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Sony Interactive Entertainment announced another studio acquisition – Bluepoint Games, the developers of the Shadow of the Colossus remake on PS4 and, most recently, the PS5 remake of Demon’s Souls.
Bluepoint and PlayStation have worked closely together for years, but the news comes after the studio’s last successful release, with Sony confirming that Demon’s Souls has sold over 1.4 million copies since its release. IGN spoke with PlayStation Studios Director Hermen Hulst and Bluepoint President Marco Thrush to learn more about the acquisition, the overall strategy of the PlayStation Studio and how, while Bluepoint is rooted in the he expertise in the remaster and the PlayStation remake, he wants to explore original ideas.
Bluepoint wants to create original games
Demon’s Souls was only released last November, and while Bluepoint isn’t officially announcing its next game, Thrush explained that the studio is aiming to work on original content in the future. No exact details on the “original content” that Bluepoint is working on, so it’s unclear whether this is a new game that is part of an existing IP address or something entirely new.
“Our next project, we’re currently working on original content. We can’t talk about what it is, but it’s the next evolutionary step for us,” Thrush said, noting that even with remakes like Shadow and Souls, the studio was already partially creating original content. He explained how, really, the studio’s growth, both in number of employees and types of projects, naturally leads to this next step, especially given the pedigree of the team.
“The transition from remasters to remakes was all about testing ourselves and pushing ourselves harder for the next step,” said Thrush, noting that the team numbered around 15 when producing the original God of War collection, she said. currently has around 70 employees. , and grew to 95 people at its peak during Demon’s Souls (with some outsourcing work as well).
“Our team is a very experienced team, the average experience of most people is around 15 years, and all of them are from the original development. It’s not like we are a bunch of developers trained in creating remasters and remakes. We have this original game development mindset in our hearts, and that is what we are now ready, finally ready with the support of Sony to go ahead and show what we can do, and show what PlayStation can do, ”he said.
And while the potential is exciting for Bluepoint to tackle its own game, don’t expect to see it too quickly. The studio has seen a surprisingly rapid turnaround on its games, having worked on five remasters or collections of PlayStation remasters and multiple ports over the past decade, while moving from remasters in 2015 to Shadow in 2018 and then to Demon’s Souls in 2020. .
“When we’re working on a remaster, on a remake, we’re very, very lucky and basically the original team finishes the game, we get that game, and then we have to tweak it for a few years,” said Thrush, noting that this “polish” is, of course, a lot of original work and art and design in its own right.
“You start with the plan, don’t you?” Real original development, there’s a plan, you execute it, and then it’s no fun and you throw it away and start over. So yes, by definition my default answer is original development, of course, takes longer. You have to, otherwise you wouldn’t be playing a good game. “
And given PlayStation’s recent pledges to be willing to delay games to allow teams to achieve their vision in a reasonable amount of time, Hulst says that will be true for anything Bluepoint and the various other Sony studios do.
“It’s always about creating quality games in a way that is sustainable for teams, for individuals on teams. Because obviously when we have acquired a team like Bluepoint, it’s a game for the long haul. for us, right? We’re not in it to get quick results, “Hulst said, explaining that, in short, the recent delays of games like Horizon Forbidden West and God of War Ragnarok
are not of concern.
“We are actually very happy with the development progress and I am happy with the decision we made there. [with Horizon and God of War]. And that’s really the people-first mindset. We are a people company. Everything we do is about developers, their health, their creativity, their well-being. “
Why PlayStation acquired Bluepoint and why Bluepoint wanted to be acquired
Although PlayStation and Bluepoint have worked together for years, Bluepoint has remained independent throughout this time. Now that has changed, of course, and Hulst and Thrush have explained why the two have decided to formalize the merger and unite Bluepoint under the PlayStation Studios banner. And a lot of it was about wanting to make this working relationship as mutually beneficial as possible in order to let the studio produce their best work.
“Bluepoint is now in a place where there is hardly an entity imaginable who knows the PlayStation better than them, as they have worked with so many different teams on their respective iconic franchises that they have had a glimpse of the developers in a wonderful way, ”Hulst said, explaining that he let the team finish Demon’s Souls before the acquisition talks really started.
“We probably expressed that better together, making sure Bluepoint can focus on their games, can focus on what they do best, create amazing worlds, wonderful character development, and use all the resources we have. have to offer, ”says Hulst.
And from Thrush’s perspective, the two sides worked so well together, completing the acquisition really allows them to keep doing it without any bureaucracy getting in the way.
“We’ve loved working with PlayStation all these years. There’s really no one else we’d love to work with, so we started talking to these guys and it worked,” Thrush explained. “And now our future is extremely bright. Like Hermen said, we have all these opportunities ahead of us. We have all the support of Sony. We don’t need to grow to be a gigantic studio. We have a lot of. help the Sony side now who can fill in all the gaps and maintain our studio culture. “
As for when the deal will be concluded, Hulst explained that much of the discussion took place after Demon’s Souls was released, so the team could focus on delivering this PS5 exclusive. Both parties have agreed on why the acquisition would be beneficial and, to put it simply, it allows Bluepoint and Thrush as studio chairman to focus more on creating the experiences they want and not to have to worry so much. the safety of the entire team.
“I also in my past run an independent studio, and realized that the amount of work you have to do, even when you have close partnerships, on acquiring businesses and making sure you cover your paris, there’s a lot of energy that goes into that, ”Hulst explained.“ I know if we take that off Marco’s plate and let him focus on what he wants to focus on with his team. … So I think it’s good for both parties. It’s good for them because they can do what they most love to do, and it’s great for us because Bluepoint is even more focused on what we want. And that’s amazing content, amazing games to come out of Blueprint. “
Thrush echoed the sentiment, noting the opportunities the studio has had for past games, like the ability to hire the London Symphony to brand Demon’s Souls, or being able to leverage other PlayStation assets, such as already established motion capture studios and more.
And while PlayStation has seen a wave of acquisitions lately – Firesprite, Nixxes and Housemarque were also acquired as proprietary studios this year – Hulst explained that Sony’s recent approach grew out of a desire to let these teams do their best. work with the PlayStation resources available to them.
“The way we look at our studio group, and we now have 16 internal teams as part of PlayStation Studios, is a big part of the way we look at our games. It has to be fair, it has to match what we do. . In qualitative terms, these have to be the right games. Same thing with the teams. The teams have to stay in a very collaborative mindset, “said Hulst.” They have to be quality driven. We don’t buy teams just to be bigger. We only buy teams because we believe that together we are going to do something that will be even better than if we did. they separate from each other. “
PlayStation won’t necessarily stop looking for potential acquisitions, Hulst explained, but they have to be studios that share the same values and can expand what’s on offer to PlayStation gamers.
“We’re always open to building new relationships or bringing people on board internally, but only if we adhere to the quality first mindset and the right kind of innovative content, new experiences, experiences. various. Because all of these teams share a lot, but they’re also very different from each other, and that’s what I really like, ”Hulst said. And I think that’s what the PlayStation audience, the PlayStation fans, deserve is this diverse roster of games coming out of PlayStation Studios. “
Jonathon Dornbush is IGN’s Senior Feature Editor, PlayStation Manager and Podcast Host Beyond! He is the proud father dog of a BOY named Loki. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush.
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