Housemarque joins the PlayStation family

Posted on June 30, 2021

Housemarque, the studio behind 2021’s PS5 exclusive, Returnal, has joined the PlayStation family. Herman Hulst, PlayStation’s Head of Studios, announced on the PlayStation blog that adding Housemarque to their studio “enhances the creative force of PlayStation Studios” and that he “cannot wait to see what the future holds for Housemarque.”

This won’t surprise those who know about the already solid relationship between PlayStation and the Helsinki game devs, which started with Super Stardust HD. The arcade-style shoot ’em up was released on the PS3 back in 2007 and a port on PS4 in 2015. Ilari Kruittinen, the Co-founder and Managing Director of Housemarque, stated that this announcement gives their “studio a clear future and a stable opportunity to continue delivering on gameplay centric approaches.”

 

Since Super Stardust HD, the studio has released other PlayStation exclusives such as Matterfall, Alienation and Nex Machina. However, the biggest of their releases has to be this year’s Returnal. Elliot reviewed the roguelike when it came out in April and shared his thoughts: “The game has an attention to detail and a unique sense of style that goes beyond anything I would have expected from this comparatively small development studio.” 

Now that it is part of the Sony family, Housemarque can no longer be considered “small.” Kruittinen acknowledged this development means the studio can “truly grow into our place in the industry and show what Housemarque can create with no limitations.” It will be exciting to see what the studio creates next with the backing of Sony.

Of course, we will keep you in the loop with all the latest news about this budding “studio-mance”. We here at Checkpoint also can’t wait to see what this relationship creates!