DAYS GONE GAMEPLAY PS4

The gist seems to be that things weren’t the best at Sony Bend for quite a while. Ross has said that ideas were floated around for a Resistance game, as well as for a new Syphon Filter game, but none of these came to fruition either. Reports have claimed that an Uncharted game was in the works at one point, with Naughty Dog supervising, but was shelved when the studio expressed its disappointment at having to work on the IP under another developer’s supervision rather than something of its own. In that time, Bend had some other projects going, almost none of which came to fruition. That, in turn, led to Ross’ departure as well.

Following that, the developer adopted a flat structure- rather than having one or two directors in charge, they adopted a committee approach for their next project, which, according to Ross, was far from ideal for the development of a massive, ambitious AAA project. As Ross explained in the USA Today interview, not long after Days Gone’s launch, creative director John Garvin was let go by the studio, apparently because there was quite a lot of friction between him and many others at Bend. There’s also the fact that Bend itself has seen a lot of changes over the last couple of years. Given that, it’s clear that Days Gone inherently lost a lot of value as an IP in its publisher’s eyes. Its lower 70s Metacritic score falls way below the standards that Sony has clearly set for itself, which demand its prestige, flagship titles to be among the best games of the year every year. That, of course, is down to the game’s critical reception. It apparently sold quite well (though there’s some confusion about the exact sales figures, especially seeing as Sony has not provided the same), but even so, Days Gone was considered a disappointment by the higher ups. With those ideas and a lot of the technology already in place, a sequel could have not only refined the original game’s ideas, but taken them even further with additional layers.īut as Ross explains, Sony Bend’s own local management wasn’t happy with how the first game performed. On top of that, with a foundation firmly in place, there was the feeling that Bend would be able to weed out a lot of the issues that generally go hand in hand with developing a completely new IP from scratch. They wanted to expand upon the excellent emergent, systemic gameplay of the first game, while layering new gameplay ideas and mechanics on top- from new animals in the open world to co-op and multiplayer to adding actual, proper swimming. Days Gone’s development was laden with budget constraints and time constraints, and Ross has talked about how a number of the issues that were present in the game were in there exactly for those reasons, from the start-stop pacing to the technical problems to the inconsistent boss fights and mission design.įor Days Gone 2, Sony Bend had several interesting ideas. So why is it that Days Gone wasn’t given the chance? What the hell happened?Ī recent interview conducted by USA Today with former Days Gone director Jeff Ross – who is no longer at Sony Bend – has provided a number of interesting insights- and the gist seems that be that after the complicated and troubled development of the original game, the starts just could not align for a sequel in the way that some at Bend had hoped they would. But more than a few times, we’ve seen games that have managed to sand out their rough edges after the first instalment with a stellar sequel- Sony’s own Uncharted did the very same, after all.

The studio seems to have left the IP behind, and now is working on another new open world IP. In early 2021, reports revealed that Sony Bend’s pitch for a Days Gone sequel had been rejected by Sony (or maybe even by Bend’s own local management).

That sequel probably isn’t going to happen anytime soon, if ever. But then again, Days Gone had plenty of bright spots as well, and the general feeling among those who played it was that with a sequel, developer SIE Bend Studio could deliver something truly special.

DAYS GONE GAMEPLAY PS4

Pacing issues, technical problems, some half-baked gameplay ideas, and other flaws combined to make for what was probably one of the roughest first party PlayStation releases of the PS4 era (at least in its later years). One of the biggest stumbles for Sony’s first party was Days Gone– a solid enough game in its own right, but not quite at the level that Sony would have wanted it to be. With the likes of God of War, Marvel’s Spider-Man, The Last of Us Part 2, Ghost of Tsushima, and many more, internal Sony studios were consistently putting out one excellent game after another that could easily rank as some of the best games of the console generation.

First party releases have always been one of PlayStation’s most crucial cornerstones, but with the PS4 generation, they became even more crucial to Sony than ever.

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