PlayStation's New LA Studio Hiring For A Groundbreaking AAA Co-Op Game

As of now, PlayStation holds 15 central game studios and five support/external development teams. Several of these first-party studios have been acquired over PlayStation's 30-year history, including Housemarque, Insomniac Games, Nixxes Software, Naughty Dog, Guerrilla Games, Sucker Punch, etc., while others were developed internally by Sony, including Santa Monica Studio, XDEV, Polyphony Digital, San Diego Studio, and others. Alongside the latter tier of studios, Sony has also been preparing some in-house PlayStation studios in the past few years, and one of them does seem to have begun developing its first title.

However, a few of the latest job listings for PlayStation's newly launched Los Angeles studio strongly indicate the development of a co-op multiplayer title. Even though Sony has not so much as named or acknowledged this mysterious PlayStation group yet, details regarding its debut project have already begun to surface online.

So, that one is the nameless PlayStation Los Angeles studio founded earlier this year and revealed by way of job listings to be in development on a "breakthrough" new AAA IP. Then, a bit of recent detective work by Tech4Gamers revealed a couple of new job listings from the PlayStation LA studio that cast some further light on its enigmatic project.

From the listings, one of the jobs is a Game Systems Designer, whose job requirements specifically state "experience with and knowledge of co-operative multiplayer design principles and ideals". Some will read that and immediately jump to a live-service project, but because this game is only presently confirmed on PS5, it may not be. PlayStation live-service titles are released on both PS5 and PC.

The second job post is for a Senior Gameplay Designer, which explains some of the larger game systems that the successful candidate would need to develop, such as "weapons, abilities, player movement, networking, and AI." Including "networking" on the list lends even more credibility to the suggestion of a new multiplayer game out of PlayStation's LA studio. Also, this job post specifically lists Unreal Engine 4/5 as a requirement.

As such, it seems the behind-the-scenes PlayStation LA studio is using Unreal Engine 5 in its co-op multiplayer title. Who could be leading the work on this title is also widely speculated about; most PlayStation users think it could be Jason Blundell, the ex-co-founder of Deviation Games.

Deviation Games was a rising outfit with which Sony partnered in 2021 to develop an all-new AAA IP for the PS5. Sadly, the partnership soured in the following years, with Sony reportedly terminating Deviation's funding in early 2023.

The studio fought for a year before it eventually shut down in March 2024. During this time, rumors began to surface that Sony was constructing a new PlayStation team made up of former Deviation staff, which would be under Blundell's leadership. The PlayStation LA studio could very well be housing Blundell's team, but only time will tell whether this theory is accurate.