After the end of Destiny 2 and the failure of the past, PlayStation still wants to invest in live service games, and MeinMMO editor Nikolas Hernes can ‘t hear it anymore.
Anyone who has been around the gaming cosmos in the last few years has certainly heard the term Live-Service
countless times. As coveted as the treasure in One Piece seems to be the success that games like Fortnite have achieved.
This very approach fails more often than it succeeds, as can also be seen with Sony and PlayStation. Concord was such a flop that the shooter was shut down after just 12 days. Even with the beloved Destiny 2, the active development was stopped, although they paid 3.6 billion US dollars for developer Bungie in 2019.
In an interview with Famitsū, Hideaki Nishino, the CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment (the gaming division of Sony), talked about live service games, and it seems they wish to continue with this strategy. They want to deliver first- and third-party content and constantly provide something
.
And even if one assumes that they will release a successful live service game: How long can it last?
You can’t just force your way into the genre
Service games have a big problem: They are always in competition with each other, and as a player, you have to submit to them: Daily quests, login bonuses, and time-exclusive events try to attract players daily. But time is limited, and so is the willingness to dive into new service games. If someone is already actively playing Fortnite or Genshin Impact, there simply isn’t enough time to play another time-consuming service game.
At the same time, the expectation of success is a big problem. If you invest about 400 million US dollars in a game like Concord, you expect early positive signals and even results. But not every service game can be a success right away. Some games grow over time and show the community what is really behind them – as demonstrated by Rainbow Six Siege from Ubisoft – only over time did the shooter become a great success because Ubisoft did not give up (source: gamesindustry.biz).
But there can also be difficulties the other way around. Even if a game works and is successful at first, it must continue to be developed and supported. In the case of Destiny 2, this apparently did not work, and it was one of Sony’s best service games.
The expectations seem to be too high, and I doubt that suddenly a new Fortnite
will be released that will be just as successful. Even games like Helldivers 2 or ARC Raiders, which were quite successful, lose players after a while, and one should be prepared for that, as that is natural.
What makes me even angrier and more frustrated are the consequences. Behind these games are studios with many employees. When a studio is closed, the experience of many veterans is lost. Some developers leave the industry entirely, and that is terribly harmful for the future. As a result, knowledge and experience are lost, an asset that could fundamentally harm gaming in the long run.
Sony’s greatest strength lies elsewhere
Sony has, at least in my opinion, a much greater strength than live service: Prestige single-player titles – and they are lacking in the PS5 generation. While there are games like Ghost of Yotei or Spider-Man 2, that is too little and not really sustainable, considering how high the budget of these games seems to be. As Forbes reported, Spider-Man 2 is said to have cost nearly 300 million US dollars.
Such AAA games cost money and a lot of time. Sony should scale back a bit. Develop smaller games that keep the developer and publisher more regularly in the spotlight.
But here I probably speak as a player who wants to see new experiences that are not as easy to monetize as traditional service games.
I can’t completely detach myself from service games, as I am looking forward to one. In an interview with Famitsu, Nishino mentioned the upcoming fighting game Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls. This game is a collaboration between PlayStation Studios, Arc System Works, and Marvel Games.
With this game, they could deliver a successful offering for fighting games that could certainly be considered a service game. Fighting games are, thanks to DLC fighters and costumes, service titles that remain monetizable for a longer time. They may never reach gigantic numbers like Fortnite, but they can build a loyal core community that is willing to invest money – together with the Marvel license, they certainly have a good foundation.
And that could be the right step: not looking for a new Fortnite, but building smaller
titles as service games that target a core community and do not consume endless amounts of time. This not only saves costs but also generates predictable revenue – but that is probably a rather naive thought.
Which live service games are you playing, and do you still have time and interest in new ones? Feel free to share your opinion in the comments. Beyond the horror term Live-Service
, I’ve been missing the fire that made Sony so special for a long time: The PS5 has become really boring because Sony has forgotten its greatest strengths
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