SIE only has itself to blame, falling upwards despite making countless unforced errors worked last generation but eventually it has begun to catch up with SIE. Santa Monica cutting its external output helped them focus on rebooting God of War but means there are gaps in its first party line up. The de-facto withdrawal from Japan is not just bad PR, its bad for business.
Problem run deeper than covid or end of PS4 generation. Major change in culture required, perhaps a change in management but even if SIE does take steps to increase engagement, there are limits to what can be done now. Microsoft hardware being more appealing (Xbox Series S offers a more affordable option that SIE lacks an answer for), stronger first party plus Activision Blizzard, Gamepass, Switch & its successor. Aside from the steps I've
outlined before, gotta make full use of its history & fully commit to PSVR2 as key differentiators from much stronger competition.
More contentious (Legacy Platform!) but worth mentioning is PC support. Hard to measure the impact, even if more symbolic than financial, SIE hardware is less appealing now you can play (some) Playstation Studio games with better visuals & performance on PC. The lack of clarity on what is & is not being ported means that SIE is in no man's land between exclusively & multi-platform, unlike Microsoft (everything Xbox/Windows PC at launch) or Nintendo (fully exclusive) meaning it pays to take a wait & see approach. As to what they could do in the short term;
- Commit to patching in peer to peer online rather than switching off servers with no alternative (Killzone, Rigs).
- Remove PAL versions, NTSC by default, patches with translations.
- Relaunch PS2 range in full HD with QOL improvements & patches to ensure they work on PS5 (Ape Escape 2).
- PS3 emulation and/or remasters (Motorstorm, Killzone, inFamous).
- Patches for Bloodborne, Dead Nation: Apocalypse Edition, Driveclub & Shadow of the Colossus or Xbox BC performance upgrades on a system level.
- PS4/PS5 cross buy - no more upgrade fees to encourage PS4 users to buy a PS5 to revisit the game.
- PS4/PS5/PC cross buy - PC PSN or some type of deal with Steam / EGS to enable this option.
- PS1, PS2, PS3, PSP & Vita back catalogue, PS Plus & individual downloads for both first & third parties.
- PSVR backwards compatibility with PSVR2, either through emulation, ports & remasters.
- Create bespoke VR teams within every Playstation Studio & release a compilation of all prior Insomniac Games VR titles on PSVR2.