Copyright theage
Rob Davis, an Australian developer living in California who worked on the two most recent God of War games and was campaign director on Ghost of Yotei, likened PlayStation Studios to HBO in its golden era. The games have similarities, if only because they’re all vying to be the highest form of glossy character-driven interactive media, with some “healthy competition” between them. “Because the teams have been together for a long time, and because we hopefully know our audience quite well at this point, the thing that I’ve noticed consistently is the desire to bring cinematic action into life and drive really high-quality games across the board,” he said. “For many people that’s not really a business driver. It’s personal. To be a top developer, and to inspire players. The actors themselves are incredibly committed to these roles and characters, because I think they have seen how much the PlayStation audience takes their heroes seriously.” Though every studio under the PlayStation umbrella has its own approach — including Santa Monica (God of War), Naughty Dog (The Last of Us), Guerilla (Horizon), Insomniac (Spider-man) and Sucker Punch (Ghost of Yotei), you could argue the focus on acting and cinematic presentation comprises a house style, or at least a common passion. And Davis said a practical benefit of that is that it can help guide developers as they put their massive projects together. By picking out elements of other media they want to evoke, and aiming to make it into a playable reality, they can have a tangible goal to shoot for.
