Gotham Knights and Hogwarts Legacy publisher reveals its focus on live service games, while Sony reconsiders its own plans

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Live service games are both in and out

Gotham Knights
(Image credit: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment)

Sony is reconsidering the live service plans it made earlier this year, while Gotham Knights' publisher says it wants to go all in. 

During Sony's FY2023 Q2 earnings call, company president Hiroki Totoki discussed Sony's live service plans and revealed the company was reviewing the 12 live service games it currently has in development. In May of this year, Sony was in the midst of a live service push as it aimed to "increase the number of active users on PC." Now, Totoki has said the company only plans to release six of the games by the end of the financial year 2025.

As transcribed by Twitter user @Genki_JPN, the Sony CFO said: "It's not that we stick to certain titles, but for the gamers, quality should be the most important." Last year, Sony acquired Halo creator and Destiny 2 developer Bungie for $3.6 billion - with plans to use the studio's live service experience to bolster its own online games. We already know that PlayStation studio Guerrilla is planning a Horizon Zero Dawn multiplayer game. 

In contrast to this, Gotham Knights and Hogwarts Legacy publisher Warner Bros. Games also held an earnings call yesterday and revealed its plans to go all in with live service games. As reported by Eurogamer, the company's CEO David Zaslav said: "Our focus is on transforming our biggest franchises from largely console and PC based with three-four year release schedules to include more always on gameplay through live services, multiplatform, and free-to-play extensions." 

This is somewhat surprising considering Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League was reportedly delayed following live service backlash from fans. In the same earnings call, Zaslav added: "Ultimately, we want to drive engagement and monetization of longer cycles and at higher levels. We are currently under scale and see significant opportunity to generate greater post-purchase revenue." The company currently holds the rights to several big lPs, including Batman, Harry Potter, Mortal Combat, and more. 

While we wait for all of these live service games, find out what else we'll be playing soon with our new games 2023 list. 

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Hope Bellingham
Hope Bellingham
News Writer

After studying Film Studies and Creative Writing at university, I was lucky enough to land a job as an intern at Player Two PR where I helped to release a number of indie titles. I then got even luckier when I became a Trainee News Writer at GamesRadar+ before being promoted to a fully-fledged News Writer after a year and a half of training.  My expertise lies in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, cozy indies, and The Last of Us, but especially in the Kingdom Hearts series. I'm also known to write about the odd Korean drama for the Entertainment team every now and then.  

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