Sony’s E3 press conference left much to be desired this year — it was shorter than usual, featured no surprises and many of the titles showcased during the conference lacked concrete release dates. Well, Sony has taken note its fan’s frustrations and has revealed that all of the PS4 exclusive titles that were slated for a 2018 release, will “most likely” be released during the first half of that year.
The news comes straight from Shawn Layden, president of Sony Interactive Entertainment of America, who stated in an interview with The Telegraph that he and the company are aware of the criticism Sony has received concerning its press conference, then confirmed the release dates for many of the titles shown off during the event.
“To be honest, we’re already halfway through 2017,” he said, responding to the publication noting the lack of exclusives for the second half of this year.
“And that’s the nature of game development,” he later added. “No, I feel the lineup we have coming into the holidays this year – and [Gran Turismo Sport] will launch in the fall – I don’t know if you got to go to the pre-show? Well GT was heavily represented there on the floor. We think there is a lot of attention around that title from our company. And the stuff coming in 2018, all of that is coming in the first half of the year, so is it in the next 12 to 13 months? Most likely.”
If this comes to pass, Sony and the PlayStation 4 will likely dominate the first half of 2018. With titles such as Spider-Man, God of War, Days Gone and Shadow of the Colossus, there’s little reason why Sony can’t ride the momentum established from the first half of this year and ride that into the first half of the next. Unfortunately, every indicator points to nothing of note coming in the second half of 2018 as Layden was reluctant to mention anything of note.
Either way, this is good news for fans who had been hoping for anything more specific than “2018.” However, this whole situation still speaks to a larger problem that Sony has been a culprit of in recent years: it announces its games too early. It’s nice when we get to see an early glimpse of what Sony has in store for us, but it becomes frustrating when we see the same game a year later without a solid release date. Hopefully, Sony addresses this problem going forward (and maybe even stretch out the releases of its games), because what they’ve been doing has only worked so far because Microsoft lacks a solid Xbox-exclusive lineup to compete. The Xbox One X alone isn’t much to worry about, but the power of that console and a solid selection of console-exclusive titles will definitely give Sony something to worry about.
In the meantime, we can most likely look forward to these exclusive titles in the first half of 2018 and now we just half to wait until a later time for Sony to announce specific release dates.
