At 59, he still plays everything, from Sony’s own blockbusters such as God of War and Horizon to independent games from little-known developers; currently he’s got a big Marvel Snap habit going, he tells me, but he’s also been playing the Bafta-winning Before Your Eyes on the recently released PlayStation VR2 headset , and he expresses an enduring admiration for Nintendo’s polish, creativity and tactility.
In 2000, Yoshida was sent to the US to help run PlayStation’s American studios – Naughty Dog , Sucker Punch and Insomniac. It was here, with Santa Monica Studio, that he worked on his first game-of-the-year winner, the original God of War . It was the first of many. “After that there have been so many game of the year awards, I cannot believe it,” he says. “If you are involved in one GOTY game, that’s a good career I think, but for me it’s been six or seven.
In doing so, Yoshida is often present for the entire lifecycle of a game, from idea to prototype to release, and he sees how hard developers work to realise them. He still counts 2012’s Journey – which he says was an incredibly hard project for its makers at Thatgamecompany – among his career highlights, because it overcame impossible odds.
Things have become more difficult for game developers in the 25+ years that Yoshida has been working in the industry. Development costs have skyrocketed: 2010’s God of War III, an extremely expensive game for its time, cost $44m to make. Modern PlayStation 5 games, such as God of War: Ragnarok can cost around $200m. At the other end of the scale, independent developers are coming out with better games on smaller budgets, meaning getting noticed is harder.
“Getting games funded is tough, but even when you make an amazing game, there are so many out there in the market, great games that nobody knows,” he muses. “The good thing is, these days, there are really good high-quality indie publishers out there.