Jade Raymond's new Sony studio, Haven Entertainment is reportedly working on a brand new IP. According to VG247, the new game will be live-service and exclusive to Sony's PS5 console. This live-service game is the unannounced new IP she teased when she first announced she was leaving Google Stadia in order to form her own studio at Sony.
Raymond has had a fantastic career in the video game industry already. She joined Sony as a programmer right after finishing university, and then later went on to join EA, and then Ubisoft, where she worked as a producer on numerous games, including Assassin's Creed and Watch Dogs.
RELATED: Skull & Bones Doesn’t Have A Place In Today’s Gaming LandscapeRaymond has a history of opening and leading studios, having served as the managing director of Ubisoft's Toronto studio before rejoining EA to found Montréal-based Motive Studios, responsible for developing Star Wars Battlefront 2 and Star Wars: Squadrons.
Raymond joined Google back in March 2019 and launched the company's first Stadia studio in Montréal. She clearly made an impression there, as six employees recently left the Stadia studio she founded to work at Haven.
According to VG247 and LinkedIn, several veteran video game developers around the Montréal area have joined the studio to work on this new live-service PS5 exclusive. These include: the lead writer of Assassin's Creed, Corey May, Mathieu Leduc, the art director for Watch Dogs, and Daniel Drapeau, the gameplay director on Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
Although there has been no official announcement or release date for this upcoming game, with all the amazing talent at Raymond's new Haven studio, we've got our fingers crossed that this game will be a success.
Rumours that this game will be a live-service title, however, do fuel the fears that all triple-A games are now moving towards the profitable games-as-a-service model. Since the gargantuan success of GTA Online, many publishers seem to be after their own version – Warner Bros Games said it would be focusing on live-service titles, and Assassin's Creed Infinity looks set to be the next big competitor to Rockstar's cash cow.