Examples of Damage Control in Gaming: Sony Steps in Cross-Play Drama yet Again

You’ll find few sane people who don’t think allowing for cross-play in games is a good thing, the option to let players play games online across platforms in specific games. But Sony bizarrely hasn’t been playing ball when it comes to allowing games on their platform to cooperate with the same titles on others, though they’re fine with allowing it with PC versions like Street Fighter V.

This became a significant controversy with Fortnite, where Sony wouldn’t let PS4 owners play with Xbox One and Switch players and gave nonsense answers as to why. The same issue occurred with Rocket League and Minecraft, to the point that Nintendo and Microsoft made a small advertising campaign showing how well they were playing together for the latter. They also exchanged pleasantries on Valentine’s Day, to show how they’re truly “Stronger Better Together.”

After a heap of deserved complaints were sent in their direction, Sony decided to cooperate and allow for cross-play in these games after all. From here, it appeared these issues were over.

You’re seeing this post here, so you already know they’re not giving this up. Developer Gaijin Entertainment says it’s been in regular contact with Sony to enable cross-play for MMO air combat title War Thunder. They claimed to have asked Sony for it multiple times, which started when the Sony Cross-Play Beta program was in effect, but they’ve yet to hear back. Hi-Rez Studios was more direct on Twitter, saying they want Sony to “stop playing favorites and tear down the crossplay/progression wall for everyone” so they can enable cross-play for Smite, Paladins, and Realm Royale. It appears that Sony is either still not that committed to enabling cross-play, or they’re only willing to provide it for popular games. There are likely several more developers frustrated with this process.

Interestingly, Sony Worldwide Studios chairman Shawn Layden denied the difficulty involved in this during an interview with Game Informer (scroll down to the last question). Layden claimed they’re “open for business,” and elaborated on how simple the steps are to enable cross-play for PS4 games. He said it requires for developers and publishers to contact their account managers, who will walk them though the steps put in place after Epic Games’ issue with Fortnite. He continued by saying he doesn’t believe there’s any “gating factor,” and thinks developers are open to making proposals thanks to how well the process worked for other titles.

It sure sounds like someone is lying here, or isn’t too sure about how this works. Notice the uncertainty in some of Layden’s words; he actually did say “I don’t believe” and “I think” during this part in the interview, indicating uncertainty about the process. Some of those developers responded by saying they tried to go through the steps he explained, only to be put on-hold or told that it couldn’t happen.

The newest developer to join this saga is Chucklefish, who tried to get cross-play enabled for Wargroove before the game released at the start of this month. Developer CEO Finn Brice mentioned on the ResetEra forums that the company made several requests for cross-play to the account manager and by appealing to Sony’s higher-ups. But they were told it couldn’t happen, despite how easy it would have been for them to enable if Sony gave them the okay.

There are three possible scenarios here. Either the developers are lying, Layden is lying, or Layden is simply uncertain about this. Given his word usage, the last one there seems like the more likely scenario. It would be good for everyone if Layden realized this and is currently working to fix these issues following this interview, considering his answers are across the internet now. They should have this fixed before the next generation PlayStation console arrives, if not before then.

Interestingly, it feels like the chance of that happening lowered with the announcement of Jim Ryan’s appointment as Sony Interactive Entertainment’s new president and CEO. Ryan, by the way, has some absolutely spectacular opinions about several company-related matters. For one, he felt the shift away from showing indie games during press conferences was necessary due to how little context could be conveyed through small clips in montages. “It is almost viewed as wasted time,” he said during the interview with GamesIndustry.biz, despite the number of fans who miss these showcases. Ryan also had some choice words for backwards-compatible software in consoles, where he mentioned how “ancient” PSOne and PS2 games looked, and wondered “why would anybody play this?” Great.

None of this should be used as proof that the Sony from the late PS2 and early PS3 era has reared its ugly head again, but these signs are hardly encouraging. Hopefully they haven’t reemerged, if only because there’s no way they’ll be able to provide quotes on par with former Sony chairman and PlayStation system engineer Ken Kutaragi. It won’t be surprising if Sony provides a response to this reemerged fiasco soon, unless they really don’t care.