By March 2026, PlayStation expects to deliver “more than 10” live service games, a goal that will be aided by the company’s acquisition of Bungie. “Through close collaboration with Bungie and the PlayStation Studios, we intend to launch more than 10 live service games by the fiscal year ending March 31, 2026,” Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki stated during the company’s most recent earnings call.
Games that are updated with fresh material over time are known as live service games, and they make the majority of their money through in-game payments rather than initial sales. Totoki cited a significant increase in revenue from these types of games as one of the reasons Sony pursued the model:
“From the calendar year 2014 to the calendar year 2021, the size of the global game content market doubled, driven by add-on content revenue from live game services, which grew at an average annual rate of 15% during this period. We expect this trend to continue going forward.”
Bungie’s early investment in live service games, beginning with Destiny in 2014, has given it “a wealth of experience and outstanding technology in the field,” according to Totoki, which Sony sees as a big asset in acquiring the firm.
“The strategic significance of this acquisition lies not only in obtaining the highly successful Destiny franchise as well as major new IP that Bungie is currently developing,” explained Totoki, “but also in incorporating into the Sony group the expertise and technologies that Bungie has developed in the live game services space.
“We intend to utilize these strengths when developing game IP at the PlayStation Studios, as we expand into the live game services area.”
It’ll be a significant departure for Sony’s first-party games, which have tended to focus on single-player narrative experiences in recent years, with mixed results. Sony is unlikely to forsake this strategy, but live service games appear to be on the way to becoming a significant part of the company’s output.
Bungie is already working on a “comedic” new IP that could be included in Sony’s live service gaming lineup.
Interestingly, while these games are first-party, they may not be the exclusives that Sony is known for. Totoki also stated that the business intends to expand its presence on non-PlayStation platforms, citing the recent success of God of War on PC as an example. “On platforms other than PlayStation, we hope to recruit new consumers and boost engagement,” he stated.
This push could be related to Sony’s rumored Xbox Game Pass competitor, but it could also refer to the company’s continuous release of first-party PlayStation games on PC, as well as Bungie’s work in the multiplatform arena.
Sony is counting on the combination of live service titles and multiplatform releases to be a major revenue generator in the next years: “We expect to accelerate the growth of our first-party game software revenue, aiming to more than double the amount by FY 2025, catalyzed by the acquisition of Bungie,” Totoki stated.
