Shuhei Yoshida's call: the year of PS4

New Year’s Day, 2016, and Sony’s messaging had a theme: after a 2015 that, for PlayStation exclusives, was more quiet than groundbreaking, the platform holder bet big on the year ahead.

Shuhei Yoshida, president of SCE Worldwide Studios, made the prediction plainly: 2016 would be the year PS4 owners saw the value of their investment justified, and the year fence-sitters finally bought in.

“Next year marks an unprecedented wave of great games for PS4. It is also the year of the highly anticipated PlayStation VR. It is the year in which PS4 users — and those thinking about acquiring one — say, ‘okay, it’s time to have this console.’”

The usual executive optimism, except this time the lineup backed it up: Street Fighter V, Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Horizon: Zero Dawn, Gran Turismo Sport, and The Last Guardian were all queued for the year.

History’s verdict: he was right. That run — Horizon and Uncharted 4 especially — became the backbone of the PS4’s legacy, and turned a console already leading the generation into the one that defined it.