Ranking PlayStation Studios

Rating and Ranking PlayStation First Party Studios

There is no understating the importance of first party studios when discussing the best console around. During the PS4 and Xbox One generation, the argument was always that Sony had better first party titles and there was truly no counter for it. Some of the best games of the past decade were exclusive to the PlayStation 4 including Horizon Zero Dawn, BloodBorne, God of War, Uncharted 4, Last of Us: Part 2, SpiderMan, Ghost Of Tsushima and the list goes on like this for a while.

The thought occurred, we all know just how important first party studios are, but we don’t really have a rating scale for these studios. Sports are much easier, you can easily see someones batting average, or how many touchdowns or how many triple doubles, but when it comes to gaming it feels a little more in the grey area. It feels like studios are almost judged similar to popularity where it becomes more about what the most recent release was, as opposed to the overall track record of the studio.

When trying to figure out what studios to use, it felt best to leave the smaller studios out of the argument and focus only on higher profile, triple a studios that typically make blockbuster games or are at least feel like they are on the cusp on mainstream success.

For the first instalment of studio ratings we are only going to be focusing on Sony First Party Studios or as they are better known today, PlayStation Studios.

How it works!

The first thing to figure out before trying to give these studios a rating based their games is to figure out what the criteria would be when determining what studios are applicable.

Rule 1: No one hit wonders! We are only going to be including studios with at least two games on their resume.

Rule 2: The studio needs to be fairly active, which means that only studios with at least two games over the past decade would be included.

Rule 3: There will be a recency bias. This means that the last effort means the most and carries more weight towards the studios final score. This will be achieved by multiplying the most recent release score by 1.1.

The List

The Rest

Before we start talking about the biggest studios in the portfolio we will gather all the smaller ones. The rest of the studios in the portfolio don’t quite deserve the same recognition as some of the more household names. Housemarque had mostly focused on smaller indie, arcade style titles before 2021, which means that it will be really interesting to see how the studio uses the success of Returnal to springboard the studios popularity with the next title. Bend feels like they are on an upwards trajectory after the release of Days Gone that didn’t fare well with critics but had a lot of impressive features.

Media Molecule has only developed and released one game in the last 10 calendar years, which means that they weren’t included due to the rules laid out before creating the list. Even though the engine behind dreams is incredible, it didn’t breakthrough yet like Sony probably hoped it would, even though it had a lot of impressive features.

Days Gone (71x1.1) + Uncharted: Golden Abyss (80) = Bend Studio Rating 79.05 (8th)

Returnal (85x1.1) + Matterfall (73) = HouseMarque Rating 83.25 (7th)

SuckerPunch Games

If there is one pattern to see with PlayStation Studios, it’s how they have all evolved over the past two decades. There is no exception for SuckerPunch Productions, who have come a long way since their first PlayStation title, Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonnus in 2002. The game was both a critical and commercial success as it spawned two sequels that followed shortly after in 2004 and 2005, both of which were developed by SuckerPunch, but even many years later in 2013, Sly Cooper was still being developed, although this time not by the studio that created the series as they had moved on to other projects.

Since their departure from Sly in 2005, the studio shifted their focus to Infamous in 2009, which was extremely well received by critics and fans. In the July 2010 Issue of Game Informer that revealed the studio was working on the sequel, it was noted that the original had sold over two million units during its first year. This level of success turned another above average PlayStation studio into a team worth keeping an eye on. Infamous was followed up in the short years after with two full sequels and two full standalone expansions.

In 2020, Sucker Punch took another giant leap forward as a studio with the release of Ghost of Tsushima. This open world action adventure game finally gave many gamers what they were looking for with an Assassins Creed style game with a feudal Japan setting. The big difference is that Suckerpunch went for a much more serious tone than what could have been expected from Ubisoft and the results were greater than expected.

As announced by PlayStation on Twitter, Ghost of Tsushima became the fastest selling first party original IP debut with over 2.4 million copies in its first three days. Based on the history of the studio upon quickly following up success with more like they did with Sly and Infamous, it would be safe to expect a lot more Tsushima content over the next five years.

Ghost of Tsushima (83x1.1) + Infamous Second Son (80) = Sucker Punch Rating 85.65 (6th)

Guerilla Games

The Amsterdam based studio has evolved quite a bit since 2004 when they released Killzone on the PlayStation 2, which is what the studio would become known for during the next decade. Everyone knows by now that Killzone was developed by Sony to have an answer for Microsoft and Halo. Although Killzone, never quite became the Halo killer that Sony would have liked, Guerilla was still able to make some excellent and at the very least visually stunning games along the way.

Usually pushing the envelope with visual fidelity led Guerilla into engine development, which paved the way for the Decima Engine which would go on to power Killzone: Shadow Fall, which was a PS4 launch title that displayed the power of consoles at the time on the PlayStation 4. Not only was the Decima Engine used for Killzone but it also was the backbone behind the open world, critically acclaimed Horizon: Zero Dawn, which took Guerilla Games from above average shooter developer with a cult following to mainstream tentpole developer for Sony. The strength of the Horizon series and Aloy was seen leading up to the release of the PS5 as the Guerilla open world game was heavily featured in the marketing for the console.

Not only has developing Horizon taken Guerilla into an all new echelon of developers, but it has also added a whole new level of awareness of the studio. This means that Guerilla has a large opportunity fo whatever it decides to work on after Horizon, whether that be an all new IP or a return to Killzone, there will be a lot more eyes on the project with a greater chance of blockbuster success.

Horizon Zero Dawn (89x1.1) + Killzone: Shadow Fall (79) = Guerilla Games Rating 88.45 (5th)

Team Asobi

With the recent dissolution of Japan Studio, it seems that Team Asobi seems poised to carry the flag for the beloved studio that was known for creating some iconic experiences.

Astro Bot Rescue Mission was a VR title which could be either viewed as a pro or a con because it can’t be easy to make a VR title, especially one that became what was considered to be essential or system seller. The other title that Team Asobi made was Astro’s Playroom which was a pack in with the PlayStation 5. Sure it was fairly short but it was a very polished experience that showcased all that the PS5 had to offer including the SSD, graphical power and DualSense. Team Asobi also now has most of the expectations of the now defunct Japan Studio, which people regarded highly.

Astro’s Playroom (83x1.1) + Astro Bot Rescue Mission (90) = Team Asobi Rating 90.65 (4th)

Insomniac Games

It’s hard to argue that any Sony first party game development studio is on a hotter streak at the moment than Insomniac, who seem to be producing excellent games at an unbelievable rate. These aren’t just mobile quality games either, these are some of the best experiences available on PlayStation. With PS4 you have Spider Man from 2018, which set the bar for superhero experiences. With the launch of PS5, Insomniac was ready with the smaller standalone games Spider Man: Miles Morales and just a few short months later, delivered another critically lauded title with Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart.

Insomniac also doesn’t seem to be slowing down anything soon with big reveals at the September 2021 Showcase that featured their next two games including Marvel’s Wolverine and Marvel’s Spider Man 2, which looked to feature Peter Parker, Miles Morales and Eddie Brock. Lets not forget about the cult favourite and Xbox exclusive Sunset Overdrive. The IP was owned by Insomniac before their acquisition from Sony, which means that Sony now owns the IP which means that there is still a possibility for that series to make a return in the future. With over 400 employees working at the studio, who knows what the future holds for Insomniac, especially with Marvel IP, Sunset and Resistance: Fall of Man.

Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart (88x1.1) + Spider Man: Miles Morales (85) = Insomniac Rating 90.9 (3rd)

Santa Monica Studios

If you look at the history of Santa Monica Studios, you will see one thing: God of War. This isn’t to discredit the studios first game, Kinectica which released in 2001 for the PS2, but if you look at the past 20 years of the studio there is only God of War titles. After the release of God of War in 2005, It was clear that Sony had a epic action adventure game on their hands with mainstream critical and commercial success selling almost five million copies with the sequel selling similarly and performing better critically. The peak of the series was for God of War 3, which took everything loved about the series and added a level of scope unimaginable on the PS2, thanks to the CELL processing power of the PlayStation 3.

It was only a matter of time before the series experienced burnout from the fans. Not only with the mainline games, developed by Santa Monica but there were also many smaller supportive studios releasing handheld and mobile entries in the series. In the eight years between 2005 and 2013, there were a total of eight releases, not including collections and the fatigue became obvious with the release of God of War: Ascension in 2013 from Santa Monica. As a huge fan myself of the series, even I skipped Ascension and haven’t played the game to this day. This was by far the coldest reception the team had seen so far in the series with an 80 review average and sales being the lowest the studio had seen with Kratos.

Gamers and the world were growing up and Kratos was staying behind. Santa Monica took their longest time in development since their inception with five years between the release of God of War: Ascension and God of War (2018). It’s clear that the studio had to take the time to figure out how to evolve the character of Kratos and just like Nathan Drake did in Uncharted 4, the God of War had to mature for a new audience. The amazing scope, the epic action was all still present but most importantly, the story was very impressive with likely many at the studio starting their own families as well and experiencing a new chapter of life and the challenges that come along with it.

The evolution of Kratos did not go unnoticed as God of War 2018 easily became the best selling game in the series over 10 million copies in its first year, which has led to anticipation levels for the sequel God of War: Ragnarok to be though the roof.

God of War 2018 (94x1.1) + God of War: Ascension (80) = Santa Monica Studios Rating 91.7 (2nd)

Naughty Dog

The house that built Crash Bandicoot will easily be the most divisive studio on this list. Not even discussing the massive hate that came Naughty Dog’s direction after the some of the polarizing choices the studio made on the The Last of Us: Part 2, even before that game people still find it easy to hate Nathan Drake and the Uncharted series for its unrealistic gameplay and cartoonish nature. This view truly understates just how hard it is to make a blockbuster level game on the Uncharted level with amazing visuals, fun storylines, which have evolved as the series matured, fantastic controls and a level of polish rarely seen.

When looking at the most recent release from Naughty Dog, which was the Last of Us: Part 2 in 2020, its hard to fathom that this is the same studio that started with games like Crash Bandicoot as well as the Jak and Dakster series back on the original PlayStation.

With at least two internal development teams and over 540 employees, the only thing that the studio has expressed to fans is that they were, at least at one point, working on the multiplayer component for The Last of Us: Part 2. This knowledge came from the studio vocally telling fans before the release of The Last of Us: Part 2, that multiplayer was once part of the plan but the game would not be releasing with it like it did for the first game with “factions mode”

Just posted to their social media account recently was the information that the studio was hiring aggressively, across multiple disciplines for the studios first standalone multiplayer game. The post also featured a picture of what looked to be Ellie standing outside of the downtown core of Seattle.

With the combination of the pandemic and the recent skyrockting popularity of Battle Royale style games, it is very likely that plans were changed along the way or the scope outgrew the initial vision.

Moving from lighthearted mascot adventure games like Crash and Jak to the action packed, Indiana Jones-esque series of Uncharted and finally to the extremely dark and oppressive, post apocalyptic world of the Last of Us, where Naughty Dog decides to go from here is anyones guess. Obviously we know that the studio is working on this standalone multiplayer game, but that likely doesn’t take all 540 employees.

Since 2011, Naughty Dog has released full games that include Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception, The Last of Us, The Last of Us: Left Behind, Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, and The Last of Us: Part 2. This means that over the last decade, Naughty Dog has released six games, which is including their standalone expansions because both of those titles would rival a full game from any other studio.

At a rate of approximately one game every two years, we should be hearing something from Naughty Dog in 2022, but the pandemic obviously might have shifted this. At the very latest, I would expect to see the next title from Naughty Dog in 2023.

The Last of Us: Part 2 (93x1.1) + Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End (93) = Naughty Dog Rating 97.65 (1st)

Ratings Outcome

It’s not a huge surprise that Naughty Dog is the highest rated in Sony’s stable of developers. Its also a good place to be when the lowest rated studio is Bend with a 79.05 coming off Days Gone that amassed what feels like a huge cult following and received a lot of post launch support.

Before assembling this list, the rules were created that would make the scoring fair for all studios and for the most part the ratings reflect how most people feel about each studio. We also didn’t include Polyphony as they are only know for creating the Gran Turismo series that doesn’t have the mainstream potential of the rest. The only studio that might look slightly out of place to some on the list is Team Asobi being as high as they are but their recent work has shown that they are more than capable of making a push into the mainstream.

Bend Studio Rating 79.05

polyphony digital rating 82

HouseMarque Rating 83.25

Sucker Punch Rating 85.65

Guerilla Games Rating 88.45

Team Asobi Rating 90.65

Insomniac Rating 90.9

Santa Monica Studios Rating 91.7

Naughty Dog Rating 97.65