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People Can Fly has entered into an agreement with Sony Interactive Entertainment on production of a game using Sony's IP, codenamed "Project Delta"
- Thread starter FalsettoVibe
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yurinka
Member
I don't care who the head of the Japanese team is, he's just listed there like the head of the EU team is too.
And yes, multiple producers from EU did work on it, starting with the most important one, the executive producer I highlighted, plus the senior online producer (now working at Firesprite as Tech Production director), an associate producer (who also did work at the Until Dawn remake), in addition to the business planning manager of the project.
I have to overexplain it because you don't seem to know the basic things. As an example, XDEV doesn't only manage the production of 2nd party games / 1st party games with a lead dev team not owned by Sony.
They also manage/handle the production of the job made by internal support teams or external support teams for internally developed 1st party games, 2nd party games and even in some very rare case where Sony supports them, 3rd party games. Mostly gamedev support but also QA, localization, marketing, PR etc.
It isn't a product development department, it's the SIE and SIEA HQ, which also features game development support stuff including their XDEV team.
The SIE HQ is in 2207 Bridgepointe Pkwy, Foster City (San Mateo, California):
https://maps.app.goo.gl/1ai5joyJNJKqAScX6
The HQ sometimes it's called 'San Mateo Studio' because Foster City is in San Mateo County (in the San Francisco Bay Area): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster_City,_California
That HQ has three five-story building where in addition to do SIE HQ global stuff, SIEA HQ stuff (regional things for the Americas) they also do development related stuff:
- They are the home of XDEV American team once some of them were moved there from SSM many years ago
- Sometimes mentioned as SIE San Mateo Studio or Foster City Studio before that, always focused on producing/managing/supporting 2nd party games made by other teams, but sometimes also internally developed 1st party games from NA studios
- They were the home/office of the Pixel Opus incubation project
- They handle game/studio specific (and SIE-wide, in some things for the Americas) development support, sales & marketing, PR, finances, legal, IT, plus PS OS/PSN/PS+ stuff etc.
- It has 17 sound studios and a mix master room where they make sound effects for SIE games
- It has a Q&A area, a playtesting area, server rooms and a big conferences room
They weren't established in 2020, Sony had their American external development team since the PS1 (a team here in Foster City, other in SSM during the Journey and similar era), as you mentioned producing 2nd party games made by the back then not acquired Naughty Dog, Insomniac or Sucker Punch.Their main purpose is the produce games made by SIEA subsidiaries, like Naughty Dog, Sucker Punch and Insomniac. They also used to be the main producers of externally-developed games up until 2020 when XDEV America was established, but they continued to work on the external projects that started before this, hence them producing both Helldivers 2 and Firewall Ultra.
This is what the true XDEV America team looks like, from Concord's credits. None of these people worked on Helldivers 2 or Firewall Ultra:
And like, no fucking shit the XDEV social media account never posts about Helldivers 2. It's not their game.
Games way before XDEV America was established, read what I wrote above.
Click there in the names of John Sanders, David Thach, Dais Kawaguchi, Tyler Chan, Ernesto Corvi and you'll see them working in many 2nd party (plus internally developed 1st party mostly for support teams) games previous to 2020 like Predator Hunting Ground, Returnal, Déraciné, Shadow of the Beast, Murasaki Baby, Sports Champions, Detroit, Bravo Team, Hidden or the SotC/Demon's Souls/Medievil remakes.
Obviously not all these producers / product managers / etc. work in all the 2nd party games (outside people like their bosses Scott Rohde and Hermen). Each project only needs a few of them, and some of them got their position closer to recent releases or way before.
Their American team sometimes have been credited (more recently) as XDEV, but also as 'External Development', or 'Second Party team', or simply as SIE producers / project managers / product developers normally in the chunk dedicated for the SIE/SIEA HQ chunk or PS Studios chunk because it is what they mostly are.
They aren't like a separate studio with a XDEV America banner in the door of the building, they are just the people who manages the external production/development from America, in the same way there's another team doing the same in their Japanese HQ buillding (and during some years were part of Japan Studio, before they were merged with Japan Studio were separate).
She was in Business Development in the XDEV team of Japan Studio, later moved to Localization Producer in the XDEV team of SSM and later in 2019 moved to the Foster City SIE HQ XDEV team where she has been associate producer and producer.
So no, as shown her first project wasn't TLOU2R.
In Gran Turismo 7 and Death Stranding she didn't work as localization producer, she already was associate producer in the San Mateo SIE HQ:
As I said yes, Japan Studio supported in multiple Gran Turismo games. Developers, not producers.
XDEV normally does production/product management work of external teams, normally non Sony owned lead teams or support teams. But sometimes they directly provide support with their own coders or artists they have there.
When their Japanese external development team was inside Japan Studio, sometimes they supported Polyphony (team which started as a spinoff of what later was known as Japan Studio).
As an example, out of Japan studio artists who recently worked in Astro Bot or Astro's Playroom, minimum Kyoung Mo Sung, Noriyuki Katsumura, Seiichiro Kuroki did work in Gran Turismo 5 modelling cars or stage effects, in addition to other Japan Studio artists who are no longer there (in most cases their last credited game was TLG or Knack 2) like Yasusuke Ohnami, Tomohiro Ise, Aya Osaka.
Or same goes in GT Sport with Yuka Mafune, who helped modelling cars but also did work in Astro Bot and Playroom.
I'm lazy to search it know, but I remember similar cases of Japan Studio workers who did support GT4 or GT6.
Yes, it's the example to prove you wrong when you said that the EU team didn't really had a hand on Sterllar Blade
Yes, normally the XDEV of each region is the one who handles the projects of their region, even if they collaborate.
But in case of Helldivers 1 & 2 it was handled by the XDEV team from the SIEA HQ in Foster City instead of from their EU XDEV team from Liverpool.
Pretty likely because back then before Helldivers 1 was released in 2015 Jim Ryan still didn't have unified their external development teams globally to have a better coordination, and since the US team did the 1 also wanted to do the 2 having the same external development producer for both games (Eduardo Zamora, the other one left/was fired, maybe due to the 5 years long Helldivers 2 delay).
I assume that with the Jim Ryan change they wanted to avoid in the future these things and make sure the lead dev team and the xdev team are in the same region.
Because it is a mess, years ago I did work with our office in Spain (similar timezone than XDEV EU or Arrowhead) having the HQ in San Mateo (having Capcom USA as neighbors in the next door) and we were working while they were sleeping, and for the meetings with them we had to wait to start it until 6 or 7 in the afternoon, when some people in our office was supposed to go home 1 hour or 2 before that. We later got bought again and having the HQ in Paris, aligned with our timezone, it was way smoother: in my case I was able to chat with my boss without needing to wait until the next day to get a reply email or to make meetings late.
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I feel like being somewhat obligated to reply to your long ass posts. Well, here we go...
Once, once again, I'm not saying that XDEV Europe did not help on this one, but rather, that it was led by the Japanese studio.
Let's keep this simple enough; please explain why none of these games were ever posted by the official global XDEV account on Twitter, when they have posted about Rise of the Ronin, Stellar Blade, Concord, Until Dawn, Death Stranding 2 and Saros.
www.gamedeveloper.com
In the past, three of SIEA's studios (San Mateo, Santa Monica and San Diego) that would produce games from external partners and even owned developers depending on where they were located; which explains why SMS was involved with PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale when Sony owned SuperBot, for example.
Around 2016-2017, Sony put an end to these groups in SMS and SDS, and only letting external development operations remain in San Mateo Studio.
It was in 2020, that they established a separate external development department that would go under the global XDEV Group. Product Development Department/San Mateo Studio would stop these operations for the most part, except for keeping to support prpjects that fully started before this time like Firewall Ultra and Helldivers 2. Concord was their first ever project (that they kept supporting even after Sony acquired Firewalk).
But if you keep insisting, I want you to come with solid proof that all of this was consolidated under something called -San Mateo Studio'.
And 2020 makes the most sense as both David Thach and John Sanders didn't become directors until that year, and it can't be the same team that supported previous externally-developed games, as once ONCE again, that same team worked on Helldivers 2 AT THE SAME TIME.
David Thach? Senior director at the localization department at SIEA from 2014 to 2020.
Dais Kawaguchi? Producer at the localization department at SIEA from 2009 to 2020.
Tyler Chan? Producer at the localization depsrtment at SIEA from 2015 to 2020.
Ernesto Corvi? Senior technical project managaer for, once again, localization at SIEA.
What do all of these people have in common? That they've been working at external development since 2020!
Arnaud Saint-Martin is credited on every XDEV Japan game, Nick Ryder is credited on every XDEV Europe game, yet David Thach could not even get credited on Helldivers 2? Why is it that XDEV never posted about HD2 on social media, then?
sonyinteractive.com
Her moving in October 2019, when DS1 was already done for, means that she purely worked on localization.
The biggest clue on GT7 is the fact that the credited 'Senior Producer' on the game is the same Senior Producer role for AMERICAN LOCALIZATION he held on every previous Gran Turismo game.
Also, Santa Monica Studio was not doing localization anymore by that time. That's a whole different department.
Helldivers 3 will 100% be handled by XDEV America.
Please answer why XDEV never posted about Helldivers 2.
Never argued against this.
Please understand what I'm telling you. Most of those are executives, management. Staff below these positions is what I meant with ""normal"" producers, and the only one from XDEV Europe found at this game was Lucy Jones, who was an associate producer at that.
Once, once again, I'm not saying that XDEV Europe did not help on this one, but rather, that it was led by the Japanese studio.
Which is ironic as you seem to get a ton of shit wrong.
Only in the case of Firesprite and Housemarque (with both being part of the XDEV Group). Specifically NOT with Naughty Dog, as it's part of the Product Development Group, like most of the rest of the studios. I will use Media Molecule as an example.
Funnily enough, while it can work as a general statement, it's not always like that. See: Firewall Ultra, Helldivers 2 and Lego Horizon Adventures.
Let's keep this simple enough; please explain why none of these games were ever posted by the official global XDEV account on Twitter, when they have posted about Rise of the Ronin, Stellar Blade, Concord, Until Dawn, Death Stranding 2 and Saros.
Making shit up again, this has never happened. The SIE staff you happen to see credited in games like Final Fantasy VII Rebirth are part of the partners relations teams, nothing to do with XDEV.
Different departments, different departments, different division (lol).
Why would they call the HQs a 'studio'? It's just the product development department within these HQs. This is from Spider-Man 2018 (an externally-developed game). Both Connie Booth and Grady Hunt had those very same roles on internally-developed games like The Last of Us Part II, Ghost of Tsushima and Spider-Man Miles Morales, all internally-developed games.
You know that there is a San Mateo city within the San Mateo county, right? SCEA used to be located in Foster City, until they moved their HQs in 2013 to the city of San Mateo, both part of San Mateo County.The SIE HQ is in 2207 Bridgepointe Pkwy, Foster City (San Mateo, California):
https://maps.app.goo.gl/1ai5joyJNJKqAScX6
The HQ sometimes it's called 'San Mateo Studio' because Foster City is in San Mateo County (in the San Francisco Bay Area): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster_City,_California
Sony Headquarters Moving To New San Mateo Office
SCEA announced today that it has signed a long-term lease for a new office in San Mateo, California, which will serve as the company's new headquarters for the foreseeable future.
Absolutely no relation with each other. The current XDEV America people were never part of that branch.
In the past, three of SIEA's studios (San Mateo, Santa Monica and San Diego) that would produce games from external partners and even owned developers depending on where they were located; which explains why SMS was involved with PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale when Sony owned SuperBot, for example.
Around 2016-2017, Sony put an end to these groups in SMS and SDS, and only letting external development operations remain in San Mateo Studio.
It was in 2020, that they established a separate external development department that would go under the global XDEV Group. Product Development Department/San Mateo Studio would stop these operations for the most part, except for keeping to support prpjects that fully started before this time like Firewall Ultra and Helldivers 2. Concord was their first ever project (that they kept supporting even after Sony acquired Firewalk).
Not sometimes, they always did that, and still do to this day (except for games made by other internal departments like Santa Monica Studio).
San Mateo Studio definitely never handled any of those things outside of development support and IT.
All different departments, once again.
But if you keep insisting, I want you to come with solid proof that all of this was consolidated under something called -San Mateo Studio'.
Since the PS1? Please let's keep it in the last 7 years or so, because it's clear that you will have even less idea before that. Just because they had several external development teams all across the years doesn't mean that they're somehow related to the current one.
And 2020 makes the most sense as both David Thach and John Sanders didn't become directors until that year, and it can't be the same team that supported previous externally-developed games, as once ONCE again, that same team worked on Helldivers 2 AT THE SAME TIME.
See? This is why you absolutely suck at doing the most basic of research. These people were credited on all these games? Yes, but not for the roles you think.
David Thach? Senior director at the localization department at SIEA from 2014 to 2020.
Dais Kawaguchi? Producer at the localization department at SIEA from 2009 to 2020.
Tyler Chan? Producer at the localization depsrtment at SIEA from 2015 to 2020.
Ernesto Corvi? Senior technical project managaer for, once again, localization at SIEA.
What do all of these people have in common? That they've been working at external development since 2020!
Oh no, you're pretty wrong there. Normal producers don't need to work on every game, yes, but management IS definitely credited on every project.
Arnaud Saint-Martin is credited on every XDEV Japan game, Nick Ryder is credited on every XDEV Europe game, yet David Thach could not even get credited on Helldivers 2? Why is it that XDEV never posted about HD2 on social media, then?
How can you not even realize that she is credited on Puppeteer in your own pic from the other post? And Business Development was never part of External Development, lol. Notice how they are totally different departments.She was in Business Development in the XDEV team of Japan Studio, later moved to Localization Producer in the XDEV team of SSM and later in 2019 moved to the Foster City SIE HQ XDEV team where she has been associate producer and producer.
So no, as shown her first project wasn't TLOU2R.
In Gran Turismo 7 and Death Stranding she didn't work as localization producer, she already was associate producer in the San Mateo SIE HQ:
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sonyinteractive.com
The biggest clue on GT7 is the fact that the credited 'Senior Producer' on the game is the same Senior Producer role for AMERICAN LOCALIZATION he held on every previous Gran Turismo game.
Also, Santa Monica Studio was not doing localization anymore by that time. That's a whole different department.
I'm exclusively talking about production.
Cool, where are the producers?
It never happened, not for any Gran Turismo game since 2.
How so when it's about Rise of the Ronin? You haven't proved anything.
Helldivers 2 started production in February 2016, which means that it was handled ny the exact same team as HD1. By 2020, it was too late to change the project over to XDEV America, so they just kept going.
Helldivers 3 will 100% be handled by XDEV America.
Please answer why XDEV never posted about Helldivers 2.
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yurinka
Member
I shown you the receipts that almost half of the XDEV people who worked on it are from the EU team but you can't accept it with weird twists and excuses like saying that they don't count because doesn't have certain rank, as if executive producers and associate producers wouldn't do anything. This is what you're telling to me.
No.
Firesprite, Housemarque or Media Molecule aren't part of XDEV. The EU XDEV team has their own office in Liverpool. They originally were inside SCEE Liverpool Studio until they branched out, as later did the XDEV SSM team when merged with the Foster City/San Mateo one to become their US team in their SCEA/SIEA HQ building, and as later the JP team branched out from Japan Studio to become again an standalone team in their JP HQ building.Only in the case of Firesprite and Housemarque (with both being part of the XDEV Group). Specifically NOT with Naughty Dog, as it's part of the Product Development Group, like most of the rest of the studios. I will use Media Molecule as an example.
When they all 3 weren't owned by Sony and were external teams, the XDEV EU team, who was the first one to use the XDEV brand instead of mentioning 'External Development' or 'Second Party Team' when weren't simply listed as production staff of their regional HQ, was the one handling them as happened with all 2nd party games.
Same goes when working for Quantic Dream, Until Dawn or for when asked people like Sumo, Tarsier or Double Eleven to work on LBP. All these projects were managed by XDEV EU.
Both when owned or not, XDEV also provides support from internal or external teams to the different 1st (which includes 2nd) games. The type of support varies depending on the project, ranging from basic stuff like marketing, PR, CM, localization etc. to the typical development support when they need some extra coders or artists.
Product development is just a role or department that all games have.
As explained above, their external development group provides their 1st/2nd party (and in rare cases 3rd) all the kind of support they may need. One of them -at least for the EU team- is CM / social media.
Depending on the game/team, they decide that the PS/studio/brand/game account will be enough, sometimes they ask for support from XDEV, who sometimes uses their XDEV account or sometimes XDEVs handles the game/brand accounts.
Regarding Helldivers 2 they already had a community and had a very strong internal CM team who did a great job both from their own accounts and also via guerrilla viral marketing on Reddit or Twitter and securing a very strong streamer and youtuber support. So I assume they didn't need extra XDEV support in this area or decided to spent that part of budget on getting a bit more gamedev delay.
Regarding Firewall, I have no idea. Maybe being a PSVR game they promote them in other way. Regarding Lego, maybe what Sony signed with Lego that they were going to focus CM on the PS and Lego accounts or something like.
I don't know, they don't do the same for all their projects. Depends on each game/team.
Sure, Jan. As a few examples more, why SIE appears listed as subcontractor in Forspoken, or why SIE's localization team was the one who localized Kena?
Yes, XDEV (or most producers in general that aren't producers of only department of a game) doesn't only manage a single department or division. When they manage a 2nd party game they manage the entire project, its budget and all the departments and divisions that will apply for that project.
And when they only provide help for a specific thing for an internal or external project they only do that. As could be to find and manage an external porting team to port USFIV to PS4 and publish it, or to support Kena by making their localization, or to find and manage some additional art support team(s) for an internally developed 1st party team etc.
With that, I don't mean things like that the external development team localize the game themselves. They act as communication between SIE/PS Studios management, Kena devs and SIE's localization team, set the budget and roadmap, double check that milestones are set, then do the same with the localization QA, etc. They have a few internal engineers, artists etc but normally they normally what do is to manage the work of other support teams.
In some cases, some of the people who does these services also happen to be in the same office even if they belong to a different team, while in other don't. As an example, Sony's American FPQA team is in the SIEA HQ, like their US XDEV team, but this doesn't mean they are part of it. Not sure it continues being the case, but decades ago Sony also had a FPQA team in their Liverpool office, where Liverpool Studio & XDEV were, but that didn't mean FPQA are part of XDEV.
I think you may know who people like Connie Booth or Mark Cerny are and that they don't only work in that specific development team and that they work for most if not all 1st and 2nd party stuff, they do/did 'HQ' work.Why would they call the HQs a 'studio'? It's just the product development department within these HQs. This is from Spider-Man 2018 (an externally-developed game). Both Connie Booth and Grady Hunt had those very same roles on internally-developed games like The Last of Us Part II, Ghost of Tsushima and Spider-Man Miles Morales, all internally-developed games.
I assume they did choose San Mateo Studio (and Foster City Studio before that) because they also had many other teams using the name of where they were, like Liverpool Studio, San Diego Studio, London Studio or Santa Monica Studio.
As an example, Ubisoft in my city has two Ubisoft Barcelona studios (even if one wasn't in the city itself but in its metropolitan area), and in Paris they had up to 5 different studios and their HQ, all called Ubisoft Paris. Some of them in the new HQ building and other ones in their old HQ building. And both buildings aren't strictly in the Paris city, but in its Metropolitan area, in a city that is next to it.
Some companies decide to use the name of the city following some name convention for when they don't have a specific name for the studio.
Yes, the San Mateo city is next to Foster City. Both SIEA/SCEA HQs, the new and the old are basically in the border between both cities. These two office locations are like 5 minutes away from each other.You know that there is a San Mateo city within the San Mateo county, right? SCEA used to be located in Foster City, until they moved their HQs in 2013 to the city of San Mateo, both part of San Mateo County.
Sony Headquarters Moving To New San Mateo Office
SCEA announced today that it has signed a long-term lease for a new office in San Mateo, California, which will serve as the company's new headquarters for the foreseeable future.
When they moved in 2013 their SCEA HQ they obviously also moved the external development team they had inside to the new campus. A handful years later SCE merged with SNEI creating SIE, turning that new campus as the global SIE HQ.
Their "external development"/"XDEV"/"second party" team from Foster City Studio / San Mateo Studio always have been part of the SCEA/SIEA HQ staff, since the PS1 days. They never -this includes now- have been a separate entity or have been in a separate office. They never had a separate subsidiary company or their own office separated from the SCEA/SIEA HQ.
Some time ago, as you mention, some teams like SSM, Liverpool Studio or Japan Studio handled 2nd party stuff themselves, basically games made by external teams from their region. In the case of SSM they handled games like the RaD titles (GoW PSP, The Order), the ThatGameCompany titles or many other less known ones -but still great- like Sound Shapes or Hohokum.
Out of the three regions, the most successful ones with 2nd party games were the Liverpool team, which got branched out from SCE Liverpool getting their own separate office and team and later mostly centralized (even if there were still a few exceptions) their EU 2nd party team work and keeping SCE Liverpool focused on internal developed games only.
So Sony followed that strategy for the other studios. First removed the 2nd party management stuff in NA from SSM to keep SSM focused only in internally developed games only, leaving the NA 2nd party management stuff only for the HQ/San Mateo team, who would centralize it for NA similarly to how XDev did did for EU.
San Diego is different, because they have there a big team of Creative Arts team: a big team dedicated to instead of managing 2nd party games, the support work itself with many artists or animators who do support stuff for a lot of both internally developed 1st party games and 2nd party games.
Later did the same in Japan, they moved the Japan Studio external development team to become formally again a separate team as originally was, even both Japan Studio (now Team Asobi) and their external development team continue in the same Japanese HQ building but in different, separate offices. The idea with that move was also to help their Japanese XDEV team grow in a new office, because they were starting to manage not only Japanese 2nd party games, but also games from the rest of Asia.
It was in 2021, when they made that restructuring in the Japanese office, when their Japanese external development team started to report to XDEV instead of to the related local internal development team, and when XDEV started to work as a global coordinated team, working together and helping each other even if each regional team normally is in charge of their 2nd party stuff (there's the Helldivers exception that is a remnant of the past since the sequel started back in 2016 and continued the work made in Helldivers 1).
But again, like in EU and JP, their Foster City/San Mateo NA HQ have been managing 2nd party games since the PS1 days. They handled the production, product development, marketing, publishing etc. of games like the early (originally they were 2nd party games, Sony did acquire their lead dev studios time later) Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, Syphon Filter, Ratchet, Sly Racoon, Ratchet, etc.
Back then in these early days they had a smaller team in their American HQ, they didn't have dedicated people there for external development stuff. Back then the people who handled their 2nd party games were basically the same who handled the internally developed games. As they kept growing over time they created more specialized positions, which in case of production/product development/marketing etc. meant some people focused on external development.
Yes, they also produced internally developed games developed in other internal studios since the PS1 days. In a few cases (a Jet Li game and the Pixel Opus games) they even developed in that SCEA/SIEA HQ their own games.
I said sometimes because in most games they don't appear in the creadits listed as Foster City Studio or as San Mateo Studio, but instead just as SCE/SIE/SCEA/SIEA staff.
San Mateo Studio (or Foster City before it) is just one of the informal names they had for their SIE global HQ/SIEA HQ/SCEA HQ office. This is why they are normally just credited as SCEA or SIEA, specially in the early days, before they started to specialize people into a '2nd party team' or 'external development' or rebranded it as 'XDEV'.
If you search any subsidiary company with San Mateo Studio or Foster City Studio names you'll find out that never existed. Unless I missed somethign, you won't find San Mateo Studio or Foster City Studio in game credits either. If you search the San Mateo Studio or Foster City Studio address you'll find out it was the same one of the old and new SCEA/SIEA HQ. They never have been a separate thing of their American HQ.
And obviously in their American or global HQ they do many things other than (in this case) to produce 2nd party or internally developed 1st party games. The ones I listed are some of them.
As I explained before they have been handling production of 2nd party games / external development from that Foster City / San Mateo office (their American HQ) since the PS1 days, I listed just a few examples.
They didn't start doing it a few years ago, they always did that. You can check the game credits of their 2nd party NA games and you'll notice that since the PS1 days until now their Sony production/product development/marketing folks are from there (outside the SSM cases).
You can go to their personal LinkedIn for these people who worked in these PS1-PS5 games and you'll see they list to work during that period at SCE/ SCEA / SIE / SIEA / PlayStation (not San Mateo Studio, not Foster City Studio, not XDEV), and listing as location Foster City or San Mateo.
These two guys mentioning "External Development" or XDEV in their LinkedIn profile doesn't mean that their San Mateo / Foster City team did start to do this job there or that they did become a separate new team.
As an example, that John Sanders (who since November is in Ember Labs btw) has listed before his "Director, Product Development, External Development (XDEV) at PlayStation Studios (Director of product development with external partners for PlayStation Studios)" position another one that indicates they were doing the same there "Executive Producer, Global 2nd Party Games at San Mateo (Production oversight and business development for SIE/PlayStation Published titles with external developers)".
Some people may list name differently their studio, team or job position but they always managed 2nd party games from there. Some day started to specialize people in 2nd party, or external development, later at some point made a regional related team in US and Japan, and later in US and Japan started to call it more formally XDEV until finally all 3 NA, EU and JP teams joined into a global group.
Names may change, some people may move to other departments or companies, some join or leave, but their San Mateo / Foster City office had since the 90s people publishing externally developed games handling their production, product management, publishing etc from the Sony side and finding them support of other teams on areas where needed.
yurinka
Member
You're the one who "suck at doing the most basic of research" or are simply lying.
Localization is one of the many different departments managed, budgeted, overviewed etc by producers of a game, in this case XDEV for externally developed games or first/2nd party games where they do provide external support.
"What do all of these people have in common?" That none of them worked in any localization department and all of them were already working in external development since way before 2020, some of them from the SIEA HQ and other ones (before moving to the HQ) from SSM.
According to their personal LinkedIn
- David Thach 2014-2020: "Senior Director, International Software Development & Special Operations, WWS America" (nothing specific to localizaiton)
- Dais Kawaguchi 2015-2020 "Producer, International Software Development" (nothing specific to localization)
- Tyler Chan 2019-2020 "Associate Producer, International Software Development & Special Operations" And adds "Responsible for game production and publishing support for PlayStation platforms. This includes coordinating cross-functional teams and resources to bring first party games to market on PlayStation 5, with past experience on PlayStation 4 and PSVR. My day-to-day involves managing collaboration with diverse disciplines such as development, marketing, legal, localization, PR, QA, user testing, and international counterparts to ultimately facilitate successful project execution. Projects included: Demon's Souls Remake, MediEvil, Returnal, PSVR Demo Disc 2, Bonus Content applications for many first and third-party titles." (nothing specific to localization, it's just of many things they handle).
- Ernesto Corvi: can't find his LinkedIn
- David Thach (nothing related to localization)
- Concord: Senior Director under SIE: External Development
- Stellar Blade: Spècial thanks under SIE PS Studios, XDEV: Production Support
- Many internally developed 1st party or 2nd party games more: Senior Director under International Software Development & Special Operations
- Many 1st/2nd party games more: Director, International Software Development under WWS America or SIE WWS America
- Dais Kawaguchi: (only Demon's Souls mentions something about localization)
- Concord: Producer under SIE: External Development
- Stellar Blade: Special Thanks under SIE PS Studios, XDEV: Production Support
- Returnal: "Producer, XDev" under SIE: XDev
- Astro's Playroom: Producer, External Development under External Development
- Demon's Souls: Producer, under SIE WWS: Localization - International Software Development & Special Operations
- Inmortal Legacy: Producer, under WWS America - International Software Development & Special Operations
- Déraciné, SotC remake, : Producer under SIE, WWS: International Software Development & Special Operations
- TLG, Bloodborne, Rain: Producer under WWS America or SCEA: WWS America
- Tokyo Jungle: Assistant Producer under SCEA Santa Monica Studios
- Gran Turismo PSP, Gran Turismo 5 Prologue: special thanks under SCEA - Santa Monica Studios
- Tyler Chan (only Demon's Souls mentions something about localization)
- Stellar Blade: special thanks under SIE PS Studios, XDEV: Production Support
- Concord: Associate Producer under Sony Interactive Entertainment: External Development
- Astro's Playroom: "Associate Producer, External Development" under External Development
- Demon's Souls: Associate Producer under SIE WWS: Localization - International Software Development & Special Operations America
- Medievil: Associate Producer under SIE WWS America, International Software Development & Special Operations America
- Erica: Associate Producer under SIE, International Software Development & Special Operations
- Blood & Truth: Associate Producer under International Software Development & Special Operations
- Inmortal Legacy: Assistant Producer under Worldwide Studios America: International Software Development & Special Operations
- Déraciné: Assistant Producer under SIE WWS: International Software Development & Special Operations
- SotC remake: Assistant Producer under SIEA: International Software Development & Special Operations
- Ernesto Corvi (nothing related to localization):
- Concord: Senior Staff Technical Project Manager under SIE: External Development
- Kena: Additional Engineering (in the middle of mostly Ember Lab game staff, not any specific Sony team)
- Medievil remake: Senior Technical Project Managers under SIE, WWS America: International Software Development & Special Operations America
- Iron Man VR: as 'Camouflaj would like to thank'
No, I'm not wrong. You're wrong: management sometimes is credited, sometimes isn't. As an example, Arnaud Saint-Martin isn't credited in every XDEV Japan game.
He was hired in September 2020 when the XDEV Japanese team was still inside Japan Studio, so he was there when they worked in Death Stranding Director's Cut (released in 2021 on PS5 and 2022 in PC) but he isn't credited under any role even if many Sony people is credited under XDEV or under Japan Studio:
Game credits of Death Stranding Director's Cut:
https://www.mobygames.com/game/1727...ectors-cut/credits/windows/?autoplatform=true
And well, if something, the main difference that separates the US team from the EU & JP one is that the EU & GP teams have their own office.
In Puppeteer she is credited as "Business Management Dept.", yes. I said "Business Development", which is how she was credited in Rain and is basically the same, because it's what they'd do in a business management department:How can you not even realize that she is credited on Puppeteerin your own pic from the other post? And Business Development was never part of External Development, lol. Notice how they are totally different departments.
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To manage (a.k.a. develop) a business, in this case to handle/publish/produce/develop a videogame.
Meaning, if Japan Studio had at some point a 'internal development department', 'external development department' and 'business development department', in the first team there were the devs who worked in internally developed games like Puppeteer, in the external development department would work the devs who worked in externally developed games as would be Bloodborne and in the business development would work product developers, producers, marketing, etc.
So in that business development department, as she was credited in Pupppeteer is where people like the producers, product developers etc would be.
This is how she is credited in the games (Japan period):
- Rain: Business Development under SCEI (Sony Computer Entertainment Japan)
- Puppeteer: Business Management Dept. under SCE Japan Asia
This is how she is credited in the games for her SSM period:
- Bloodborne: Assistant Producer under SCEA: WWS America
- The Tomorrow Children: Assistant Producer under SIEA: WWS America
- Death Stranding: Associate Producer under "SIE WWS America, Product Development"
This is how is credited in her Foster City period:
- Death Stranding Director's Cut: Associate Producer under SIE WWS America, Product Development
- Gran Turismo 7: Associate Producer under SIE, PS Studios
- TLOU2R: Producer under SIE, PS Studios
- Helldivers 2: Producer under SIE, PS Studios
True, what SSM had was an internal development team doing GoW games and an XDEV team where she worked as Assistant/Associate Producer.
Assistant/Associate is an entry/low level rank for producer. Pretty likely this is the reason of why in her SSM period instead of managing entire games she was limited to make the production tasks related to localization.
As she explains, as Associate Localization Producer she wasn't the localizator who translates the games. The localization team pretty likely was in a distant city.
Later in 2019 when she moved to the SIE HQ is when she started to producer of whole projects.
Ok. I was talking about XDEV, who do many things more.
Some examples:
- GT7: under 'Sony Interactive Entertainment, PlayStation Studios'
- GT Sport: under WWS America / International Software Development & Special Operations, or under WWS Europe - International Software Development
- GT6 under WWS America
- GT4 under Sony Computer Entertainment America Production
Sure Jan, the people I posted in this post and in the previous one plus more that there may be never existed.
The game credits lists under its XDEV team lists these people from the XDev EU team:
- Executive Producer: Jason Paul Stewart
- Senior Director: Tim Preece
- Business Planning Manager: Nick Ryder
- PA and Team Assistant: Laura Darley
- Associate Producer: Lucy Jones
- Senior Online Producer: Jean-Paul Roberts
- Executive Assistant: Maria Ledson
- Special Thanks: Alessandro Gaudiosi, Neil Johnson, Charlie Newport, Dave Bickley, Mark O'Connor, Shaun Rees
As I mentioned before I don't know why XDEV social media accounts didn't post about Helldivers 2, they don't post about many of the projects they worked on. CM is one of the areas where XDEV can help the projects where they work. In the past they handled the CM of internally developed games.
Helldivers 2 is a GaaS, and CM is very important for them, so they did put a strong CM team inside Arrowhead that is doing a great job with their social media accounts, Reddit, Discord or securing support from streamers and youtubers. Pretty likely they did put their CM money there instead of keeping a part of it for the XDEV account.
Another possibility is that since the game had a 5 years long delay, maybe originally was under XDev EU, and due to the big delay some XDev people in charge of it got fired, some boss like Scott or Hermen got mad and decided to don't include the XDev brand in Helldivers 2 and to bring it to NA where they did handle HD1.
Another possibility is that since HD1 was handled by the American external development team (rare exception where a game isn't handled by the XDEV team of their region), they got happy with HD1 so decided to work on it from there in the sequel too. And HD2 started in 2015/2016, when the Foster City external development team of the American HQ still didn't use the XDEV branding name, so kept it like that.
TheThreadsThatBindUs
Member
A new Live Service Socom game?
Gaf would collectively shit the bed... but you know, it could be sick AF.
GreatnessRD
Member
onnextflix5
Member
Killzone gass game no doubt, can’t think of any other PlayStation ip that would suit them.