Sony, a household name known for its best-selling first-party single-player titles like God of War, Horizon, and Spider-Man, is doubling down on what has worked for the franchise while also opening itself to new ventures.
Sony confirms its plans to introduce new PlayStation franchises, the majority of which are presumably live service titles, in its most recent presentation.
According to one of the slides, the 2025 fiscal year is particularly big for the company as it estimates that around half of the investments by PlayStation Studios will be on new properties. Sony points out this is a massive jump from previous years. In the same slide, Sony compared this to the 2019 fiscal year, when it only invested 20% of its resources in new franchises, or the current fiscal year where the same number is at 40%.
More importantly, based on the slides, each of the 50-50 split of investments for FY25 appears to be larger than the entire spending for FY19.
Sony sang a similar song last year when it confirmed that more live-service titles are coming in 2026, and the company's most recent moves reflect this shift.
Sony's acquisition of Bungie signaled this pivot and it makes sense for Sony to reaffirm its commitment, especially after Guerilla Games confirmed its multiplayer Horizon game.
We're just hoping Sony doesn't burn itself to the ground trying to look for the next Destiny 2 or Fortnite. Because, for every one of those games that come out on the market, there are a bunch of others that meet their untimely demise way too soon.
Ultimately, this strategic decision to focus its efforts as much on new franchises as they will in their existing ones as well as diverging into live service games helps put Sony in a good position to retain its pole position in the gaming industry. The company's commitment to pushing the boundaries of interactive and, hopefully, high-quality, entertainment should be reciprocated by a thankful market that will be more than welcoming of fresh ideas.
As players eagerly await the arrival of unannounced groundbreaking titles, the future of gaming looks brighter than ever.
