Days Gone Director Confirms Sequel Was Pitched to Sony - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 02 May 2021 / 1,912 Views
The former Sony Bend game director Jeff Ross speaking with God of War creator David Jaffe in an livestream (and transcribed by VideoGamesChronicle) combined that the studio had been working on a pitch for Days Gone 2, however, due to an NDA with Sony he could not confirm or deny that it had been cancelled.
Ross, who is now working at Mortal Kombat developer NetherRealm, said he was working on a Days Gone 2 pitch, but ended up leaving the company due to personal reasons and it "had nothing to do with the status of the sequel." He did confirm parts of a recent report were true such as that parts of Sony Bend were assigned to work on Naughty Dog games.
"I don’t think it’s publicly confirmed what the status of [Days Gone 2] is," said Ross. "I don’t want to be the guy who’s the official source for whatever that is. To answer your question, in that context, I will just say that the calculus for Sony at this point is… when a game like Days Gone started, we were 45 people, we were walking around asking how we could build an open-world game with 45 people, and the answer was we grew. We changed our number from 45 to something like 120."
Ross added, "There was a starting budget for Days Gone, which was big, but it’s not where we ended. We ended at a much higher number and I think that number is then probably the starting point for the next one.
"Sony with these big triple-A games… they’re not cheap games to make. The first Syphon Filter I think cost $1m or $2m. The second one was definitely $2m because we did it in a year. So the return of investment on those is great, [but] for games where you have to sell four of five million copies just to break even… there’s got to be a confidence in the return, because Sony doesn’t have the cash that Microsoft does and they’ve got to use it very intelligently and they’ve got to stay focused on a diverse portfolio."
Ross said that Days Done sold more copies than every other game the studio had released combined.
"Days Gone has sold more copies than every game the studio has ever made combined. So it’s successful in that way, and in the community and player response. But the critics… yeah, that was the Normandy Beach. It was a bloodbath.
"m super proud of it. The caveat is I know as well as anybody else what all the flaws are in the game. It’s not a perfect title, but it was the first entry in a series and you always know that the first one is establishing that beachhead, and then it’s a platform you’re going to build on top of, improve and double down on the right things."
The former Sony Bend game director added that the Days Gone 2 pitch had plans for a "shared universe with co-op play." This is a feature he wanted in the original.
"We wanted co-op from the beginning [in Days Gone], but obviously you have to make concessions for what you’re not going to be able to do," he said.
"It would’ve been a secondary mode if we’d have done it in the first one, or even in another one. I wouldn’t have complicated the main narrative… because that’s really what we’re good at. That was the strength of the first title, so build on that and make it better.
"But then take this world that you’ve built, and all these assets and systems, and repurpose them for some sort of similarly themed multiplayer version of this universe. So [it] would be with guys like Deacon trying to survive, building up a clubhouse or a crew. I think it would be fun to be in that world cooperatively and see what horde battles could be like."
Ross was asked if those plans would've made it into the sequel and he said, "It’s one of the things that we had in our pitch, yeah. It was the idea of a shared universe with co-op play."
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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The first game was still profitable, even though critics didn't like it. From what I've seen on Youtube, it seems there's a fair amount of people who found this game later and kind of wondered why it got so weak scores. So there's a fan base, it's a recognizable enough name and this time the devs wouldn't have to start from scratch because the basis is there to just improve and expand on what was good about the first one. On top of this, they have the storytelling skills to pull off a good game. I think there's enough here to make a sequel, but what do I know. Maybe we should start a hashtag campaign on Twitter or something.
The hits just keep on rolling in. Sheesh...
It was on open world game,
They took calculated risk and it didn't pay off,
I enjoyed the game though but looks like SONY is very strict with the metacritic scores hahaha
A daysgone sequel would be better left to around midway in ps5's cycle , once we start seeing ps5's true potential.
Sony are making some poor decisions at the moment....
Understood the reasons for both side, but for me this very good game didn`t need a sequel, I rather they use the experience they got and increase in size to make a new game even if it is a reboot of syphon filter.
Start playing it recently. So far one of the worst games sony released on the ps4, not surprised they don't want to make a sequel.
You are kidding right? This game is one of the best games I played last gen, and has some of the most satisfying gameplay .
So explicitly confirmed the other rumor article was spinning bullshit trying to yoke unrelated topics together, when he says he left for personal reasons and none of the drama hype about conflict with Sony. I don't really know why they should have immediately done a sequel anyways, better to work on other projects and come back to it later if it still feels worthwhile.
Honestly, I feel like the idea of just adding shared world multiplayer with base building etc is mediocre. I'd rather see the game world setting built on but not necessarily focused on survival element in same way, with progressing the timeline significantly that element could go way but still based off same story and history. I think alot of the bad reviews were based on it's early state which they improved alot on later, but either way I feel like they would go into a new projec (same or new IP) with alot better skills and experience.
