Sony Game Studios Acquisitions [2021]

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https://twitter.com/x/status/1409818391444176899

Today I’m thrilled to welcome a new member to the PlayStation Studios family! I have been a fan of Housemarque since the studio’s early days when they introduced Super Stardust HD to PlayStation fans. Housemarque’s recent release of Returnal proves the studio is one with incredible vision, capable of creating memorable new games that resonate with our community. This addition enhances the creative force of PlayStation Studios, and I cannot wait to see what the future holds for Housemarque.

Welcome to the family, Housemarque!

https://twitter.com/x/status/1410591921676832773

Sony Interactive Entertainment Acquires Nixxes to Further Elevate PlayStation Studios Exclusive Titles

Highly Regarded Netherlands-based Studio Will Bring Its Technical Expertise to Aid in Creating Premier PlayStation Gameplay Experiences

July 01, 2021 09:30 AM Eastern Daylight Time

SAN MATEO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sony Interactive Entertainment (“SIE”) announced today that SIE has completed the acquisition of Nixxes Software B.V. (“Nixxes”), an industry-leading Dutch studio with more than 20 years of experience in game development and optimization. Based in Utrecht, Netherlands, effective immediately, Nixxes will join PlayStation Studios Technology, Creative & Services Group to provide high quality in-house technical and development capabilities for PlayStation Studios.

“I highly respect Nixxes and am excited for this very experienced team to become part of the world-class development community at SIE,” said Hermen Hulst, Head of PlayStation Studios. “They have a passion for improving games and for delivering the best possible experience for gamers. Nixxes will be a strong asset for everyone across PlayStation Studios, helping our teams focus on their most important goal, which is to create unique PlayStation content at the best possible quality.”

“We can’t wait to get to work and are so excited to bring our technical and development expertise to an IP powerhouse like PlayStation Studios,” said Jurjen Katsman, Founder & Sr. Director, Development, Nixxes. “We’re looking forward to working with some of the most talented teams in the industry to deliver the highest-quality gameplay experiences for PlayStation fans.”

Terms of this transaction including the acquisition cost are not disclosed due to contractual commitments.
 
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Ouch this one actually hurts as they've been one of the best studios WRT console ports to PC.

Although hmmmm, considering almost all of their previous work has revolved around PC ports of console titles, I do wonder if part of the reason for their acquisition by Sony is that Sony want a team with a lot of experience doing high quality console ports to PC to spearhead efforts to port more of their titles to PC?

It'll be interesting to see how they do with creating a game when given the chance. The closest they've come to developing a game was helping with the development of Marvel's Avengers (wasn't this @London Geezer 's favorite game? :D), and that likely just the PC version of it (porting it to PC).

Regards,
SB
 
That's a good get. They are pretty much the highest tier of porting studio along with bluepoint and qloc.

They basically made better ports of tomb raider 2013 and rise to PS3/4 than crystal dynamics did in optimizing their master versions for 360 and Xbox one respectively

As a purely technical studio they would do well for supporting internal teams at WWS in addition to being a porting house to PS5 and PC(PS4 games to PS5/PC and porting master PS5 versions to PC eventually)
 
Judging by Sony's press release and Nixxes statements, this has more to do with internal studios support and potential new PS IPs, more so than PC ports.
 
My guess is...nixxes were banking on avengers and crystal dynamics to pull through. Based on how the game flopped my view is that nixxes probably sees writing on the wall regarding SE's patience regarding CD as a studio and square enix Europe's gaming division in general.

It's a sad state of affairs. I loved the tomb raider trilogy despite being a controversial opinion.
 
I agree. WWS is in dire need of resources to support all those studios they've got especially when it comes to shipping on time and without technical issues. This also may help alleviate crunch maybe?

More support on individual projects means less stress for the teams pushing their workers
 
Inuhanyou said:
I agree. WWS is in dire need of resources to support all those studios they've got especially when it comes to shipping on time and without technical issues. This also may help alleviate crunch maybe?

More support on individual projects means less stress for the teams pushing their workers
Click to expand...

Yup. If the stories about Bend Studio being used as supplemental support for other Sony gaming studios (Guerilla, IIRC) are true, then yeah, Sony is doing what they have stated previously about manning up these studios with additional resources and bodies.
 
https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2021-07-01-playstation-has-bought-another-developer#comments

''Earlier this year, PlayStation's overall boss Jim Ryan suggested Sony would double down on releasing its games for PC as well as console - although not necessarily day and date, as Microsoft does with games on Xbox.

The addition of Nixxes adds a significant pool of talent in its PC port department, as Sony looks to bring more games to the platform in the future.''

As promised by Jim Ryan, a well and nice investment for their pc ports, its the most logical company to aquire.
 
https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2021-07-01-playstation-has-bought-another-developer#comments

Earlier this year, PlayStation's overall boss Jim Ryan suggested Sony would double down on releasing its games for PC as well as console - although not necessarily day and date, as Microsoft does with games on Xbox.

The addition of Nixxes adds a significant pool of talent in its PC port department, as Sony looks to bring more games to the platform in the future.
Click to expand...

"I highly respect Nixxes and am excited for this very experienced team to become part of the world-class development community at SIE," Hulst said in a press release. "They have a passion for improving games and for delivering the best possible experience for gamers. Nixxes will be a strong asset for everyone across PlayStation Studios, helping our teams focus on their most important goal, which is to create unique PlayStation content at the best possible quality."
Click to expand...

Support pretty much.
 
chris1515 said:
Nixxes is probably the studio doing the rumored Bloodborne remaster on PS5 and maybe PC.
Click to expand...
Nixxes is strictly a studio that does ports, not remakes.

More specifically, since their inception 20 years ago they only did ports of Eidos games, and since Eidos was purchased by Square Enix in 2008 they've only been working with Square Enix.


To summarize, what Nixxes only ever did were ports for studios that belong to Square Enix: Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal and IO Interactive.

https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixxes_Software

That said, I wonder if Sony really intends to drastically change what Nixxes has been doing for 20 years (e.g. working with FromSoft), or if there's something else brewing here.
 
ToTTenTranz said:
Nixxes is strictly a studio that does ports, not remakes.

More specifically, since their inception 20 years ago they only did ports of Eidos games, and since Eidos was purchased by Square Enix in 2008 they've only been working with Square Enix.


To summarize, what Nixxes only ever did were ports for studios that belong to Square Enix: Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal and IO Interactive.

https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixxes_Software

That said, I wonder if Sony really intends to drastically change what Nixxes has been doing for 20 years (e.g. working with FromSoft), or if there's something else brewing here.
Click to expand...

The wiki doesn't have it in there, but they've also helped with the PC version of FFXIV. For example, the graphical additions that appeared on PC in Heavensward that didn't exist on PS4 were additions done by Nixxes.

Regards,
SB
 
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