Sony is shutting down Dark Outlaw Games, the first-party game studio led by former Call of Duty creator Jason Blundell. bloombergJason Schreiber reports. Schreiber says that before leading Dark Outlaw Games, Blundell was the head of Deviation Games, an independent studio, but was also developing a PlayStation game before it was shut down.
Dark Outlaw Games has yet to announce what it is working on, but given Blundell’s experience with the Call of Duty franchise, it seems the studio was developing a multiplayer project for PlayStation. Blundell was a programmer and producer at Activision before going to work at Treyarch. call of duty 3And he then contributed to several Call of Duty: Black Ops games, including serving as director of the campaign and Zombies modes. Call of Duty: Black Ops III and career and zombies mode Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.
Engadget has reached out to Sony for more information on the fate of the Dark Outlaw games. We will update this article if we get any response.
According to Schreiber, the studio’s closure is being combined with PlayStation’s staff reductions focused on mobile development. Sony has made a habit of laying off employees and closing studios over the past year, seemingly as a way to step back from earlier investments in online, live-service multiplayer games. Bluepoint Games shut down in February after the company attempted to shut down the live-service God of War game. Sony also shut down Fireworks Studios after the multiplayer shooter’s spectacular failure harmony In October 2024. And a year before that, Naughty Dog officially dropped work on a standalone multiplayer version of The Last of Us due in December 2023.
This leaves Sony with at least two Horizon Zero Dawn spin-offs, a co-op game from original developer Guerrilla Games and an MMO from developer NCSoft; fairgame$Joe Heaven is still in active development despite the departure of studio head Jed Raymond; Arrowhead Game Studios’ Helldivers 2; Bangi’s destiny 2 And marathon; And if you really want to stretch, gran turismo 7. Sony clearly hasn’t given up on producing online multiplayer games, but it’s hard not to characterize its attempt to expand in this area as a disaster.
<a href