 3 million more on social channels, it did–without getting too corny–change my life.
That being said, I don’t remember much about my first playthrough anymore. I started roughly seven months after the initial launch, and I remember enjoying the game, just like everyone else. After some time, though, something clicked, and I wanted to make a quick video with some combat tips of my own. This was my first voice-over in a video I’d ever done, and I loathed listening to my own voice. I wrote it off as a one-and-done project, even stating at the end of the video: “Please DON’T subscribe; I don’t make content like this on the regular, so just enjoy the content you may have learned today.”
At that time, there was a large void of combat-specific content for Breath of the Wild, and after that video’s initial success, for some reason, I slowly started to come out of my shell and grow to become a content creator. Being one of the first combat players in Breath of the Wild and the originator of the whole genre of Breath of the Wild combat montages with cinematic music was something I am still proud of. Other gaming outlets such as Kotaku, IGN, and Gameology even picked up on content I created.
But after four years of growth with the game, there is a part of me that wishes that I could go back and forget what I learned. I’ve been playing the game wrong, after all. The insane journey that this game has led me on career-wise is amazing on its own merit, but it’s the original wonder and magic of the game itself that I miss the most. Being a glitch hunter and all, breaking the game and understanding its mechanics too well naturally destroyed the magic of Breath of the Wild’s immersion for me, and Nintendo’s acute understanding of how to make a world that feels alive and breathing at all times is something that feels less impactful four years later after having broken the game so much.
Yet, when I think about it, I know that I still love Breath of the Wild’s tone, style, environments, characters, and most of all, the absolute freedom, resulting in what I think is the best sandbox game in history. Embedding something like rules in the world, such as burning grass or slippery wet cliffs, is nothing new to gaming, but it’s the way the game presents itself without too much hand-holding or direction that makes it such an enjoyable experience that really connects with me on a personal level.
Ever since I played my first Zelda game, Ocarina of Time, when I was seven years old, Link has always been an icon and anchor of my childhood, and that has never stopped throughout the years. Breath of the Wild just cemented my love for the series more than it ever has before. Breath of the Wild did indeed change my life.
Yahoo Answers, the legendary user-based answering service, is shutting down permanently on May 4. That seemed to mean that many of its best answers would be lost to time, but a modder has chosen to keep Yahoo Answers’ greatest hits alive in an unexpected place: The Typing of the Dead.
Twitter user YahooAnswersTXT, who compiles the best Yahoo Answers questions and posts them on their account, collected 500 of the very greatest and used them in a custom dictionary for Typing of the Dead: Overkill. We have no idea why some of these questions were asked, but here are some of the very best:
What does Bigfoot want??
Is yamble a word?
GANGSTER GHOST?
I can’t stop sinning?
Yahoo Answers let users crowdsource answers to pretty much anything, but as you can see from these answers, they sometimes didn’t actually ask questions with answers at all. No one knows what Bigfoot wants. Two of the above aren’t even questions. But this one might be our favorite because of an answer it did receive.
Nothing has changed in a decade
You can install the RIP Yahoo Answers mod for yourself in the game via the Steam Workshop page.
Typing of the Dead is a spin-off of Sega’s House of the Dead series, using essentially the same structure but replacing the light-gun shooting gameplay with typing challenges. It was silly in 2001 when it came to North America and it’s silly now.
Jonathan Ferguson, a weapons expert and Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries, breaks down the intense weaponry of the Metro franchise, including the in-universe weapons the Kalash, the ridiculous quad-barrelled shotgun, the Duplet, and the iconic Bastard Gun.
Epic Games seems to understand that, given Steam’s massive user-base, the only way it can be a viable competitor is to have games that aren’t available on Valve’s service. Exclusivity deals with third-party companies cost money, and it looks like Epic Games is losing a huge amount of money to make those exclusives happen.
As spotted by PC Gamer, despite paying approximately $444 million for “minimum guarantees” on third-party games for the Epic Games Store in 2020, sales of all third-party games for the year amounted to about $265 million. Apple said that Epic Games lost about $181 million on the Epic Games Store in 2019, putting the total losses thus far at more than $300 million, should these figures be correct. Big games like Metro Exodus and Control were released first on EGS before coming to Steam later.
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Metro Exodus – Official Launch Trailer
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Apple used these figures in a statement as part of its lawsuit against Epic Games, pointing out that the service is unprofitable and is missing security features that Apple’s App Store includes. It pointed out that most of Epic Games’ Fortnite revenue is generated on platforms other than iOS, as well, which would seemingly mitigate the effect of the game not being available there anymore.
These loss numbers are still fairly small compared to Epic Games as a whole. The company was valued at more than $17 billion last August after securing additional funding. And despite being unavailable on iOS for months, Fortnite continues to thrive on other platforms.
The Epic Games v. Apple trial kicks off on May 3. The outcome could determine not only if Fortnite can return to Apple devices, but also if Apple can keep a monopoly over digital purchases on its platform.
Mass Effect Legendary Edition is set to release in just over a month, and the remastered trilogy’s project director Mac Walters has announced that it has gone gold. That means there is very little chance it’s going to get bumped from its May 14 release date.
Walters celebrated the occasion with a clip of several Mass Effect characters dancing, including meme legend Garrus Vakarian.
When a game “goes gold,” it essentially means that its code is finalized to the point where it can be put onto discs and shipped. However, because we live in an era of content updates and patches, it doesn’t really mean as much as it used to. BioWare could choose to replace huge amounts of the game’s code in the future if it wanted to change something, but it does still serve as a big milestone for developers who have been working on the project for months or years.
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Mass Effect Legendary Edition Teaser Trailer
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Mass Effect Legendary Edition bundles together the first three games with improvements to make them feel like one cohesive experience. The first game was criticized, in its original state, for lackluster combat, and this should no longer be an issue in the retooled version. It’s coming to PS4, Xbox One, and PC, with optimizations for the newer systems rather than dedication next-gen versions. A fifth Mass Effect game is in development, as well, though it appears to be pretty early right now.
Another game that also went gold this week is Nier Replicant, which is also a retooled version of a past game. As with Mass Effect, the original Nier’s combat was surpassed by its sequel, and Nier Replicant will implement those ideas into the original game while retaining its story.
