“It has been decided that production on a small number of projects within London Studio, Studio Liverpool, and Evolution Studios will be streamlined or closed due to a portfolio review and project prioritisation”, reads a statement given to Gamesindustry.
“This decision was made following an internal review of all games and it was deemed that with the incredibly strong list of exclusive first party titles coming up both this year and in the near future, resource should be reallocated to enhance those projects closer to completion.”
While specifics on the cancelled games were not released, the studios affected are behind franchises like WipeOut, MotorStorm, SingStar and EyePet.
Maybe Sony is cracking down on improperly capitalised game series?
Sony closes projects at UK studios [GI.biz]
AmbroseIV
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 6:21 PMWell… this is pretty stingy. If the franchises are improperly managed, isn’t that the fault of the publisher/IP holder (i.e. Sony)?
What’s the bet studio closures are coming next (and I hate when big publishers do that)…?
Larfin_Man
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 6:31 PM“the studios affected are behind franchises like WipeOut, MotorStorm, SingStar and EyePet.”
So basically every game that forgot to add a space between each word in the title.
djmcbell
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 6:33 PMSucks, especially here in the UK (again, sorry I’m not from Oz – if it helps my parents live over there).
You hear tell of people in the games industry in America starting off on $65k, which most certainly isn’t the case here – when I was applying three years ago the games programming positions I was going for started off at £14k – not much above the minimum wage (of course that doesn’t include unpaid overtime etc).
Having said that, costs for anything are becoming very restrictive in the UK. We’re expecting a further 5p a litre for petrol in the next few weeks, making it up to about £1.37 a litre. Value added tax has gone up to 20% (which a lot of places are adding extra onto or just exploiting to get some more cash – looking at you HMV).
There are far cheaper areas and it seems Sony is – sadly for us Brits – taking advantage of that. It’s a business.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it farmed out some of these licences (if it could) to other developers in cheaper countries, or set up new studios in those countries to take advantage of the economic climate.
AmbroseIV
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 7:09 PMEveryone’s welcome at Kotaku AU, so heya!
(…and I’m sure it makes Mark look super-impressive to the Allure guys, in that he can transcend geographical barriers’n'what-not)
Back to your post, Aus. is actually very similar and we’ve a lot of the same problems – I often feel the same way about the investment into our game industry. At best, it’s incredibly irritating and at worst, well…
Elephant Fresh
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 7:27 PMThis is a prudent business decision. Racing games have become so polarized, it seems like the only high selling titles coming out of the genre are sims (GT5) and kart type racers – WipeOut (despite being a superb, awesome franchise that blew my 12 year old mind) looks decidedly ‘arcade racer’ these days. And don’t get me started on Motorstorm. trucks AND dirtbikes? shit, add jetski’s in there and you have the boring vehicle holy trinity.
Scott
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 8:38 PMSo from now on in every racing game should only be a sim or mario kart clone?
:(
sad world for those of us that like variety
Daniel Harkin
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 8:12 PMlol@ Larfin_Man
I never played any of those games, it must suck for people in the UK though.
ed
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 8:39 PMDidnt sony cancel “Eight Days” for the exact same reason, transfering priority to those very titles?
Oo
From 2008 –
“This decision was made following an internal review of all games and it was deemed that with the incredibly strong list of exclusive first party titles coming up both this year and in the near future, resource should be reallocated to enhance those projects closer to completion”
Umm…. they just lookup the “press release handbook” it seems. Its almost the exact same statement.
Snacuum
Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 8:43 PM“the studios affected are behind franchises like WipeOut”
I hate you sony.
Crazyguy1990
Friday, March 11, 2011 at 8:19 AMPlus one.
steve
Friday, March 11, 2011 at 3:51 PMHate me if you want but I played plenty of Wipeout demo’s since the PS1 days and never got into them.
Though I do own GT5 and ModNation Racers :P
steve
Friday, March 11, 2011 at 3:51 PMHowever, the most fun I’ve ever had with a driving game would have to be GTA