With the critical embargo for PlayStation 4’s launch lineup effectively ending yesterday, early reviews for Sony’s three first-party titles appeared online, and the company have responded to the decidedly mixed reaction. Speaking with GamesIndustry International, Sony’s president of Worldwide Studios, Shuhei Yoshida, has expressed his disappointment with the initial impressions.
Here’s what Yoshida had to say about the scoring spectrum:
“With this launch there are lots of games coming out, so the media must be very busy going through the games quickly, and especially since the online functionality wasn’t ready until in the last couple days. So we have to look at how much time they spend on what aspect of the games and how that may be contributing to some of the lower scores.
“It’s disappointing but I don’t think it’s worrisome for the launch of the system,” Yoshida added. “I’ve played through all of our games, Killzone, Knack and Resogun, and I totally enjoyed playing through these games. I’m now on my second run of Knack and Resogun at a higher difficulty – these games really grow on you when you play more. I’m very confident that once you purchase these games and play, you’ll be happy that you’ve done so.”
The three titles in question include Killzone: Shadow Fall, Knack and Resogun — Housemarque’s digital title that is available free of charge for PS Plus subscribers — which have averaged 75, 59 and 82, respectively, over on Metacritic. In particular, it was Japan Studio’s platformer Knack that drew the heaviest criticism, which will undeniably hamper Mark Cerny’s ambition to mould the unique creation into Sony’s next mascot.
Although consoles have launched without system sellers in the past and went on to succeed, Sony will feel underwhelmed with the preliminary reception. Having said that, in the same interview, Yoshida elaborated on the core ideology behind the PlayStation 4 and how the software lineup is designed to appeal to a broad spectrum of gamers; from first-person shooter fans to the more casual joystick junkies.
The PlayStation 4 will release tomorrow, November 15th in North America. Tell us, are you a little apprehensive about the console’s library? Have you pre-ordered any of the aforementioned titles with your hardware? Let us know below.