Kiwi Talkz #184 - Shawn Layden Interview (Former CEO & Chairman of Playstation & SIEA)
Shawn Layden was former CEO of Playstation worldwide studios and former chairman of Sony Interactive Entertainment America. His career in Sony is legendary as a Japanese localizer that had a meteoric rise to be one of the head honchos of the whole company.
SOCIAL MEDIA
TWITTER -@SHAWNLAYDEN
BLUESKY - @shawnlayden.bsky.social
TIMESTAMPS
00:00 - Intro
01:02 - Why Playstation Used Numbers For Each Console Iteration
03:26 - Being The Fix It Guy At Sony/What Motivates Shawn
05:45 - Building A Reputation
07:00 - Doing 18 Hour Days During The PSN Hack
09:00 - Why Sony Is So Good At Marketing
13:01 - How FOMO Is Used In Marketing
14:00 - Why Sony Now Releases 1st Party Games On PC/Initial Pushback
15:50 - Why Astro Bot Was Shawn’s 2024 GOTY
18:30 - Why The Japanese Are So Good At Game Design
21:57 - Western Games Are Too Big In Scope/Dev Costs Come From Salaries
23:05 - Why So Many Game Studios Are On The West Coast Of America/Environmental Costs
24:57 - Game Devs Commute Times Create Major Sunk Costs/Working From Home
28:30 - Shawn Pushed Realistic Graphics Well Acknowledging It’s Not Sustainable
30:52 - How Sony Prices Games & When To Drop The Price
33:40 - Concords Failure/Why Games As A Service Was Popular And No Longer Isnt
37:31 - Why The PS6 Won’t Be Discless
40:00 - Launching Handhelds Are Hard/Why The PS Vita Failed
43:00 - Sony Characters Won’t Appear In Super Smash Bros
44:20 - Why Playstation All-Stars Didn’t Sell Well
46:48 - Q+A - How Will The Market Of Fortnite/Roblox Players Change As They Get Older
49:28 - Q+A - Shawn’s Opinion On Microsoft’s Multiplatform Approach
51:22 - Nintendo Are Best Positioned To Navigate The “Diminishing Returns” Problem
54:18 - Q+A - What Games Did You Think Would Be Big Hits But Weren’t.
58:21 - You Learn More From Failures Than Successes
59:43 - Closing Comments