Shuhei Yoshida has revealed that two PlayStation projects were cancelled after costing $25 million each; one of them was a new IP game from the developer of God of War.
We have heard about a few cancelled games in recent times, including the game screenshots for the scrapped God of War multiplayer title, images for Rare’s Everwild, comments on the cancelled Civil War game, and more. Now, Shuhei Yoshida has spoken about PlayStation projects that were cancelled after significant investments.
Two PlayStation Projects Costing $25 Million Each Were Cancelled
During an appearance on the My Perfect Console podcast (via VGC), Shuhei Yoshida opened up about cancelled PlayStation Projects. Yoshida first spoke about the internal game from God of War developer Santa Monica Studios. He confirmed that it was not a God of War game, but a new IP instead, with “a really amazing concept and very interesting gameplay ideas”.
Yoshida revealed that the game was supported for “many years”, but after putting in $25 million, the developers came to him saying, “We have to stop.” He wasn’t able to recall the exact reason for the cancellation, but it was probably because “the team was not able to find the game”. He added that it was a great concept, but “the gameplay didn’t really come to be.”
Shuhei Yoshida then discussed canceling “so many games” that were in early development. With most new games, developers will try a new idea, create a prototype, and if it’s successful, they continue; if not, it has to be reworked or stopped. Hence, early cancellation is not as expensive for them.
However, when projects like the Santa Monica title are progressing well and have had $25 million invested in them, it becomes a “tough decision” to cancel them. But in their case, the developers themselves came and told him, “You know, we probably have to stop.”
There Have Been “Much Bigger Cancellations”
Yoshida then spoke about another game “of the same size” that was cancelled. The cancellation occurred when Yoshida was put in charge of Worldwide Studios, where he was overseeing all the games in development. There were many “great projects” from European studios like London Studios, EyeToy, and eventually PSVR and Media Molecule, you know? Guerrilla Games.
However, there was one “big budget project” that didn’t “have the core game” similar to Santa Monica’s cancelled new IP. He added that these were the two large cancellations, “but these days, $25 million cancellation is nothing special. [There are] much bigger cancellations.”
Yoshida also spoke about how difficult it is to cancel games, even when there is a slight chance for the game to “turn around.” However, at the same time, the financial loss could become larger, and the developers could become tired of working on those titles, he explained. Which is why he tries to communicate during every cancellation, not to get stuck on a project, but rather to do “something different, something new, like brand new. So let’s do the fresh restart’.”
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Only one that I know of that one God of War III Director Stig Asmussen was developing they probably kept getting after him for and eventually shut him down, so he went to Respawn to make Star Wars