PlayStation seems to be waving the white flag on its PC strategy, at least when it comes to single-player games.
Earlier this year, Bloomberg reported that PlayStation was backing down from releasing future first-party titles on PC. There was still some ambiguity around how hard and fast those rules would be; as one example, Saros developer Housemarque dodged the question if the game would ever come to PC in an interview with Game Informer in the lead-up to the game’s PS5 release. Now, things seem to be more concrete: Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier reported that during a company town hall meeting this week, PlayStation studio business CEO Hermen Hulst affirmed that first-party narrative-driven single-player games will now be console exclusives for PlayStation.
That means you shouldn’t expect Ghost of Yotei, Saros, Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, or Marvel’s Wolverine to come to PC. If you want to play those games, you should expect to buy a PS5. With that said, Hulst specifically calling out single-player games is interesting. This may mean multiplayer-centric games, like the in-development Fairgames, will still come to PC, something that would be wise given the immense success of Helldivers 2 on PC.
This news comes after roughly six years of PlayStation bringing some of its biggest games to PC, including its rebooted God of War titles, Marvel’s Spider-Man games, Ghost of Tsushima, and The Last of Us series. These games often arrived months or even years after initial release, seen as a way to squeeze extra money out of these games from people who weren’t going to make the jump to PlayStation. There may have even been some hope that by creating new fans on PC, it might inspire gamers to purchase a PS5 to play sequels to their favorite PlayStation games.
However, it seems the strategy hasn’t been as fruitful as PlayStation may have hoped. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 had an all-time peak of 28,117 concurrent players on Steam — a fairly low number for one of PlayStation’s biggest games starring one of the most iconic characters in modern fiction — while online games like Helldivers 2 peaked at 458,208 concurrents on Steam. Helldivers 2 also benefited from a simultaneous launch with the game’s PS5 version, unlike many of the single-player titles.
Former PlayStation executive Shuhei Yoshida recently questioned the idea of PlayStation pulling back on PC, noting how the extra revenue from “releasing games on PC after a couple of years must have helped recoup the investment of these big budget games and help[ed] the team and company to reinvest that money into their new games.”
He continued: “If they were releasing new AAA games day one on other platforms, I don’t think that’s a good strategy for [a] platform holder like PlayStation. I’m not seeing any proof of them changing their strategy this generation, but if they are changing, it’s going to be interesting how they are able to maintain the investment on the big budget games on the first-party side going forward.”
Similarly, Xbox is also reportedly assessing its approach to exclusivity going forward. Although PC is a big part of the Xbox ecosystem now and has been for years, many have questioned whether or not Xbox will continue to bring its games to PS5 under the leadership of Asha Sharma, the new Xbox boss. As of right now, there are a lot of rumors about what may happen next, but nothing has been concretely decided. Currently, games like Fable and Forza Horizon 6 are confirmed for PS5, with the former expected to arrive the same day and date on Xbox and PlayStation platforms.
Cade Onder is a freelancer for IGN’s news team. He covers all things entertainment, including gaming, film, and more. You can find him on Twitter @Cade_Onder.
