SONY seems to be trying to Sabotage Stellar Blade PC Launch

[Dexter]

I've been looking forward to the game for months, but I was hoping the Publishing Agreement they signed was going to be only for consoles and they were going to self-publish on PC, but apparently not...

• They barely avoided/dodged the PSN requirement, but they didn't dodge the SONY Region Lock from ~140 countries
  
  
• Many countries where it's still available apparently have exaggerated regional pricing
  
  
• It's the only game by SONY so far to feature Denuvo, "The Last of Us II Remastered" that launched just last month and "Marvel's Spider-Man 2" that launched earlier this year didn't feature Denuvo.

I've had a hundred earmarked for this game, so far I can barely swallow some of the decisions, despite how expensive the "Complete Edition" is. But I'm waiting for more Shenanigans to drop, and definitely not Pre-Ordering. Something tells me SONY may still have some surprises up their sleeve. The final shoe drop for me would likely be if they attach the SONY PSN EULA/Privacy Policy/Code of Conduct with weird ♥♥♥♥ in it like "Be Inclusive" to the game ahead of release, for what's a Single Player game.

Here's what's going to happen, if no more bad surprises drop until Launch I'm going to buy the game on Day-1. If anything else bad occurs from now until then and the Terms are altered even further I'll just get Clair Obscur instead, which seems to be a Single Player game without any EULA or other big Publisher shenanigans attached to it: https://steamcommunity.com/app/1903340/discussions/0/592895445665057366/

Yoko Taro warned Kim Hyung-Tae about it: https://www.ign.com/articles/stellar-blade-x-nier-automata-taro-yoko-hyung-tae-kim

Speaking of which, Mr. Kim, I wanted to ask you if there were any fights with Sony Interactive Enteratainment (SIE), since they are publishing Stellar Blade.

Kim: (Glances at SIE staff members in the room and laughs.) The people at SIE are… very, very nice!

Yoko: SIE’s staff members are pulling faces I’ve never seen before. I wish the readers of this article could see it!

Arrowhead Studios seemingly learned their lesson, and will self-publish their next game after what happened to Helldivers 2 due to SONY requirements and interference: https://www.pcgamesn.com/helldivers-2/arrowhead-next-game-without-sony

Square Enix also dropped the SONY console Exclusive deals recently: https://www.techradar.com/gaming/consoles-pc/square-enix-is-ditching-playstation-exclusivity-to-aggressively-pursue-a-multiplatform-strategy

Please devs in general and especially Shift-Up, if you make a sequel or any other game LEARN YOUR LESSON. You don't need the backing of some console publisher taking big parts of your profits to be successful, in fact you're likely to be more successful and make more money without them. It's absolutely not worth it signing your publishing rights away to SONY. It was probably one of the worst decisions you made with Stellar Blade. It could have been a Multiplatform Blockbuster Hit instead of a Single Console Exclusive.

If you absolutely need the money for some reason, at least just give them a few months of Console Exclusivity at the most, but don't hand the publishing rights for your game across all platforms to them. Don't trust SONY, SONY is Asshoe!

[Ryu Hayabusa]

Sony hates PC players.

[Reiss]

You know, I don’t want to defend Sony, but I think they had nothing to do with the decision to integrate Denuvo into the game. The way the developers themselves defended Denuvo - the lies about performance improvements (thanks to Denuvo), which only the laziest haven’t mocked - already shows it was entirely their call.
As for the regional blocking clauses, I’m well aware these were spelled out in the contract with the publisher. There’s zero chance ShiftUP didn’t read/skim over/knew nothing about that 'little' detail.
Now, it’s just convenient for someone to play the fool and act like they’re not involved in this mess. Draw your own conclusions.

[AILAD]

I think Denuvo is on shiftup, not Sony, for the reason that you mentioned.

The region lock because of PSN which is not even required is just insane at this point frog Sony.

[lailaamell]

also the devs might put the lock on aswell

[Flamescion]

They barely avoided/dodged the PSN requirement

Can you not read? The PSN linking in this game is purely for a bonus outfit and it's not required at all in any sense of the word.

Not surprised you people can't read tho.

[lailaamell]

Originally posted by Flamescion:

They barely avoided/dodged the PSN requirement

Can you not read? The PSN linking in this game is purely for a bonus outfit and it's not required at all in any sense of the word.

Not surprised you people can't read tho.

issue is its region locked in countries conveniently also all on the list of not being support by psn but so is every other sony game atm aswell

[Dexter]

Originally posted by AILAD:

I think Denuvo is on shiftup, not Sony, for the reason that you mentioned.

Publishing decisions like pricing, regions for release, DRM etc. are usually up to the publisher. A developer can petition or argue their opinion on these things, but ultimately it's not really up to them.

Which is one of the reasons more developers should self-publish in the first place, their success and profits would be due to their decisions and the quality of their work, not the whims or policies of publishers they're attached to.

[Iron]

I'd rather have Shift Up alone behind the wheel, at least there would be a chance for things to be good. Can't really be a lot worse than what we got this time.

[Pozhinateli]

Same as they sabotaged with PS5 release by day 1 censorship.

[Heinz]

I thought region locks was a Netflix thing. This is all new to me. I hope this will not be the future of PC gaming. Living at the mercy of terrible console companies.

[Sblade]

Originally posted by AILAD:

I think Denuvo is on shiftup, not Sony, for the reason that you mentioned.

The region lock because of PSN which is not even required is just insane at this point frog Sony.

Denuvo headquarters are SONY DADG Austria....

[TotemMX]

Originally posted by Dexter:

Which is one of the reasons more developers should self-publish in the first place, their success and profits would be due to their decisions and the quality of their work, not the whims or policies of publishers they're attached to.

Is easy to say, but most of studios dont have the money (neither want to assume the risk) to self publish their games.

[Michiru]

unfortunately, in some interview last year ShiftUp said they have no plans to self-publish their games in future
still, they can choose better publisher, someone like Bandai Namco who is pretty generous with their regional prices and NEVER region block any country, even Russia

[Wymn]

Originally posted by Michiru:

unfortunately, in some interview last year ShiftUp said they have no plans to self-publish their games in future
still, they can choose better publisher, someone like Bandai Namco who is pretty generous with their regional prices and NEVER region block any country, even Russia

Well... they surely don't region block but they have been blocking Venezuela in STEAM in a literally exclusive way without any explanation since 2022 and Bandai Namco is very predatory when it comes to DLC like skins and stuff like that so If Bandai Namco were to publish the game, all extra skins would have been 6$ each and extra quest/boss DLC would have been 30$ each lol

[TattooedMuslim]

Cdkeys have this for £45.99 so it's not all bad