Sony exec cautious about cloud gaming, says it’s “very tricky”

Sony’s chief executive Kenichiro Yoshida has warned that cloud gaming is technically “very tricky” but the company is up for taking on the challenge.

Sony will study “various options” around streaming games, even using its AI agent GT Sophy to enhance cloud gaming, said Yoshida in an interview with the Financial Times.

“I think cloud itself is an amazing business model, but when it comes to games, the technical difficulties are high,” Yoshida said. “So there will be challenges to cloud gaming, but we want to take on those challenges.”

The biggest of those challenges is latency – the response time between player input and game reaction.

Yoshida also discussed the “dark time” for gaming – the hours in the evening when traffic is at its highest – and how this means servers are idle during the day, a costly inefficiency.

Sony was able to use those quieter hours to allow GT Sophy to learn how to beat human competitors.

“The dark time for cloud gaming had been an issue for Microsoft as well as Google, but it was meaningful that we were able to use those [quieter] hours for AI learning,” said Yoshida.

Last month, PlayStation boss Jim Ryan teased the company has “fairly interesting and quite aggressive plans” for cloud gaming, although no specifics were revealed.

Later that same day, at its PlayStation Showcase the company revealed Project Q, a new handheld gaming device that will allow users to stream games from a PS5 over Wi-Fi.

Cloud gaming has, of course, been a major factor in the CMA’s decision to block Microsoft’s planned takeover of Activision Blizzard in the UK. Microsoft is set to appeal.

Yoshida declined to comment on the impact Sony foresees from Microsoft’s attempted purchase of Activision Blizzard, said the Financial Times.

Google closed its Stadia cloud service at the start of the year, after a string of failings due to a problematic roll-out and lack of consumer interest.