Journalists from The Verge attracted attentionthat documents filed by Sony in a US Federal Trade Commission case against Microsoft and Activision Blizzard contained poorly concealed confidential information.
Image source: Sony Interactive Entertainment
It appears that Sony’s lawyers scribbled over the documents with a black pen, erasing indicators not intended for prying eyes. As it turned out, when scanned, the text appeared through a layer of ink, revealing what was hidden.
The court hastily removed the overly explicit documents from public access, but it was too late: the information reached the population, journalists and even Sony’s competitors. What did the careless editing reveal?
Image source: The Verge
One of the Sony documents contained information on the production budget (excluding marketing costs) for two major PlayStation exclusives – action-adventure The Last of Us Part II and open-world action game Horizon Forbidden West.
As it turns out, The Last of Us Part II took 200 people to develop and cost Sony $220 million, and Horizon Forbidden West took five years and $212 million to produce, involving 300 people.
Image source: Twitter (Dex-M)
Another document from Sony reveals how many PlayStation users play Call of Duty. In 2021, more than 12 million people spent more than 30% of their game time in Call of Duty, 6 million more than 70% (an average of 296 hours) and 1 million played full time.
In the same year 2021 Sony earned Call of Duty has over $800 million in the US and $1.5 billion worldwide. And that’s just games – including accessories, subscriptions and everything else, the figure totals $13.9 billion (maybe even $15.9 billion, the text is illegible).
Image source: The Verge
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