Despite rumblings of internal strife at PlayStation, Sony appears more focused on the ongoing sales success of the PS5.
It’s easy to assume that things aren’t going super smoothly at PlayStation right now. With Spider-Man 2 now out, there are currently no exclusives left on the release schedules and there is a noticeable dearth of info on Sony’s live service projects like The Last Of Us spin-off.
What’s more, PlayStation boss Jim Ryan, the one pushing Sony’s live service future the hardest, retired last month and now head of internal production Connie Booth has left, with rumours that she was fired.
But if there’s trouble behind closed doors, Sony isn’t publicly acknowledging it. Instead, it’s focusing on the continued success of the PlayStation 5, which is expected to meet its 2023 sales target of 25 million units – a number that’d make it the best year for any PlayStation console in history.
25 million is an incredible figure, given that the PlayStation 5 has only sold something over 40 million console since November 2020 and well beyond what the Xbox Series X/S and aging Nintendo Switch is expected to achieve.
After years of stock shortages, 2023 marks the first time the PlayStation 5 will be fully stocked for the Christmas season, which means it should be relatively easy to pick up whenever you want.
Sony has plenty of reasons to be confident. The PlayStation 5 has been consistently outselling the Xbox Series X/S and the Nintendo Switch this year, with sales jumping by 24% in September even without any new exclusives that month. October is bound to be an even better month, thanks to Spider-Man 2 – which became Sony’s fastest-selling exclusive ever.
As for the rest of the year, Sony will need to rely on third party support, particularly Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, which has its own console bundle. That’s no doubt the final vestige of Sony and Activision’s Call Of Duty deal from before the Microsoft acquisition.
‘This holiday season is the first holiday season we will be fully stocked on PlayStation 5 in every geography,’ says Eric Lempel, Sony’s head of business operations, in an interview with CNBC, adding that Sony fully expects ‘record breaking sales.’
Strangely, he doesn’t mention the new slimmer PlayStation 5 model that’s launching in November, although it doesn’t seem that Sony is going to be actively promoting the change, since it’s still the same price as the original models.
Lempel was also asked about Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard and what Sony’s response will be. It’s been speculated that Sony will make a similarly large buyout to match it, but Lempel seems to suggest that Sony’s more interested in partnering with studios for PlayStation 5 exclusives rather than outright buying them… although that’s not to say acquisitions won’t continue to happen.
‘We’ve done more M&A [mergers and acquisitions] in the past decade than we’ve ever done. We’re always looking to work with new partners, whether that’s somebody as an external provider… or working with a developer along with the way and then acquiring them later,’ explains Lempel, citing Spider-Man studio Insomniac Games as an example.
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