Sony acquired Bungie for $3.6 billion at the beginning of the year. When Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Lane said the acquisition would not stop, users speculated.
Later, Jeff Grubb said that Sony was about to announce a major acquisition, and another whistleblower, Greg miller, also confirmed that he had also heard the rumor. Regarding the specific details of the acquisition, they said they did not dare to announce too much, otherwise, it would be very troublesome.
Games Beat reporter Jeff Grubb broke the news that the rumored “large acquisition” seems to be Sony’s acquisition of SE, but he can’t confirm the authenticity of this rumor. After all, such a large-scale deal will always risk falling through before it is finalized.
Now, Stephane D’Astous, founder of Square Enix subsidiary Eidos Montreal Studio, has revealed that Sony intends to acquire Square Enix Tokyo, thereby taking IPs such as Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts.
In an interview with GameIndustry, D’Astous opened up about how he felt working at Eidos, calling it a “chronic train accident.” Embracer announced the acquisition of Crystal Dynamics, Square Enix Montreal and other studios in May this year, and won IPs such as “Tomb Raider”, “Burst” and “The Thief” in one fell swoop, costing about 300 million US dollars. At present, Crystal Dynamics is actively developing the new “Tomb Raider” and is working with Microsoft to develop “Perfect Dark”.
It is worth mentioning that D’Astous left Eidos back in 2013 due to his “lack of courage and communication” at SE which affected his ability to work. He admitted to hoping that Square’s acquisition of Eidos in 2009 would transform the studio and help Eidos make a difference. “Don’t get me wrong, we’ve had good results,” D’Astous said, “but I’ve always felt that the way Eidos sells games is too traditional…it always underestimates the quality of the games.”
Before his departure, D’Astous was present at SE’s multi-project deal with Marvel, namely Marvel’s Avengers in 2020 and Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy in 2021. While both games received decent reviews, they were underwhelming commercially, which he attributes in part to superhero fatigue.
Games like Guardians of the Galaxy and the crystal-powered reboot of Tomb Raider were both called “disappointing” by SE, and D’Aastous confirmed Square would say that to its developers.
In his view, Square Enix Japan lacked confidence in its Western studios and revealed that SE often disparaged these studios in its annual financial reports. “Square Enix Japan always adds a sentence or two, ‘We were disappointed with some games. They didn’t live up to expectations,'” he said. They strictly take this approach for some games made outside of Japan. ”
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