Guerrilla Games’ Horizon: Zero Dawn has sold an impressive 3.4 million copies worldwide since its launch in the U.S. in late February.
Speaking during an interview with Glixel, Shawn Layden, President of Sony Interactive Entertainment America (SIEA), applauded the Amsterdam-based studio’s bold move to step away from its first-person trappings with Killzone and venture into fresh territory. The success of Horizon, alongside other PS4-exclusive titles, have resulted in a strong 2017 thus far for Sony.
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“We’ve been so proud of what that studio has been able to do. It’s a brave step for that studio to go from making shooters like Killzone to an open world game,” said Layden.
Layden went on to note that Horizon notched up some impressive digital sales via the PlayStation Store, selling some 915,000 copies. In particular, the PS Store is performing strongly as a whole, representing 40 percent of new game sales for PlayStation platforms.
“This kind of shift changes everything. It changes the publishing model, it allows smaller players to put out games, it affects DLC and it has a huge impact.”
Horizon Zero Dawn received positive reviews from critics upon release, and sold 2.6 million copies less than a month after launch. The game’s immediate success prompted analysts to suggest the game could go on to equal Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End in terms of sales, and we already know that Guerrilla is in the process of working on story-based DLC for the open-world adventure game.
Sony has not yet confirmed a follow-up to Horizon, although it has made it clear that the format holder is eager to see it join the PlayStation family’s library of major gaming franchises. Even Microsoft’s Xbox boss has doffed his cap to the critically acclaimed post-apocalyptic opus.
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