Sony boss reckons PS5 games could be more expensive to develop

Sony Interactive Entertainment boss Jim Ryan reckons that the cost of production for PS5 games is likely to increase in relation to current-gen pricing.

The news comes from an interview with GIBiz, during which Ryan also mentioned that the PS5 is going to launch globally this holiday. In terms of the cost of PS5 games, however, Ryan was posed a question on how expensive looking last month's PS5 tech demo in Unreal Engine 5 looked.

"I think, to the extent that the technology enables the graphics side of it to become more interesting and life-like, [the games] will become slightly more human intensive and capital intensive to produce," Ryan told GIBiz. "So, yes, we think there probably will be an increase in development budgets."

"We don't see it as being a massive increase, and that's why we want to do more faster than we have ever done before, to provide a fertile install base for people who make games to be able to monetise against."

"If we can keep pace with a likely increase in development costs, then the industry can continue to prosper."

Ryan also clarified that the majority of release dates for PS5 games currently planned as launch or post-launch titles should be relatively unaffected by factors such as the coronavirus.

"If you ask just about anybody in any line of business if they're functioning just as efficiently working remotely as they are in the office, most people will tell you they're at 80% or 90%," Ryan told GIBiz.

"The developers that I talk to say the same thing. The line-up of games that we will present at and around launch does not appear to be meaningfully impacted in any way whatsoever."

A range of PS5 games are due to be unveiled later this week, with an event scheduled for 1pm PT (4pm ET, 9pm BST) on June 4.