Sony to debut constantly-updating games

Future. Sony is ramping up investment into live-service games that continually update to provide new missions and experiences for players online. That not only expands the longevity (and cultural conversation) around games but could open up new revenue streams as virtual goods and paywalled missions get released over the years.

Never gets old
Sony doesn’t ever want to let players run out of the game, so the company is focusing on rolling out a slate of “continually-updated online games” (aka live-service games)

• Inspired by the likes of Fortnite and Destiny (which is now a Sony title after acquiring the developer Bungie), these games are multiplayer, which can be expanded and built upon even after it launches to the public.
• Speaking at an investor presentation last week, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan said that 49% of its PlayStation Studios budget will go towards those games by the end of the year… and increase to 55% by 2025.

While no specific games have been announced yet, TechCrunch notes that titles such as God of War, The Last of Us, and Uncharted were all part of the presentation, which may be teasing a huge multiplayer expansion of games usually thought of as single-player stories.

Head for the clouds
Getting back to Destiny: Sony brass said that snagging the talent and infrastructure for live-service games was a huge reason why the company acquired Bungie. Although Bungie originally made the Halo franchise, it sold off that title years ago, and Destiny has been its bestseller since.

The ability to roll out live-service games coincides with the video-game industry’s shift to cloud gaming — of which Sony (via PlayStation) and Microsoft (via Xbox) are competing for dominance. Each has its own separate streaming service and is on a buying spree for independent developers to shore up exclusive content. By going to the cloud, the ability to roll out updates on a dime to players becomes not just a reality but potentially the selling point for user adoption.