Yesterday morning, PlayStation announced via tweet a new acquisition. Bluepoint Games, the developers behind the PlayStation 4 remakes of PlayStation 2 classic Shadow of the Colossus and PlayStation 3 genre-definer Demon’s Souls, are now “part of the PlayStation family.”
Introducing the next member of the PlayStation Studios family… pic.twitter.com/mRDLD5KwDM
— PlayStation (@PlayStation) September 30, 2021
As the console wars rage on, Microsoft and Sony are in a competition to swallow-up studios for first-party exclusives or limited-time console exclusives. Bluepoint marks the fourth studio that PlayStation Studios has purchased this year, following Firesprite, Housemarque, and Nixxes Software.
The Austin-based company did not announce any new games in development, but the studio has established a close relationship with Sony through a lot of repackaging.
After their last original release, 2006’s Blast Factor (the first PS3 game to run at 1080p 60 FPS), Bluepoint put together the 2009 God of War Collection for PlayStation 3. In 2011, they released The Ico & Shadow of the Colossus Collection for PS3 and Metal Gear Solid HD Collection for PS3 and Xbox 360. In 2012 they ported PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale to PlayStation Vita. In 2013, they ported the PS3 indie game Flower to PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita. In 2015, they put together Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection, an assembly of PS3 games for PS4, and then brought the 2012 PlayStation Vita Gravity Rush to the PS4. 2018 brought Shadow of the Colossus and last year brought Demon’s Souls. Bluepoint also ported Titanfall to the Xbox 360 from Windows and Xbox One in 2014.
Over at IGN, Jonathan Dornbrush interviewed PlayStation Studios head Herman Hulst and Bluepoint president Marco Thrush to discuss the acquisition. Thrush told IGN that Bluepoint has grown from 15 people during the original God of War Collection to 70 now, and the move from remasters to remakes was to “test [them]selves and push [them]selves harder for the next step” of original content. They felt encouraged by PlayStation’s “recent commitments to being willing to delay games to let teams achieve their vision on a reasonable schedule.” I’m sure we’re all excited to see what visions Bluepoint brings to PlayStation 5.