If you needed any more proof that the modern gaming industry is fundamentally broken at the executive level, today is the day. In a move that is as baffling as it is infuriating, Sony is officially shutting down Bluepoint Games.
The news, broken earlier today by Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier and subsequently confirmed by PlayStation, reveals that the studio will close its doors for good this March, leaving roughly 70 incredibly talented developers out of a job. PlayStation Studios head Hermen Hulst cited the usual corporate buzzwords in an internal email—”challenging industry environment,” “rising development costs,” and “economic headwinds.”
But let’s cut through the PR spin and call this exactly what it is: Sony punishing a gold-standard single-player studio for Sony’s own live-service failures.
Before they were fully acquired by Sony in 2021, Bluepoint was the undisputed king of remakes. They didn’t just port games; they completely revitalized them. They gave us the definitive way to play Shadow of the Colossus in 2018. They single-handedly carried the PS5 launch window on their backs with the breathtaking Demon’s Souls remake in 2020.
This was a studio that understood the assignment every single time. They knew how to respect legacy code, preserve the original artistic vision, and deliver highly polished single-player experiences that players actually wanted to buy.
So, what did Sony do after acquiring this powerhouse of single-player talent? They chased the live-service illusion.
Instead of letting Bluepoint do what they do best—perhaps tackling a highly requested Bloodborne remaster or giving another classic IP the Demon’s Souls treatment—Sony had them working on a live-service God of War game. Let that sink in. They took a studio famous for meticulously crafted self-contained experiences and shoved them into the multiplayer content-mill.
When that live-service project was inevitably canceled in January 2025 amid Sony’s broader disastrous pivot away from Games as a Service, Bluepoint was left out to dry. Reports indicate the team spent the entirety of 2025 pitching new projects, only for Sony executives to reject them all and shutter the studio completely.
The hypocrisy of closing Bluepoint becomes absolutely blinding when you look at how Sony treats its now favorite child: Bungie.
Let’s look at the facts. Sony bought Bungie for a staggering $3.6 billion specifically for their live-service “expertise.” What has that investment yielded in the last three years?
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Massive, repeated revenue misses that triggered devastating rounds of layoffs.
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A player base in free-fall following the disastrous reception of the recent Destiny 2: The Edge of Fate expansion.
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Endless delays for their upcoming extraction shooter Marathon, which has reportedly failed internal reviews and been plagued by stolen art controversies.
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Just a few months ago, Sony had to publicly eat a $204 million impairment loss because Bungie’s assets have depreciated so heavily.
Bungie has fumbled the bag at every single turn, bleeding hundreds of millions of dollars. Yet, they are allowed to keep the lights on and keep endlessly delaying updates (like this week’s three-month delay for the next Destiny 2 patch).
Meanwhile, Bluepoint—a studio with a flawless track record of actually shipping successful video games—is unceremoniously executed because the live-service pivot Sony forced upon them didn’t pan out.
Sony built its undeniable dominance during the PS4 era on the back of premium narrative-driven single-player games. It is the exact type of games Bluepoint excelled at making. Yet, in their desperate scramble for recurring revenue and infinite playtime, Sony’s leadership has completely lost the plot.
Concord failed. The Last of Us Factions was canceled. And now, Bluepoint Games is dead. It is a massive loss for the industry, a tragedy for the developers losing their livelihoods, and a massive red flag for the future of PlayStation Studios.
