Gabriel Stanford-ReisingerDuring an interview with PlayStation boss Jim Ryan back in March, GamesIndustry.biz confirmed that Sony has no intention on releasing AAA first-party games to the revamped PlayStation Plus because it wouldn’t be possible at its current pricing structure.
Jump forward to only a month before this new PlayStation Plus model goes into effect here in the Americas (and days before it hits Asia, excluding Japan) and Sony appears to not have changed its mind. During its recent earnings call (translated by irwebmeeting), CFO Hiroki Totoki took the stage to not so much discuss the competition’s strategy, but rather solidify their stance on releasing AAA first-party games day-one on the tiered service.
“I will refrain from making comments on the competitors’ strategy. Our current thinking is to have development costs/appropriate R&D investment for quality products and that will improve the business in the long run. AAA type titles on PS5, if we distribute that on the subscription service, we may need to shrink the investment needed for that, and that will deteriorate the first-party title quality. So we want to make sure we spend the appropriate development costs to have solid products/titles to be introduced in the right manner.”
While it might be disappointing for some users who believe its new tier model is too high or whatever, there are still some big games coming to the service like Returnal and Spider-Man: Miles Morales.
The new PS Plus tier model’s heading to Asia on May 23 for Asia, followed by Japan on June 1, the Ameircas on June 13, and finally Europe on June 22. Learn more about the tiers here.