Time of Year Matters Less For Games Today, Says Sony’s Shawn Layden

PlayStation may be debated for best show at E3 this year, judging by fan hype, but many can't help but notice that none of their AAA games were slated for the holiday season or 2017 in general. President of Worldwide Studio Shuhei Yoshida even stated that their lack of release dates was intentional, as the company as a whole was holding back for a later expo, but also because they've been chastised for pushing game releases back in the past. To add to this, while speaking to Golem.de, Shawn Layden of Sony Interactive Entertainment America boldly states that holiday release dates don't even matter as much as they used to.

"Games are a bit of a business, and timing is very important. By the end of the year, people simply have more money. But it changed a little. Horizon Zero Dawn, for example, was released in February and very successful. Batman Arkham Knight came out a few years ago right after the E3, and the demand for it almost exploded.

We can now publish the really high-quality games almost at any time. It is difficult if almost at the same time a similar top game appears, as was the case in the last year’s business."

This seems to be true in recent times. AAA games used to be reserved to March-April and October-November for one reason or another (namely the holiday season), but over the past two years, more games have released outside of these windows with much success. Typically, Summers would be very dry in terms of game releases, but this is mostly a thing of the past, for both small and large studios.

In fact, it used to be detrimental to release a game in August, while 2017's lineup consists of Tacoma, Ark: Survival Evolved, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, LawBreakers, Sudden Strike 4, Agents of Mayhem, Matterfall, Sonic Mania, Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, F1 2017, Madden NFL 18, Absolver, Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle, Warriors All-Stars, Yakuza Kiwami, Life is Strange: Before the Storm, Redout, Cities Skylines and Pillars of Eternity: Complete Edition.

One thing is certain with Layden's claim. Releasing all AAA games in blocks makes budget gamers make choices on what they're going to buy. While they may want three titles that come out in the same month, they may only be able to afford one, when they would otherwise buy and enjoy them all. Given the way AAA titles work in the market, a purchase made 6 months later may be too late for the company to call that a gain.

What are your thoughts on this? Is a more spread out release schedule cost efficient for gamers?