Sony has been working hard to bring more live service games under the PlayStation Studios banner, and one of their biggest studios has already taken the fall with an IP that is one of the blockbuster titles on the Sony side.

Days Gone will be released by Bend Studios for PlayStation 4 in April 2019, and will then appear on PC in 2021. Bend Studio has confirmed that there won’t be a sequel to Days Gone (and some of its key developers have left the studio), as it didn’t meet Sony’s blockbuster expectations, and instead they started developing a new IP. This IP has not yet been officially announced by Sony or Bend.

They are now looking for people to work on this game, and according to a job posting found by Game Rant, it will be a live service game. In fact, the Senior Project Manager position mentions it in no uncertain terms, not once, but three times. First there is a mention of the important stages of development, then there is an expectation of experience in publishing AAA live service games, and finally the successful candidate will need to have experience in taking the team from a traditional boxed game release to a live service development studio in a leadership role.

So for the live service expansion announced in early 2022, Sony has put Bend on its knees. If this were Game of Thrones, Sony would be Daenerys and Bend Studio would be playing the role of Jon Snow. Sony ended up BENDing the knee after all, it seems. The problem is that of the 12 live service games originally scheduled for release by the end of March 2026, Sony has already delayed six, and The Last of Us Online, for example, is not coming to Naughty Dog.

Does Sony not think Bend is that important?

Source: GameRant