God of War co-developer Valkyrie Entertainment acquired by Sony’s PlayStation
Hermen Hulst, head of PlayStation Studios has announced that Sony has officially acquired support studio Valkyrie Entertainment, best known for its role in helping develop titles such as Halo Infinite, God of War and the upcoming sequel, Forza Motorsport 7, League of Legends, and Middle-Earth: Shadow of War.
“Since 2002, we have contributed to well over 100 titles, including great PlayStation franchises, such as God of War, Infamous, and Twisted Metal,” said Valkyrie president and founder Joakim Wejdemar.
The “invaluable contributions” Hulst was talking about might have been hinted at earlier. Valkyrie announced in a statement released on social media in September that the studio was working with Sony Santa Monica Studios on God of War Ragnarok.
Both Sony and Valkyrie have yet to reveal whether the latter will work on another title at the same time.
This was Sony’s fifth big acquisition this year with the Seattle-based Valkyrie becoming the 17th studio to operate under the umbrella of PlayStation. Previously in June, it acquired Returnal developer Housemarque, former WipEout developer Firesprite, and the developer behind the Shadow of the Colossus and Demon’s Souls remakes, Bluepoint. Additionally, it also purchased Nixxes Software.
“Valkyrie Entertainment is a highly adaptable and respected studio which has produced high-quality work on a range of platforms from console to PC; and a variety of styles from action to games-as-a-service titles,” said Hulst via a blog post.
“Valkyrie’s diverse capabilities will be welcomed by every team at PlayStation Studios as we continue to focus on delivering extraordinary gaming experiences.”
Will there be more acquisitions in the future?
It seems like Sony will acquire even more developers and studios. Previously in October Hulst told IGN that Sony “are open always to building new relationships or bringing people in-house, but only if we adhere to the quality-first mentality and the right kind of innovative content, new experiences, diverse experiences”.
Hulst has also said that PlayStation would bring an even more diverse range of games to the platform. He also said that Sony was “not buying teams to just be bigger”.
“We’re only buying teams because we feel that together, we’re going to make something that is going to be even better than if we did it separate from one another,” Hulst continued.
Sony’s another major move
Previously, It was also reported that Sony was making a Playstation version of Microsoft’s subscription service, Xbox Game Pass. Bloomberg reported that the service was set to be launched in spring 2022, and much like Microsoft’s Game Pass, it was expected to be available on PS4 and PS5 for a monthly fee.
The service, called Spartacus, is expected to merge PlayStation Plus and PlayStation Now into one offering. According to Bloomberg’s review of the documents they acquired from Sony inside sources, the launch of Spartacus will see the termination of PlayStation Now while the PlayStation Plus branding will be maintained.
PlayStation Plus is currently required for online gaming on PlayStation consoles while PlayStation Now is used to stream or download older PlayStation games.
