A few weeks ago, in its ever-more desperate attempts to prevent Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision-Blizzard going through, Sony made some prettybizarre comments that I suggested bordered on conspiracy theory(big thanks to our photo wiz Jamie McNeil for replacing Jim Ryan’s head with Alex Jones’ in that lead image!). What really jumped out at me was when Sony suggested thatMicrosoft might intentionally release buggy versions of games like Call of Dutyon PS5, which in turn would apparently lead to players ditching their Playstations and running out to get an Xbox (rather than, y’know, making their feelings heard online and giving Acti-Blizz hell until they fix the problem).
It was a weird thing to say in an industry filled with weird statements, but when combined with thepoor state in which The Last of Us Part 1, arrived on PCearlier this week, it looksespeciallybad.
In the words of a red-eyed puppet with swirls on its cheeks, ‘let’s play a game.’ Let’s apply Sony’s logic that they applied to Microsoft (which, to be clear, they don’t have any evidence for, and is purely hypothetical) to Sony’s recent release ofThe Last of Us Part 1. Sony owns The Last of Us IP, and has brought this IP–which it’s kept exclusively on its own consoles until now–to PC. This game, which is by most accounts a glossy and polished success story on its home platform, has launched on PC and it’s a mess. People on top-end rigs are reporting terrible frame-rates, crashes, bugs, and other problems. It’s gotMostly Negative reviews on Steam, and it’s bombing.
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Now, a regular person jaded with the industry would say that’s just par for the course with big-budget triple-A releases these days (and a lesson not to preorder games like this). But according to Sony’s own logic it applied to Microsoft, The Last of Us Part 1’s semi-functional PC port that could in fact be intentional–released in a broken state so that we’re drawn to buy the superior PS5 version. Just look at how neatly this narrative fits into exactly what Sony said to the CMA about Microsoft; all we need to tweak with Sony’s statement is to swap out Microsoft, PlayStation, and Call of Duty, for Sony, PC, and The Last of Us Part 1, respectively:
“For example,Sonymight release aPCversion ofThe Last of Us Part 1where bugs and errors emerge… Even if such degradations could be swiftly detected, any remedy would likely come too late, by which time the gaming community would have lost confidence inPCas a go-to venue to playThe Last of Us Part 1, Indeed, asThe Last of Us Part 1attests,The Last of Usis most often purchased in just the first few weeks of release. If it became known that the game’s performance onPCwas worse than onPlayStation,The Last of Usgamers could decide to switch toPS5, for fear of playing their favourite game at a second-class or less competitive venue.”
Talk about shooting yourself in the foot there, Sony! The irony here is that by and large Sony’s PC ports have been of a high quality. Games like God of War, Days Gone, Marvel’s Spider-Man, and Horizon: Zero Dawn have been received and sold very well on PC, so it feels almost karmic that in the wake of Sony’s distasteful and flat-out bizarre statements, they’ve gone and released a port of a game thatpreciselyfits the scenario they outlined could happen with Microsoft and Call of Duty in relation to Sony’s consoles.
Even if we don’t apply Sony’s own warped theory to The Last of Us Part 1 (realistically, they simply screwed up and launched the game too soon, like so many modern triple-A games are wont to do), it wouldn’t be a massive leap to suggest that the games they’ve launched are designed to lure PC players into buying a PS5 anyway. The Last of Us Part 1, Horizon: Zero Dawn, Marvel’s Spider-Man, and God of War are arguably the biggest Sony first-party blockbusters to have received PC ports, andallof those games either have or are due to have sequels that currently exist exclusively on Sony’s consoles (with no mention yet of a PC release).
I’m not saying this is the case (and kinda hoping it isn’t), but it’s another reason why Sony shouldn’t have thrown out this dubious ‘Trojan Horse’ idea that Microsoft might bring cross-platform games to PS5 with the goal of ultimately baiting players over to Xbox. If you want to look for evidence of such a practice in the games industry today–then Sony would be its biggest perpetrator.
I’m definitely happy to give Sony the benefit of doubt, and believe that The Last of Us Part 1 will be swiftly fixed on PC, and that they won’t withhold games like The Last of Us Part 2 and Horizon: Forbidden West from PC players for too long. But maybe next time Sony shouldn’t make spurious claims that end up bouncing right back in their faces.
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