Sony Ends Relationship With SuperBot

Sony have closed all connections with PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale developers SuperBot Entertainment, it has been confirmed tonight. The Smash Bros-esque brawler crashed at retail, despite some hugely positive reviews.

“SuperBot Entertainment can confirm that the relationship with SCEA has ended on good terms,” says SuperBot’s director of operations David Yang. “We are extremely grateful to have had the opportunity to work on with Sony on Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale, and are extremely proud of the work we have done.”

“SuperBot Entertainment will continue working on projects that reflect our passion for games and our commitment to creating award winning titles. We are very excited about beginning the next chapter of our future and invite all of our fans and supporters to follow our journey.”

The studio recently laid off a large number of staff.

Sony have been condensing their roster of studios over the last year or so, with Sony Liverpool being a notable recent casualty. Call of Duty Vita developers Nihilistic were another, and Starhawk developers Lightbox Interactive moved on from console development last year.

27 Comments

  1. Wow the quickest lay off of a studio ever. I loved allstar it’s a gem that had potential if advertised right.

    • It was advertised all over, in one of the biggest campaigns I’ve seen from Sony who’s campaign over that period dwarfed rivals.

      One thing Sony did do this time around was advertise… unlike most of their other underwhelming projects of the past year or two.

  2. was a good game just not many PS3 fans cared for it shame.

    was Superbot ever owned by Sony?

  3. Was hoping for some more dlc characters after Kat & Emmett. Guess that won’t be happening.

    • Sony Santa Monica will continue to support future DLC, is the official word ;)

      • Damn, you just beat me to it ;)

      • My work here is done!
        *ninja smoke bomb*

      • Ah that’s good then. Thanks.

  4. All-Stars is a sound game but, for reasons unknown, I haven’t been motivated to play it for some two months now.

    • I felt that way, and then when I was bored at a friend’s place, I turned it on…and ended up playing it for about 2 hours online. It’s a pretty fantastic and surprisingly deep game. This is quite a bummer.

  5. Damn, they didn’t get much of a chance. At least the team still exists i guess.

  6. Booooo. I thought I read somewhere Sony was satisfied with PSASBR’s performance? At least they’re staying open for now.

  7. Damn that was quick. Wasn’t Superbot intended to be Sony’s fighting game studio as well? Not a sustainable business plan to have if it goes down after one game. Hopefully the developers will survive or quickly find other projects, Sony better bloody pay them as well for their efforts.

    As for All Stars future, Santa Monica in charge of DLC gives it a small degree of confidence and they’re a talented lot (And in a stable organisation as well). But I think most of their efforts are now Vita or next-gen, All Stars will get three or four sets of characters I’m guessing.

    • Yeah I feel sorry for the devs on this one as all stars was supposed to be flagship title of Sony gaming, an icon, and a loveable game but I guess the figures didn’t add up for Sony. If Sony have the IP we may see a sequel, personally the game looked good but it wasn’t my foray; I couldn’t see the attraction in playing as radec or drake, nor some plain old bumping and bashing about.

  8. That sucks! I was hoping for a great sequel. Gotta stick with Nintendo for a cross-franchise fighter then. Let’s hope Sony can have Santa Monica make a sequel.

  9. Should have been a budget game at launch. Just way too much competition at Xmas from big franchises to be full price. I’d have probably grabbed it for £20, but for £40 it was always way down my ‘wants’ list.

  10. Sad to see them part ways as All-Stars was one of my favourite games last year. Hopefully it won’t be the end of the game.

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