After a long period of time collaborating with one another, Sony and developer Housemarque decided to make their relationship even more official this past week as the Finnish studio was revealed to have officially joined PlayStation’s first-party stable. The move, which seemed like an obvious one to many from the outside looking in, wasn’t always a sure-fire deal, it seems. In fact, Housemarque itself has now revealed that it had even more parties outside of those at Sony that had recently inquired about purchasing the studio.
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In a new interview with Yle.fi, Housemarque co-founder Ilari Kuittinen opened up about the process that the studio has gone through in being acquired by Sony. Kuittinen said that even though PlayStation was eventually the entity that opted to purchase the company, other suitors definitely came forward. The specific identities of these other companies weren’t revealed, but Kuittinen said that they were the “usual suspects” you would expect from countries like China, Sweden, and the United States.
What ended up selling those at Housemarque to go with PlayStation, however, seems to stem from the notion that Sony wanted to buy the company for a unique reason. “In our discussions, it became clear that Sony wanted to buy us because we are doing something that others are not doing,” Kuittinen said. In addition, the Housemarque founder said that Sony would allow them to largely keep being themselves and create the games that they are interested in. “Their starting point has not been that we would start making games according to the formula defined by Sony,” he went on to say.
As mentioned, it makes a lot of sense for Housemarque to join PlayStation Studios purely because of the relationship that both parties have had over the past decade. Even this year alone, Housemarque ended up releasing one of the PlayStation 5‘s big exclusives with Returnal. In our own judgment, that game is one of the best titles currently available on the PS5. You can check out our review of Returnal right here if you’re interested.
So who do you think some of these other companies in the mix for Housemarque could have been? Let me know either down in the comments or over on Twitter at @MooreMan12.
[H/T TGP]
