PlayStation Shuts Down First-Party Studio PixelOpus - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 05 May 2023 / 5,843 Views
Sony Interactive Entertainment is shutting down first-party developer PixelOpus, the studio behind Concrete Genie and Entwined, on June 2.
"Dear friends, our PixelOpus adventure has come to an end," reads a tweet from the official PixelOpus Twitter account.
"As we look to new futures, we wanted to say a heartfelt thank you to the millions of passionate players who have supported us, and our mission to make beautiful, imaginative games with heart. We are so grateful!"
Dear friends, our PixelOpus adventure has come to an end. As we look to new futures, we wanted to say a heartfelt thank you to the millions of passionate players who have supported us, and our mission to make beautiful, imaginative games with heart.
— PixelOpus (@Pixelopus) May 5, 2023
We are so grateful! ❤️🙏 pic.twitter.com/rQO2Cgvhnq
"PlayStation Studios regularly evaluates its portfolio and the status of studio projects to ensure they meet the organization’s short and long-term strategic objectives," said a Sony representative in a statement sent to GameSpot. "As part of a recent review process, it has been decided that PixelOpus will close on June 2."
PixelOpus was founded in 2014 and released Entwined in the same year for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation Vita. The studio would also release Concrete Genie in 2019 for the PlayStation 5 and was working on an untitled project in collaboration with Sony Pictures Animation that has now been cancelled.
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 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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I don't get it. Didn't they buy a couple of support studios just a few months ago? Couldn't they use this one as support for others?
There are differences PixelOpus is a small studio made up of around 15 people with no experience in support work, the other studios that Sony bought have the size technical knowhow and experience that support and porting studios need.
Regarding PixelOpus, with it being a boutique studio once you take away the staff that sit on the creative side of the fence you wouldn't have much left in way of technical staff to create a support studio .
Something that can go missing with these decisions is while past success of games plays a major role and is often the main determinate in these outcomes a positive or pessimistic outlook on future games may also decide its fate , so it may well be that based on the smaller investment needed for their games that PixelOpus sales and Roi ended up being Ok but its future game proposals fell short .of expectations
Here is to hoping everyone laid off is able to find new work quickly.
No doubt, the context seems right for expansion in the video game industry with all those new studio popping up this year. Even company as remote as the 'Cirque du soleil' are apparently looking to enter the this market: https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-and-life/entertainment/celebrities/2023/05/02/cirque-du-soleil-president-says-ai-in-entertainment-world-a-low-risk-to-company
"The Montreal-based company aims to see its brand on other platforms beyond live entertainment, including video distribution and video games, he said, teasing an announcement in the latter industry for later this month."
An article in french went a little more in detail teasing an announcement on May 25
The devs will probably go to a bigger ps studio so i dont worry too much but its sad because they made decent games.
Yes the studio is located within another studio of San Mateo HQ. They most likely will be slotted within there or elsewhere.
I'm sure the talent will be sent to other sony studios
Sadge to hear. I didn't play Concrete Genie yet, but it looked interesting.
Very sad since their games were quite unique and the studio name was cool, but if they weren't delivering I can understand the studio closing, hope they got transfered to other studios.
Games were amazing but they were niche at best,
Hopefully they get absorbed in other studios
of fucking course they did
Can't really say I'm disappointed. I know other enjoyed their games but they just weren't for me.
I guess they failed to produce results, it's a very small team to begin with. Still a shame the studio has closed, they could have let it live forth as a pet project.
They have a lot of stuff in the pipeline but it's just going to take time. They seems to have purchased a lot of studios but similar to MS it's just taking time for them to get their stuff rolling out. Luckily Sony still has their established studios lined up and pumping out the hits. MS is in a similar situation. Tons of studios but it's just taking them time to get their games out.
Me too, Sony have enough big teams that having 4 or 5 indie level shouldn't hurt and could actually keep the pipeline feed.
