One of the best games of the year, Astro Bot, served as a great reminder of how much great IP PlayStation has and doesn’t use, but that might be changing.
There are so many titles that featured in Astro Bot, this year’s the recipient of the coveted Game of the Year Award at this year’s The Game Awards, that are beloved PlayStation titles, but haven’t had a new game in forever. Some of them, like Spyro and Crash, are out of PlayStation’s hands given that they’re owned by Xbox these days, and others like Okami are third party, but hey, that one’s getting a sequel anyway! Still, there were plenty of classics featured that could honestly do with another go around, like Ape Escape, Gravity Rush, and Bloodborne, for example.
There’s no actual word on any of these games getting a new entry, and the last couple seem pretty unlikely, but PlayStation boss Hermen Hulst has shared that the company is interested in bringing back some older titles.
Speaking to Famitsu (as translated by VGC), Hulst said that “the various IPs that we own are an important asset to PlayStation, and as part of our efforts to strengthen our portfolio, we are continually looking at opportunities to leverage past IP, as well as develop new franchises. Our goal is to publish games by the world’s best creators, both inside and outside of PlayStation, and we have achieved many successes so far by working closely with external development studios.”
Hopefully that doesn’t mean Ape Escape will come back as a gacha game where you can pull different apes (even though that sounds like a not half-bad concept as I’m writing this), but with Sony prioritising live-service above all else – even though that’s not been going smoothly – anything is possible. At least just give us a Bloodborne remaster, Sony, please…