Sony has announced the acquisition of Savage Game Studiosa mobile video game development company, which will be transformed or at least will be the foundation for the creation of PlayStation Studios Mobile Divisionwhose name already makes the intentions of the corporation of Japanese origin very clear.
For a few years we have been experiencing a wave of acquisitions by giants that are amassing smaller companies, which are not small in themselves. Here we can highlight Microsoft, which after taking over Inxile, Obsidian Entertainment and Ninja Theory, has acquired ZeniMax (parent company of Bethesda and Id Software) and more recently Activision-Blizzard.
Probably as a consequence of Microsoft’s massive purchases, the competition has been forced to do the same so as not to be left behind. Sony reacted by taking over Bungie a few months ago and is now doing the same with Savage Game Studios to have its own mobile games division, which we’ll see how it works after Nintendo hasn’t shone too much in that sector with the exception of Pokémon Go .
The purchase of Savage Game Studios could respond to the diversification that Sony has promoted in recent years to cover video games via streaming with PlayStation Plus, virtual reality and its already consolidated presence on PC with the arrival of some of its star licenses. The rise in the price of PlayStation 5 in the current economic context could be another incentive to insist on diversification.
Hermen Hulst, head of PlayStation Studios, had this to say about the goals with PlayStation Studios Mobile Division: “Our mobile gaming efforts will be similarly additive, providing more ways for more people to engage with our content and striving to reach new audiences unfamiliar with PlayStation and our games. Savage Game Studios joins a newly created mobile division of PlayStation Studios, which will operate independently of our console development and focus on innovative on-the-go experiences based on existing and new PlayStation IPs”.
Hulst has also confirmed that Savage Game Studios is already working on an AAA mobile action game that would be provided as a “live service”, so it’s not implausible to think that the big PlayStation licenses could appear in the future as mobile apps. Android and iOS.