Bethesda's Indiana Jones was Supposed to Launch on PlayStation as Well; It Won't Happen
The original agreement between Disney and Bethesda's parent company ZeniMax was that the new Indiana Jones game was to come to various platforms, including the PlayStation 5 console. Unfortunately, plans have changed.
The fact that a new Indiana Jones game is being made was first revealed in early 2021. Unfortunately, since then, no new information about Machine Games' project surfaced on the web. And although the game itself is still shrouded in strict secrecy, Bethesda has confirmed that the title will appear exclusively on Xbox Series X/S consoles and PCs.
The source of such information is Bethesda's head of publishing, Pete Hines, who attended a hearing held by an FTC (Federal Trade Commission) lawyer on the acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft.
Most interestingly, however, the original deal struck with Disney stated that the upcoming Indiana Jones game would be released on multiple platforms, including PlayStation consoles. However, the terms were to change when Bethesda (which is part of ZeniMax Media) was acquired by Microsoft. At that time, it was decided that Machine Games' work would be released exclusively for Xbox consoles and PC.
Pete Hines also revealed that on the day of its release (the date of which is still unknown) Machine Games' title will also be available in Xbox Game Pass.
The behind-the-scenes of the whole affair was investigated by the editors of IGN. From the information reached by journalists, it appears that Lucasfilm (which owns the rights to Indiana Jones) had concerns about the game's multi-platform nature. Hines was said to have suggested that representatives of the Disney-owned company believed that it would take more time to rollout the game on multiple platforms. Xbox CEO Phil Spencer, on the other hand, noted in an email to 2021 that "a large number of versions of a game from Bethesda will not directly benefit the Xbox community."
Hines also talked about how discussions with the licensor can take up valuable development time.
"You're dealing with a licensor who's giving you a lot of feedback on what you're developing, and that's taking a lot of time out of your schedule; these agreements, you can't have as much time as you want, you have a time window in which you're going to release the game, and the clock is ticking," the developer revealed.
