Last year was a strange one for the PlayStation brand, in that it felt like most of its perceivable highs were followed by at least one relative low. Marvel's Spider-Man 2 was the jewel in its first-party exclusive crown, for example, yet Xbox had Starfield. Final Fantasy 16 was received well, but Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth was delayed by several months. Runaway hit Baldur's Gate 3 inadvertently became a timed PS5 console-exclusive, yet Forspoken faltered in similar circumstances. 

Moreover, after months of pushback against Microsoft's high-profile bid to acquire Activision, that deal eventually went through. And while we're yet to see how that will inevitably alter the landscape of the video games industry in the longer term, you'd have to assume Sony will be keen to hit the ground running in the here and now – all of which paves the way for an interesting 2024 as far as PlayStation is concerned.

Games on

The first notable move for PlayStation in 2024 is The Last of Us 2 Remastered, a souped-up re-release of the 2020 original for PS5 that's due on January 19 and includes cut content by way of the "lost levels", and a new roguelike mode named No Return. Given the sheer volume of remakes this horror series has released over the last decade or so, this console-exclusive is hardly a big one, but it is a console-exclusive all the same. 

February is an exciting month for PlayStation fans, with the 4v4 online party shooter Foamstars kicking things off on February 4. It's then closely followed by the console-exclusive squad-shooter Helldivers 2, which brings an old twin-stick affair into shiny third-person in the process. Pacific Drive follows that on February 22, which our own Leon Hurley said already feels like a brilliant mix of the road, the radio, and roguelike after going hands-on earlier this year. And after that again comes what may well be the PS5's biggest game of 2024: Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. Landing on February 29, Rebirth marks the second part of the planned trilogy that reimagines its 1997 JRPG source material against today's standards, taking us beyond the confines of capital city Midgar for the first time.  

Into March and a game I'm personally pining for comes in the shape of Rise of the Ronin. Due on March 22, this Edo period-set action-RPG is the work of Team Ninja, whose past chops include everything from Dead or Alive to last year's Wo-Long Fallen Dynasty, and the superb Nioh series. After that, PlayStation's console-exclusive calendar dries up, but the likes of Phantom Blade 0, Sword of the Sea, Death Stranding 2 and Hideo Kojima's new project OD, Concord, Marathon, and Bloober Team's Silent Hill 2 remake all boast vague TBC due dates, with many of those expected to drop at some point in 2024.  

Hardworn

On the hardware front, 2023 was solid for PlayStation. Between its slimmed-down PS5, the PlayStation Access controller, the arrival of PSVR2, and even the PlayStation Portal – which our own Phil Hayton liked but didn't love, ultimately billing the handheld as a one-trick pony in their PlayStation Portal  – last year was busy for Sony in hardware terms. All of which means the 12 months ahead will likely be quieter to this end. Rumors tied to the whys, whens and hows of the PS5 Pro endure, of course, with some pockets of the internet suggesting 2024 is when we should expect an upgrade to the existing models that are out there right now. But that is, of course, all speculation.

What's also hearsay is who might replace outgoing PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan who, after announcing his plans to retire from the role last year, is expected to vacate his position in March, 2024. Looking over the fence, it's hard to predict exactly what Xbox has planned this year, but by the time a new face takes the throne at PlayStation that'll likely be more clear – and at that point, the new PS CEO will be better placed to determine how much they wish to alter the company's course of action. 

In the meantime, what I'd love to see from PlayStation in 2024 is something from the company's first-party studios. You'd have to assume Insomniac will go radio silent for the foreseeable following last year's catastrophic in-development leaks – which is totally fair – but the likes of Naughty Dog, Guerilla Games and Bluepoint could surprise us, either with something from their current ensemble of games, or something new altogether. The best place to do this? A blockbuster PlayStation Showcase event. Following last year's less inspiring showings, I'd love to see PlayStation come back with a bang on this front in 2024, and I'm sure the company itself is keen to do so given how front-loaded its schedule is for the year ahead. We often talk about tone-setting at this time of year, and whereas 2023 was stable but subdued for PlayStation as a whole, laying down a marker early doors seems like the most sensible tact for Sony and its flagship games brand. 

An email chain between current and former PlayStation bosses suggest that neither of them were particularly bothered by the Xbox Activision deal. In fact, they both seemed to think it was a bad deal for Call of Duty.

The email chain, dated January 19 and 20, 2022 - immediately after Microsoft announced its plans to acquire Activision Blizzard - was made public as part of this week's hearings over the deal. The first email came after an appearance by Xbox boss Phil Spencer on CNBC, where he said the deal would cement Microsoft's role in mobile gaming. That refers to King, the Candy Crush publisher which is the third pillar of Activision Blizzard.

"Strikes me as more of a King play than COD," former Sony Computer Entertainment Europe president Christopher Deering told current Sony Interactive Entertainment president Jim Ryan in the email. Deering notes that King sold to Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick for "$5 billion and has now grown to be worth £50 billion." Deering seems to be suggesting that the acquisition - which is on track to cost $68.7 billion - would be a good deal to pick up King.

Not so for Call of Duty, however. "If it was an Xbox exclusivity play, Spencer could have locked up MS console exclusivity for the next 3 COD releases for maybe £5 billion," Deering said, adding that "if this was a play to end run PS5, et cetera, I think it was massively overvalued and will not meaningfully succeed. I guess MS can piss away that kind of valuation without being more harmed than helped, but I am not losing a wink of sleep over the future for our baby."

Deering added in a PS note that Microsoft "would have been better off announcing a new electric car."

Jim Ryan's response to this email had been revealed earlier in the hearings, and he agreed at the time that the deal was "not an Xbox exclusivity play at all" and that he was confident Call of Duty would remain on PlayStation for "many years to come." He added that "I'm not complacent and I'd rather this hadn't happened, but we'll be OK, more than OK."

That's a notably different tone than the one Ryan would take in public soon afterward, repeatedly skewering Xbox's offers to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation and taking a central role in opposing the buyout as a threat to PlayStation's longevity. 

This week's hearings have also revealed Jim Ryan's claims that publishers "unanimously do not like Game Pass."

PlayStation boss Jim Ryan says publishers "unanimously do not like Game Pass," and claims that even if Call of Duty were to remain on PlayStation after the Xbox Activision deal, its presence on Microsoft's subscription service would cheapen its value.

Today's court hearings over Microsoft's planned buyout of Activision Blizzard (via The Verge) have revealed that, during a February 2022 meeting with investors, Ryan said, "I talked to all publishers [and] they unanimously do not like Game Pass, because it's value destructive," adding that it's a "very commonly held view by publishers." 

While Microsoft has made repeated assurances that it intends to keep putting Call of Duty on PlayStation even if the deal goes through, Ryan contends that just putting the series on Game Pass would still diminish its value for PlayStation. Asked by an FTC lawyer if he had evidence of Microsoft games getting pulled from PlayStation (via Stephen Totilo on Twitter), Ryan said that "I believe the stance Microsoft is taking with regard to subscription service pricing is evidence at best of partial foreclosure."

In other words, Ryan believes Microsoft could partially restrict - or foreclose, in the terminology he's using here - the value of Call of Duty or other games on PlayStation simply by virtue of the fact that it would be $70 on PS5 and part of a $15 subscription on Xbox. Sony has been making similar arguments for months, suggesting Call of Duty could become a "de facto exclusive" for Xbox in a response to the UK CMA investigation into the deal. 

Ryan's deposition today also confirmed that Sony expected to see Starfield and The Elder Scrolls 6 on PlayStation, and that while he doesn't like Starfield going Xbox-exclusive, he doesn't "view it as anti-competitive." 

PlayStation chief Jim Ryan says that while he doesn't like Starfield's Xbox exclusivity, he doesn't view it as anti-competitive.

Axios journalist Stephen Totilo reported that, during his deposition as part of the FTC lawsuit over the Xbox Activision deal, Ryan was asked about Xbox's exclusivity practices in the wake of its acquisition of Bethesda. Regarding exclusivity details for both Redfall and Starfield, Ryan said "I don't like it," but "I fundamentally have no quarrel" with Redfall and "I don't view it as anti-competitive" when it came to Starfield.

Ryan's comments about Starfield and Redfall are very different to Sony's stance on Call of Duty. Around the world, several lengthy anti-competition investigations have focused on that franchise, which Microsoft has pledged will remain available on PlayStation for at least ten years, should the deal go through. In most territories, the deal has been approved, with the most notable exception being in the UK, where Cloud Gaming was a bigger stumbling block for Xbox and Activision. Both companies are appealing the decision of the UK's Competition and Markets Authority.

Elsewhere in his deposition, Ryan said he expected both Starfield and The Elder Scrolls 6 to release on PlayStation before Xbox bought Bethesda. Suggestions that the games might have instead been exclusive to Sony's platforms are understood to have kickstarted Microsoft's purchase of their developer. The ongoing availability of Call of Duty on PlayStation appears to have turned heads at Bethesda, however, as publishing lead Pete Hines queried that decision as "confusing" in regards to his own studio.

Just in case it needed spelling out, Starfield won't be coming to PS4 or PS5.

A newly revealed email suggests PlayStation boss Jim Ryan wasn't overly concerned that Call of Duty would become an Xbox exclusive franchise shortly after Microsoft's Activision buyout was announced.

The email, dated just two days after the buyout was made public in January 2022, was shown during Thursday's hearing between Microsoft and Activision and the US Federal Trade Commission (via IGN), which is seeking approval for a preliminary injunction against the purchase.

"It's not an Xbox exclusivity play at all," Ryan said in the email, "they're thinking bigger than that, and they have the cash to make moves like this. I've spent a fair bit of time with both Phil [Spencer, Xbox boss] and Bobby [Kotick, Activision Blizzard boss] over the past day. I'm pretty sure we will continue to see COD on PS for many years to come."

Microsoft's lawyers argued that Ryan's relatively carefree attitude at the onset of the transaction proves the PlayStation maker's main interest in stopping the buyout from closing is protecting its leading position in the market.

"Today showed Sony has known all along we'll stand by our promise to keep games on its platform and made clear its work to lobby against the deal is only to protect its dominant position in the market," a spokesperson for Microsoft told IGN.

As Microsoft begins defending its intended purchase of Activision against the FTC in court, the Xbox company has made clear the stakes couldn't be higher. On Thursday the company said the week-long hearing will "decide whether the deal goes forward," explaining that if a judge grants an injunction against the purchase it could result in a delay significant enough to sink the transaction.

Here are all of the new games of 2023 coming to Xbox Series X, PS5, PC, and Nintendo Switch.

PlayStation was sure it would retain Call of Duty simply because of Sony's presence. 

New comments from PlayStation head Jim Ryan were uncovered by reporter Florian Mueller, and they paint a pretty confident picture of the company. Ryan was apparently confident PlayStation would still get Call of Duty releases even if Microsoft's purchase of Activision Blizzard proceeded, purely because of Sony's dominance on the gaming scene. 

It's pretty hard to argue with Ryan's stance here - just look at the extent to which the PS5 is currently outselling the Xbox Series X and S around the world as proof of PlayStation's unavoidable presence in gaming.

Ryan's comments are perhaps a little less of a "bombshell" considering Microsoft literally offered to put Call of Duty on PlayStation devices for a decade. Microsoft was offering damn near anyone a 10-year deal for Call of Duty-related things like game streaming and cloud technology, but their offer to put the franchise on PlayStation for a decade was by far the most noteworthy.

In actual fact, this is the deal that PlayStation and Ryan weren't satisfied with. PlayStation reportedly turned down the deal from Microsoft, and so Ryan's new comments seem to imply that PlayStation was sure it would retain Call of Duty even after they'd turned down the initial decade-long offer from Microsoft. That's a very, very confident stance from PlayStation.

Don't forget, we're still getting a new Call of Duty game this year, according to Summer Game Fest host Geoff Keighley. 

Update - March 15: Activision chief communication officer Lulu Cheng Meservey has clarified when and where Sony chief Jim Ryan reportedly told the publisher that "I just want to block your merger" with Microsoft.  

In a new tweet discussing a story from Polygon, Meservey clarified that there was no "gentleman's agreement" to keep any comments around the company's recent Brussels meeting confidential, and more to the point, that Ryan's comment "was not part of the closed door hearing" to begin with. 

"Our side has not shared info from the hearing and doesn’t plan to," Meservey said. "Even if people take Sony’s side of the issue, they should know we respect confidentiality." 

"Same day, same place, but not part of the hearing or subject to any agreement on confidentiality, formal or informal," she added. 

Meservey has not disputed the wording of Ryan's comments, which represent a surprisingly blunt counter to negotiations over the pending deal – or perhaps unsurprisingly blunt, given the many ways Sony has called out Microsoft over previous deals. 

As it happens, earlier today Microsoft announced its fourth 10-year deal in four weeks in its ongoing attempt to push the acquisition through. 

Original story follows...  

An Activision exec claims that Sony chief Jim Ryan said he had no interest in an improved deal over Call of Duty and was simply focused on blocking the Xbox Activision deal.

In a tweet yesterday, Activision chief communication officer Lulu Cheng Meservey - who has previously been posting through it in an attempt to help pass the merger - posed a rhetorical question: "We've [...] offered Sony guaranteed long-term access to Call of Duty. But they keep refusing. Why?"

According to Cheng Meservey, the answer to that question was provided on February 21, when Microsoft and Sony's executives met in Brussels, reportedly in an attempt to hammer out details of the deal. On that day, Microsoft confirmed its deal to bring Call of Duty to the Nintendo Switch, and announced an additional, similar agreement with Nvidia GeForce Now, but it seems they didn't make much headway with Sony. Cheng Meservey claims that Ryan told Xbox and Activision that "I don't want a new Call of Duty deal. I just want to block your merger."

Microsoft has provided Sony with multiple deals over Call of Duty, and while a 'forever' agreement will likely never be on the table, Phil Spencer has suggested he's happy to offer Sony a longer-term deal if that'll help swing things, but Ryan's comments suggest Sony isn't interested in giving up any market share if it can avoid doing so.

The fate of the merger is still unclear. The UK's Competition and Markets Authority has suggested that Xbox could get the deal over the line by agreeing to sell off parts of Activision-Blizzard, but that's an idea that Microsoft leadership has been firmly against. Increasingly, however, it looks like it's on Microsoft to find ways to convince antitrust regulators rather than Sony, a company that has made it clear it's prepared to burn bridges to quash the deal - even going so far as to suggest that Microsoft might provide its customers with a sabotaged version of future Call of Duty titles. If Cheng Meservey's tweet accurately represented Ryan's words, it looks like Sony isn't prepared to give up any ground.

Want to see the future of Microsoft's console? Here's our list of upcoming Xbox Series X games.

Sony Interactive Entertainment president and CEO Jim Ryan says the PS5 shortage that's plagued the console's availability for more than two years is nearing its end.

Speaking this week at CES 2023 (thanks, CNET), Ryan had good news for folks still trying to buy a PS5. According to the PlayStation boss, not only should it be "much easier" to find PS5 stock right now, but he also expects that increase in availability to continue well into the future.

"Everyone who wants a PS5 should have a much easier time finding one at retailers globally starting from this point forward," Ryan said.

As it would turn out, increasing supply to meet demand has proved a winning strategy for Sony, which recently announced that the PS5 had topped 30 million units sold globally. That's still short of a third of the goal of 100 million units sold Sony set back in October 2020, but the PS5 still has a good few years left in its lifespan to get there.

A tantalizing list of upcoming PS5 games including Final Fantasy 16, Marvel's Spider-Man 2, and Forspoken - not to mention a robust catalog of great games that are already available on the console - will surely help continue Sony's sales momentum in the console space. Oh, and then there are the rumors of a PS5 Slim that's supposedly cheaper and more compact than the original, but we're getting ahead of ourselves there, as there's been no official word from Sony on that.

Here are the best PS5 prices, bundles, and deals currently going.

PlayStation head Jim Ryan has stressed the PS5’s supply issues are now “resolved,” and has apologized for stock shortages since launch. 

 At the recent PlayStation Partner Awards in Japan, Ryan appeared onscreen to give a brief message to the assembled crowd. “We would like to report that we have resolved the long-term supply issues of the PlayStation 5 and we will be able to deliver to Japan and Asia customers from year-end shopping season and into 2023,” Ryan said (as translated by Genki on Twitter). 

“We apologize for any inconvenience and greatly appreciate your understanding and cooperation,” Ryan concluded on the matter. Ryan didn’t elaborate on how or why the PS5’s ongoing stock and supply issues have finally been resolved now in late 2022, but this news is no doubt a relief for potential customers who’ve been struggling to get their hands on the elusive new-gen console for the past three years or so.

However, Ryan doesn’t specifically state that stock and supply issues for the PS5 have been resolved worldwide. While one could infer this from his speech, the PlayStation head stresses that Sony is targeting Japan and Asian audiences for stock for the upcoming Holiday season. Assuming this does apply to worldwide audiences, you’d think there would be a worldwide announcement from Sony relatively soon.

This doesn’t mean PlayStation won’t take stock from these regions and ship them round the world. Sony previously flew PS5 stock from Asia all the way to the UK back in 2021, right before the Holiday season kicked off, perfect for bolstering sales throughout the country just in time for Christmas shopping.

Check out our complete upcoming PS5 games guide for a full look over all the new-gen exclusives coming to Sony’s console in the future.  

PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan says Xbox's offer to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for three years after the publisher's current deal ends is "inadequate on many levels." 

In a statement to GamesIndustry, Ryan addressed the deal which Xbox head Phil Spencer mentioned earlier this month in his own statement on the effects of Microsoft's still-pending, near $70 billion acquisition of Call of Duty publisher Activision. 

"Microsoft has only offered for Call of Duty to remain on PlayStation for three years after the current agreement between Activision and Sony ends," Ryan says. "After almost 20 years of Call of Duty on PlayStation, their proposal was inadequate on many levels and failed to take account of the impact on our gamers. We want to guarantee PlayStation gamers continue to have the highest quality Call of Duty experience, and Microsoft’s proposal undermines this principle." 

As The Verge reported last week, Spencer revealed that "in January, we provided a signed agreement to Sony to guarantee Call of Duty on PlayStation, with feature and content parity, for at least several more years beyond the current Sony contract, an offer that goes well beyond typical gaming industry agreements." 

Ryan also set his sights on Spencer's statement specifically, stressing that "I hadn’t intended to comment on what I understood to be a private business discussion, but I feel the need to set the record straight because Phil Spencer brought this into the public forum."

Surprisingly candid comments aside, all of this echoes reports from January which alleged that PlayStation would get "at least" the next three Call of Duty games (presumably assuming an annual release schedule, though recent rumors claim the series may skip 2023). 

Microsoft has also repeatedly claimed that Call of Duty will stay on PlayStation "into the future," though Spencer's recent statement on a three-year window was the first to provide official specifics on how far into the future that might be.  

Spencer upheld this stance in an official statement published on September 1. "We’ve heard that this deal might take franchises like Call of Duty away from the places where people currently play them," he wrote in a blog post which also confirmed that multiple Activision Blizzard games including Call of Duty would be coming to Game Pass. 

"That’s why, as we’ve said before, we are committed to making the same version of Call of Duty available on PlayStation on the same day the game launches elsewhere. We will continue to enable people to play with each other across platforms and across devices," Spencer promised. 

The UK's Competition and Markets Authority has expressed concerns that Microsoft buying Activision could unfairly box out rivals such as PlayStation and impede future competition in the industry. 

Even as PlayStation unveils its renewed PS Plus subscription service as a competitor to Xbox Game Pass, company CEO Jim Ryan reckons gaming subscriptions will never "go to the levels we see with Spotify and Netflix." 

Speaking with GamesIndustry, Ryan acknowledged that "subscription has certainly grown in importance over the course of the last few years," with PlayStation's own premium subscription service recently topping 48 million subscribers. While Ryan expects PS Plus to continue to grow as PlayStation rolls out its expanded, three-tier model, his expectations for the games industry as a whole are more reserved.

"The medium of gaming is so very different to music and to linear entertainment that I don't think we'll see it go to the levels that we see with Spotify and Netflix," he says of subscription services. Regarding long-term engagement, Ryan adds that live service games "arguably fit that bill better than a subscription," and is quick to stress that "it's all about choice" and "nobody is obliged to do anything." 

Ryan's argument, it seems, is that while gaming subscriptions will keep expanding, they will not become the go-to way that a majority of users play games. 

Xbox Game Pass, in particular, is often described as a Netflix of games – though that's really just a shorthand term to sum up the user experience – and the renewed PlayStation Plus announced today seems functionally similar, though it will lack some key features such as day-one launches for big games like God of War Ragnarok. Ryan attributed this approach to the "virtuous cycle" of investment and success that's all but enshrined at Sony's first-party PlayStation Studios, and argued that day-one subscription launches would see a "knock-on effect on the quality of the games that we make." 

What the new PlayStation Plus could learn from Disney Plus to become a Game Pass rival. 

While PlayStation CEO and president Jim Ryan is optimistic about the future of PS5, he says the innate limitations of "the existing console model" continue to frustrate him.

Speaking to GamesIndustry in a recent video interview, Ryan stressed that he would "like to see a world where the games that we make at PlayStation can be enjoyed by many, many tens of millions of people, perhaps hundreds of millions of people." As the lead executive of one of gaming's biggest platforms, Ryan's obviously hoping to see PlayStation do well and reach more people, but the underlying dream here seems to go beyond making console numbers go up.

"Right now, a success with the existing console model, with a really great PlayStation hit we're talking 10 or 20 million people able to play that game," Ryan says. "If you compare that, and we're talking about games stacking up against music, we're talking about games stacking up against movies. Music and movies can be enjoyed by almost limitless audiences. 

"I think some of the art that our studios are making is some of the finest entertainment that's been made anywhere in the world," he continues, "and to kind of gate the audience for the wonderful art, the wonderful entertainment these studios are making, to gate the audience for that at 20 or 30 million frustrates me. I'd love to see a world where hundreds of millions of people can enjoy those games." 

The reach of PS5 games hasn't been aided by the ongoing supply limitations facing new-gen consoles (as well as basically everything else powered by silicon chips), and gaming has only become more expensive as a hobby. Unless the PS5 somehow greatly outsells the PS2, a console which set records under economical conditions which may never be replicated, it will still run into the "gate" Ryan's described. Success will be measured in the tens of millions at most. 

Sony has invested in bringing its games to more platforms through PC ports like the upcoming Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves collection, and it's even acquired port specialist Nixxes Software to help with future efforts in that space, but even that can only add so many potential players. It's unclear when or how the sheer reach and ubiquity that Ryan's described will be attainable for games, but it stands to reason it won't be within "the existing console cycle." 

On the heels of its acquisition of BluePoint, the remaster master behind Demon's Souls and Shadow of the Colossus, PlayStation says we will see more acquisitions. 

Jim Ryan has refuted claims that Sony is moving away from Japan in an exclusive interview in Edge Magazine, claiming the company is excited at the state of game development in the country. 

Speaking in E353, which goes on sale today 3 December, Ryan is asked about "conscious shift away from the Japanese market", as some have suggested is happening after PlayStation has swapped the meanings of the Circle and X button for the PS5. Ryan responds: "The Sony stance is that the Japanese market remains incredibly important to us. We have not been as excited about the engagement of the Japanese game development community as we are now for many years."

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Ryan points out that roughly ten years ago, Japanese developers seemed to be moving towards mobile gaming, but have since come back to consoles and PlayStation in the past 5 years. He explains: "We saw in the second half of the PS4 cycle a greater level of engagement from those Japanese publishers. That continues and strengthens yet again with PS5."

He also highlights the Future of Play showcases from earlier in the year, where 8 of the games highlighted in both streams came from Japanese developers. Ryan then says: "I’d also observe that we’re making a statement by launching in Japan day and date with the US, and that is not what we did with PS4. So I read that stuff. A lot of that commentary is inaccurate, and Japan – as our second largest market and as Sony’s heartland – continues to be really important to us."

Ryan discusses much more in the latest issue of Edge, including the PS5's price point, next-gen pricing, and the implications the pandemic has had on launching the PS5. Be sure to pick up the latest copy of Edge online at Magazines Direct.

Check out the latest updates on where to buy a PS5 and if you manage to get one, be sure to take a look at our best PS5 headsets and best PS5 accessories guides.