Sony Closes Driveclub Developer Evolution Studios

Being honest here, the only reason they were not closed sooner is because Sony was milking Driveclub for every little penny they could get back. If they closed the studio earlier, Driveclub would have bombed even harder.

Its a repeating pattern. Advertise a slew of social features, make a botched release.

They tried.

Driveclub shaped up to be great but it happened too late. Add to that the delayed free version and you're going to have problems.

This is not surprising for a couple reasons.

Firstly, though DC is a finished, solid game now, it took way too long to get to that point. The botched launch cost Sony a lot of money and time. Major publishers do not forget or easily forgive something like that, even if the developer has been around a while.

The second reason has to do with Microsoft, which I'm not bringing up because of some fanboy garbage. I'm bringing it up because it is a valid point. Microsoft has gained a reputation as being a place where developers go to die--even previously successful developers with promising futures. Why it happens, who really knows for sure. Lately, yet another big name developer connected with MS bit the dust. Sony is undoubtedly aware of the situation, and may have somewhat tactfully chosen the present moment, while the negative spotlight is on MS, to shut down Evolution Studios in an attempt to avoid any amount of bad press they can. From a strategic standpoint, Sony has made the right move.

And I'll throw this in there, too. Sony is wildly successful at the moment, and it looks to stay that way. Shutting down Evolution is more than 'cutting the fat'. It is a message to first party developers, as well as developers in general. The message is: 'get your shit together from the get go, because if you don't we'll get it together for you and toss you and all of your shit out the door'.

Let there be social nonsense, but there also be bankruptcy. Remember Maxis?

Suddenly I'm reminded of certain Sony fanboys' comments in an article last week that "If Sony was anything like Microsoft they'd close studios".........

let this be a lesson to devs when releasing broken games. DC was a complete disaster

That's a shame, they were a pretty consistent racing dev for years. Driveclub was one bad moment in 15 years (and the main issue was a lack of content), unfortunately it was their most expensive game as well. That's the video game industry for you though.

Somehow I'm not surprised considering how much of a disaster DC was when it launched. It seemed like they genuinely cared and tried to improved their game over time, but alas it was not enough. I hope they all can find another job pretty soon.

On another note...what's going on this month? A lot of cancelled games and studios shutting down or layoffs...might as well call it "Death March" lol.

Driveclub was nothing special from the get go, and just like lionhead, you make poor product, you should be restructured/closed. Trim the fat and bring on the lean an mean Sony

Unfortunate, but not surprising. This is what happens when you release a broken racing game and have it only run at 30fps.

"We figured out that two horribly boring and unfun driving games were at least one to many. Hopefully Sega will release a new Daytona to teach us what doesn't suck."

There fixed that farewell speech

Didn't see this coming. Possibly the botched launch of drive club had something to do with it? Not sure if they had new games coming out anyways, but that sucks if they did.

Microsoft should make a huge conference and offer them jobs at Xbox, get on the bandwagon..

Sympathy for the Devs now, then bash the Indie games they make later.

The studio The Molasses Flood is a perfect example of what happens when Devs get booted..

I wish luck to all of the developers and talented people over at Evolution Studios.

I hope you guys can find work easily and close to home.

Studio shutdowns are never fun, especially after Lionhead, Press Play, and now Evolution.

Even though Driveclub is now a decent game, I suspect if the game was better at launch they'd still be standing.

well sucks for them

This is a real shame, especially since it's mainly a racing game studio. There's not enough of the racing genre nowadays. Thank you Evolution for bringing great games, countless hours of entertainment, and smiles to people all over the world, including me! I wish you the best of luck on your journey forward!

VR is the future for Sony