Psyonix: Cross-platform play is good for eSports

Rocket League studio Psyonix says that PS4 and Xbox One players being able to compete with each other will be a big boost to the eSports industry.

The firm’s VP of marketing and communications Jeremy Dunham has told MCV that the No.1 reason the studio is urging Sony and Microsoft to allow for cross-platform play is so it can unite Rocket League’s large fanbase.

In March, ID@Xbox director Chris Charla said that Xbox would be enabling developers to support cross-network play – hinting that future games could have online functionality that allows PSN and Xbox Live users to play together. Psyonix has since said it already has the tech needed to bridge the two networks.

The studio already allows for cross-platform play between PS4 and PC, and will be introducing the same functionality between Xbox One and PC in the coming weeks.

We are a very community-focused game with a huge audience,” Dunham said. We have millions upon millions of active players every month. One of the premier features we have had since the original launch is we have been cross-network between PlayStation 4 and PC, and it’s been a great feature and has given people much higher-quality matches and lets them match-make faster.”

It gives you a lot of options and now that we are doing a lot of our really strong eSports initiatives, it also means that we can have gamers on multiple platforms playing in the same competition without having to divide it all up or force them to start their own separate leagues.

One of the big advantages of reaching a point where all three platforms could play against each other at the same time is a true worldwide best-of competition, and people would see even more players online to compete against. It’s good for competition, it’s good to have a large healthy community.”