Change of Leadership and a New Course
The roots of PlayStation's current problems go back to 2019. That's when Jim Ryan took over the company's gaming division.
At first, the changes were imperceptible. The "blues" continued to release major single-player projects: Days Gone, The Last of Us Part II, Ghost of Tsushima. With the arrival of PlayStation 5, the flow did not dry up: Returnal, a remake of Demon’s Souls, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, Horizon Forbidden West, God of War Ragnarök, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2.
However, user ratings on Metacritic gradually began to decline. God of War Ragnarök received 8.3 points from players against 9.0 for God of War (2018). The difference is even more noticeable in the Horizon series: Zero Dawn — 8.3, Forbidden West — 7.4. The gap cannot be called critical, but the trend can be traced in all projects that received a sequel — the recent Ghost of Yotei was no exception.
At the same time, it is important to clarify: a significant part of the criticism concerns not so much the decline in quality as the plot decisions and ideological accents. But is this the main problem? Of course not.
In January 2022, Sony acquired Bungie, the creators of the Destiny franchise. In the fall of the same year, the company announced the development of 12 service games at once. Although they did not plan to abandon single-player projects, this alarmed fans.
In February 2024, Helldivers 2 was released. The game quickly gained popularity: the online in Steam updated its own records for two months in a row, and the project itself was actively discussed in the gaming community. Already in March, 10 million copies were sold, and by January 2026 — 20 million. It seemed that the strategy with service games had yielded its first fruits.
Failure of Service Games and Remasters
However, in March 2024, Jim Ryan left Sony, and at the end of August, a catastrophe called Concord occurred. The project failed: on Metacritic, users rated it at 1.7 points out of 10, and the online in Steam froze at 697 people. According to analysts, about 25 thousand copies were sold. It was a complete failure — the servers were closed just two weeks after the release.
A logical question arose: is Sony capable of creating successful service games on its own? After all, Helldivers 2 was developed by a third-party studio, and the "blues" only acted as a publisher. As soon as the company took on its own product, Concord came out.
After Ryan's departure, the new management canceled half of the projects — six out of twelve service games. They did not even spare the multiplayer project for The Last of Us, which had been in active development for a long time and required significant investments. The management began to restore order in the internal studios, and the players breathed a sigh of relief. However, since then the situation has not improved significantly.
The flow of new games has dried up. Sony tried to fill the resulting "windows" in the release schedule with remasters of old projects — even those that were released just a few years ago: Horizon Zero Dawn, The Last of Us Part II and Days Gone. However, the changes in the reissues were not always noticeable, especially in the case of Days Gone, which only increased the irritation of an already dissatisfied audience.
Over the past two years, only two major new products have been released from the "blues" — Astro Bot and Ghost of Yotei. And if the Team Asobi project became the game of 2024, then "Ghost of Yotei" went almost unnoticed.
Sony: Then and Now
Let's remember what made Sony great. It all started in 1994. The first PlayStation became a revolution in the gaming industry. The console made full-fledged 3D massive and accessible, allowing you to create games that simply did not fit into the technical framework before.
In 2000, PlayStation 2 consolidated its success. A huge library, dozens of cult series — it was then that the image of the platform where the main games of the generation are released was finally formed. It is no coincidence that PS2 is still the best-selling console in history.
PlayStation 3 had a difficult start. The architecture of the Cell processor complicated development and seriously hampered the porting of games. But by the end of the generation, the console flourished: studios learned how to work with the "hardware", and players appreciated the powerful library and functionality of the system.
PlayStation 4 brought the Sony formula to the maximum. Despite the lack of backward compatibility with PS3, it was this generation that finally established the cult of PlayStation exclusives. These games were waited for, discussed and extolled.
Today, Sony's internal studios seem to be stuck.
Insomniac Games abandoned the additions to Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and instead decided to release a separate game about Venom — based on the Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales model. However, there is still no official information about the project — only rumors. The development of Marvel’s Wolverine has also been delayed: the release is scheduled for 2026, but there are practically no specific details.
Reasons? It is enough to recall that Insomniac was simultaneously working on the cooperative online game Spider-Man: The Great Web — a kind of GTA Online version in the "Spider-Man universe". We, of course, do not know the details about the timing of development, the cancellation of the project and the amount of resources spent. But the fact remains: this is not the only internal Sony studio, famous for single-player projects, which stalled against the background of the company's bet on service games.
In addition to "Wolverine", it is worth mentioning Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet from Naughty Dog. The game was announced in December 2024 at The Game Awards, but since then — only general statements and unconfirmed rumors. There is still no specifics. We remember — multiplayer for The Last of Us.
Guerrilla Games released Lego Horizon Adventures, but the project did not meet expectations. The ratings speak for themselves: on Metacritic, the game has 5.8 points out of 10 from users and 70 out of 100 from critics, and in Steam — only 58% positive reviews. Now the studio has announced the cooperative action Horizon Hunters Gathering. According to insiders, the main resources of the team are directed to this project. How much this will delay the release of the triquel of the main line — it is better not to guess.
Nothing has been heard from Santa Monica Studio since the release of God of War Ragnarök and the Valhalla add-on. According to rumors, the studio is working on a new science fiction IP and a sequel to God of War, but there is no official confirmation of this. There is also information about the canceled service game about the "God of War". Another studio, Bluepoint Games, was working on it.
It seems that after Jim Ryan's departure, Sony's management has not decided on a further strategy. During this time, the head of the gaming division has changed three times: first, the post was taken by financier Hiroki Totoki, then management passed to the duo Hideaki Nishino and Hermen Hulst, and later Nishino headed the division alone. However, during all this time, a clear and publicly defined policy has not been formulated.
Previously, the "blues" often faced difficulties. Sometimes the pressure was exerted by competitors, sometimes problems arose through the fault of the company itself. But Sony recognized its mistakes and returned to its strong side. Now, however, the company seems to be moving by inertia — they are completing old projects and do not demonstrate a clear understanding of the future course.
After four successful generations, a logical question arises: what does the PS5 offer today? A few worthy projects in five years and a number of re-releases from the PS4 era.
The company continues to swing from side to side. In August of last year, Vice President Sadahiko Hayakawa announced a change in strategy towards multiplatform. After the release of Lego Horizon Adventures on Nintendo Switch and Helldivers 2 on Xbox, there was talk of a possible expansion of Sony projects on competitor platforms.
However, already in September 2025, PushSquare analyzed Sony's reports and noticed that the line "income from games outside of consoles," previously considered one of the key ones, had disappeared from them. This created the feeling that the "blues" had revised their plans to release their projects on third-party platforms — just a month after the announcements about the change in strategy.
Since then, no new ports to PC or other platforms have been announced. At the same time, the upcoming service projects in the Horizon universe make it clear that Sony plans to release at least service games on third-party systems. But the company's position on porting large single-player exclusives remains unclear.
Quiet revival, but with nuances
In April 2024, Sony changed its approach to announcements. Previously, the "blues" often presented projects at early stages of development, fueling hype long before release. Marvel’s Wolverine was shown back in September 2021 — more than four years before its expected release, when the game was only in the initial stages of production.
It seems that now Sony will announce projects only when they already have tangible progress — a year or two before release. Perhaps there is indeed a lot of interesting things being prepared within the company, they just aren't talking about it yet.
Changes have also affected the frequency of releases. Previously, the "blues" released two or three major exclusives a year. Last year, the company announced that it plans to limit itself to one large single-player game annually. This is probably due to the need to stabilize the financial situation after a series of losses, as well as the fact that a significant part of the internal studios' time and resources was spent on developing canceled service games.
However, one cannot fail to note the weaknesses of these decisions. Abandoning early announcements will indeed reduce the flow of empty promises and add specifics. But now Sony needs hype, not silence. It is important for the company to regain the emotional support of the audience — even if the releases are still far away. In the current environment, such a restrained approach does not seem to be the most successful.
The same goes for the strategy of releasing one major game a year. Has the cost of development really increased so much that after a series of failures, Sony simply has no free funds left?
In this case, the company should revise its expenses and be more careful about budget allocation. A telling example is the animation studio DreamWorks Animation. Previously, it also relied on big-budget films, which eventually ceased to pay off consistently. As a result, the studio abandoned excessive scale in favor of more intimate but engaging projects.
Let's remember "Kung Fu Panda 4" — a relatively intimate and more restrained in budget cartoon, which was loved as much as the previous three parts. It paid off many times over. Sony could have chosen a similar path. And if releasing one game a year is a temporary move, while the "blues" are building up capacity, — okay. We'll see.
In that case, they could at least take on remasters of PS3 era projects. There is a whole treasure trove of great games there that I would still like to play today. And given that they can also be released on PS4, the profit could be higher — many players still haven't switched to PS5. This is practically free money.
Another controversial point is service games. Sony clearly does not intend to abandon this model and is trying to play on two fronts. Marathon from Bungie will be released in March — a project that had to be reworked after an unsuccessful alpha test last year.
I would, of course, like them to abandon this idea altogether. However, the periodic release of such projects, without a clear bias towards the service model, can be seen as a compromise. Everything will depend on how balanced the company approaches this direction.
Analysis
Sony's main problem is not the failure of individual projects, and not even the bet on services. The problem is strategic uncertainty. Financially, the company does not look like it is in crisis: the revenue of the gaming division continues to grow, and PS5 sales have exceeded 92 million devices. However, the console's life cycle has already passed the middle, and the density of exclusives is noticeably lower than that of PS4 at a similar stage. A brand that for decades has been associated with regular "system sellers" now lives with rare bursts.
The service strategy itself might not have been a mistake if Sony hadn't gone all-in. But the company tried to integrate it into an ecosystem built around expensive single-player blockbusters. This required a redistribution of resources and led to cancellations and pauses at studios that had previously worked stably.
Reducing early announcements is a managerially understandable step: less hype, less reputational loss in case of cancellations. However, for the platform business, not only the financial result is important, but also the emotional impulse. Without promises of a "bright future," the company loses marketing power, and with it — the interest of the audience.
To restore its position, Sony first needs to clearly formulate a strategy and define priorities: what balance between services and single-player projects does the company consider optimal and how does it see the future of its key franchises. But even more important is to convey this position to the players. So that current PS5 owners do not feel abandoned, and potential buyers understand what exactly they are investing in when purchasing a console with the expectation of several years ahead.
In addition, the company should restore the feeling of regularity of releases — even if this requires revising the scale of projects and reducing budgets. More compact but complete games are able to maintain interest in the platform no worse than rare megablockbusters. At the same time, Sony could more actively work with the legacy of PS3, offering popular re-releases of cult series.
A clear line, consistent decisions and transparent communication can return PlayStation to the position of industry leader, and not a participant in the race for fleeting trends.
However, perhaps Sony simply does not need to rush with changes. This is also one of the scenarios. There is no strong competitor that would push for drastic decisions right now. Microsoft has actually withdrawn from the classic console war, and the AI boom only increases the attractiveness of buying a console, which today may cost as much as 32 GB of DDR5. Market pressure has weakened — and therefore, the incentive to change has also weakened.
On the night of February 12-13, a State of Play presentation will take place. They promise a record-breaking timing in the history of the format — more than an hour. Among the stated topics are not only games from third-party developers, but also a demonstration of the "future" of Sony's internal studios. Let's see what exactly the company considers its next step.