Sony Interactive has announced plans via TheHollywoodReporter to launch a new film and television production studio called PlayStation Productions. They’ll look to develop and make video game properties for the theatrical release that will be handled by sister company Sony Pictures.
Sony Interactive Entertainment has launched PlayStation Productions, a production studio that will mine the company’s extensive catalog of video game titles for film and television. The new enterprise, headed by Asad Qizilbash and overseen by chairman of Worldwide Studios at SIE, Shawn Layden, is already in production on its first slate of projects and has set up shop on the Sony Pictures lot in Culver City.
While other video game studios, including Ubisoft and Activision Blizzard, have opened film and television arms to adapt their games for a different audience, PlayStation Productions differs both in its deep catalog of content and also in its approach to production. Sony Pictures, a sister company, will help with distribution, but production of projects will be handled by PlayStation Productions firsthand, not licensed out as is the case with similar enterprises at other game companies.
Through its partnership with Sony Pictures, PlayStation Productions will be afforded the time to make film and television projects that live up to the quality of their video game source material.
Some of the Sony PlayStation projects that could likely land at PlayStation Productions include God of War, Uncharted, Last of Us, Death Stranding, Ghosts of Tsushima, and many more.
While not a PlayStation exclusive property, Metal Gear Solid has a feature film at Sony Pictures and I’m curious if PlayStation Productions will end up adapting that instead.
With most of the comic book properties mined, video game IP is seen as the next wave of adaptable projects that the general public would have awareness for. There are plenty of production companies linked to game studios including Activision Blizzard and Ubisoft, but PlayStation Productions seems to have more of a hands-on role, creative control, and will actually make the material.
SOURCE: THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER