Microsoft’s announcement of its planned $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard had a lot of gamers yelling or, more likely, frantically typing about monopolies and exclaiming that Microsoft basically owns everything now. It might surprise you to learn that this acquisition is predicted to position Microsoft’s new gaming division, Microsoft Gaming, as only the third biggest gaming company in terms of revenue. Sony still remains ahead, as does Chinese mobile gaming behemoth Tencent.

So, if Sony is still bigger than Microsoft (at least in terms of games), and Microsoft now owns “everything”, what does Sony own? Everything remastered? Everything: The Complete Edition? No. None of these answers is correct, or even remotely sensible. For a more accurate summary of what game companies and game franchises Sony owns, read on.

Related: The five best PlayStation games of 2021

The list of gaming companies Sony owns is much simpler than the list of gaming companies Microsoft owns, mainly because Sony’s never bought out a major publisher, whereas Microsoft has basically bought out two in the space of the last year. Sony has acquired a lot of developers though (including Bungie, which was previously owned by Microsoft), as well as established many major studios of its own. And, of course, it owns the single most lucrative gaming brand of all: PlayStation. Here are all of the studios and franchises Sony owns:

Company: Bend Studio
Location: USA
Major Franchises:
Syphon Filter
Days Gone

Company: Bluepoint Games
Location: USA
Major Remakes:

• God of War
• Ico
• Shadow of the Colossus
• Uncharted

Company: Bungie
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• Destiny
• Marathon
• Mythic
• Created Halo, but that now belongs to Microsoft

Company: Firesprite
Location: UK
Major Spin-offs:

• Run Sackboy! Run!
• Horizon Call of the Mountain

Company: Guerrilla Games
Location: The Netherlands
Major Franchises:

• Horizon
• Killzone

Company: Haven Studios
Location: Canada
Major Franchises:

• Unannounced PlayStation IP

Company: Housemarque
Location: Finland
Major Franchises:

• Returnal
• Stardust

Company: Insomniac Games
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• Ratchet & Clank
• Resistance
• Spider-Man

Company: London Studio
Location: UK
Major Franchises:

• SingStar

Company: Media Molecule
Location: UK
Major Franchises:

• Dreams
• LittleBigPlanet

Company: Naughty Dog
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• Jak and Daxter
• The Last Of Us
• Uncharted

Company: Pixelopus
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• Concrete Genie
• Entwined

Company: Polyphony Digital
Location: Japan
Major Franchises:

• Gran Turismo

Company: San Diego Studio
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• MLB: The Show

Company: Santa Monica Studio
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• God of War
• PixelJunk
• Twisted Metal

Company: Sucker Punch Productions
Location: USA
Major Franchises:

• Ghost of Tsushima
• Infamous
• Sly Cooper

Company: Team Asobi
Location: Japan
Major Franchises:

• Ape Escape
• Playroom

Sony also owns a handful of studios that provide development support to various first-party and second-party developers, but these are all of its lead development studios.

Finally, Sony owns a lot of major game franchises that are handled by second-party developers, or are not currently tied to any particular studio:

• Buzz!
• EverQuest
• Everybody’s Golf
• Everybody’s Tennis
• Lemmings
• MediEvil
• MotorStorm
• Siren
• SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs
• Warhawk
• Wild Arms
• Wipeout

About the author

Gavin Mackenzie

Gavin Mackenzie has been playing video games since the early 80s, and writing about them professionally since the late 90s. Having been a writer and editor on various British magazines including PLAY, GamesTM, and X360, he's now a freelance guides specialist at Gamepur.

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