Twenty years ago at E3 2005, Sony showed off a Killzone 2 video as an example of the PlayStation 3’s power over its rival console, Microsoft’s Xbox 360. However, Sony later admitted that the Killzone 2 video wasn’t actually gameplay footage and that it was meant to be a “target render” for the team to achieve. Now, former Xbox boss Peter Moore has shared that he knew all along that the Killzone 2 demo was “BS.”
While speaking with The Game Business, Moore recalled that Sony pulled a similar trick to outshine the Dreamcast when he worked for Sega. Sony essentially tried to adopt the strategy a second time to overshadow Xbox 360’s launch.
“It was exactly the same tactics of creating a very expensive movie,” said Moore. “But when the game came out, it was completely BS. I knew it that night when I watched it. I thought there’s no way they’re delivering this experience. They were doing the same thing to us as they did with Sega, which is go: ‘Alright, cute little Xbox 360 coming out, but the big boys will be out with the PlayStation 3, so you should hang around and wait for that. Because look what we can do.'”
According to Moore, game journalists also recognized Sony’s strategy and quickly came to the conclusion that the PS3 wasn’t powerful enough to produce that level of detail in real-time.
Moore went on to describe Microsoft’s strategic rollout of Xbox 360, and added that landing the console-exclusive rights for Call of Duty 2 went a long way towards the company’s success.
In the present, Call of Duty remains the most-successful FPS franchise, which is now owned by Microsoft after the Activision Blizzard sale. As for Killzone, the most recent game in the franchise was 2013’s Killzone Shadow Fall. There was also a Killzone 2 DLC for Helldivers 2 that was released in late 2024.
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