Sony has revealed it will launch more than 10 new live service games within the next four years.

The company unveiled its plan during an investor call, where CFO Hiroki Totoki essentially admitted the acquisition of Bungie for $3.6 billion was about more than just Destiny and more about ramping up efforts to produce live service games, which are games that are updated with new content over time. They tend to generate revenue through in-game purchases, rather than initial sales.

"The strategic significance of this acquisition lies not only in obtaining the highly successful Destiny franchise, as well as major new IP Bungie is currently developing, but also incorporating into the Sony group the expertise and technologies Bungie has developed in the live game services space", said Totoki during a call with investors on Wednesday 2 February 2022. "Through close collaboration between Bungie and PlayStation Studios we aim to launch more than 10 live service games by the fiscal year ending March 2026".

Totoki also noted that, from 2014 to 2014, the global game content market doubled. This growth, the CFO said, was "driven by add-on content revenue from live game services, which grew at an average annual rate of 15% during this period". Totoki added: "We expect this trend to continue going forward".

There is no mistaking that this is a major shift in strategy for Sony. It is well-known for offering first-party titles that largely focus on single-player narrative experiences, while its competitors in recent years have pushed forward with games such as Microsoft's Minecraft and Sea of Thieves and Epic's Fortnite.