Sacred Symbols+, Episode 162: Jeff Ross on Bend Studio, Days Gone, and Days Future (Patreon)

Welcome Jeff Ross to Sacred Symbols+. Since the late '90s (with only a foray at High Moon Studio interrupting), Jeff had been at Sony-owned first party team Bend Studio, the organization once famous for its Syphon Filter stealth games across PSone, PS2, and PSP, and more recently responsible for Days Gone on PlayStation 4, which launched in 2019. Indeed, Jeff began as a designer at Bend and rose to director of Days Gone. He's no longer at Bend, though, and he has a lot to say about his experience there, the positives and negatives. We touch on the trials and tribulations of making Days Gone, Sony's confusing response to the game, the damage PR did releasing it to critics unpatched, and more. We go into what could have been made instead of Days Gone (a sci-fi game not unlike Horizon or a procedurally-generated horror game internally called Zombies of Catan), possible target platforms (it was once meant for Vita, too, and was running on the hardware at one point), why Days Gone 2 was a non-starter (Sony doesn't care about nickels and dimes), and even unexplored ideas for franchises like Resistance and Uncharted (you almost got a Sully-driven game that took place in the '70s). This is an episode for the very hardest-core PlayStation fans, and there's no doubt you will enjoy it. So hit play!