The winds of change are blowing at Sony
The winds of change are undeniably blowing at Sony, particularly around PlayStation and its vast and complicated ecosystem. The first example is, of course, the 180-degree shift in terms of competing with Xbox Game Pass.
And it is that, after ruling out the prospect of delivering a similar service around a year and a half ago, they began working on it immediately after and, finally, unveiled the new PlayStation Plus, which is just that, Sony's Xbox Game Pass.
Another shift in strategy concerns the relationship of its exclusive releases with the PC world. And it is because, whilst Microsoft understands exclusivity as Xbox + PC, Sony has been considerably more hesitant to this model for years.
And, to be sure, that is understandable, given that Microsoft is also a part of the PC ecosystem, with which Sony currently has no ties. Jumps from PlayStation to PC have thus been uncommon for a long time, and some titles, such as the Gran Turismo saga, are likely to remain so.
However, we learned yesterday that Returnal, one of Sony's console exclusives, may soon make the jump to PC via Steam, indicating that the company is somewhat more open to the PlayStation + PC duality, which appears to me to be a great success because it allows it to expand the scope of its titles to a multi-million dollar ecosystem.
And today, TweakDown reports that Sony revealed at its 2022 corporate strategy meeting that by 2025, one in every five of its own titles, that is, those made by its studios, will be aimed at the smartphone market. A market that, as you know, has been growing steadily for years and has particularly bright short- and medium-term prospects.
Obviously, it is too early to tell what Sony aims to bring to customers' smartphones, but it stands to reason that at least some of them will be tied to exclusive PlayStation properties.
The primary difference is that game styles on consoles and smartphones are very different, thus Sony studios will have to fine-tune the shot quite a bit to be able to make sufficient recommendations for the said environment outside of their field of knowledge.
