SIE London Studio (formerly SCE London Studio) is the British game development studio owned by Sony Interactive Entertainment and, as its name suggests, based in London. One of Sony's lesser-known development teams, London Studio primarily focuses on various technologies and experimental games that are compatible with the PlayStation brand of consoles. Though it was officially founded in 2002, London Studio's origins date back to 1994.
Back in 1994, Sony established an internal development group in Soho, London appropriately called Team Soho. Team Soho was notably comprised of fresh college graduates with little to no experience in game production. For the majority of their existence, Team Soho worked on sports and racing titles, eventually releasing a total of nine titles. The last of them, The Getaway is the team's most famous and fondly-remembered game, which would also carry over as a favorite IP among the future London Studio.
Four years later, Psygnosis - acquired by Sony in 1993 - established a new studio called Psygnosis Camedan in, well, Camedan, circa 1998. The small studio was renamed into Camedan Studio following Psygnosis' rebranding into SCE Studio Liverpool, and developed four titles under its belt.
In 2002, as part of a larger reconstruction within Sony's gaming division, it was decided to merge Team Soho and Camedan Studio in a singular entity: London Studio.
London Studio is best known for developing the SingStar franchise of party and music games, which utilize EyeToy, a camera developed by London Studio; the series as a whole has been fairly successful for London Studio and Sony, selling over 20 million copies across several installments. Outside of those games, London Studio also assists in the development of titles developed by other European first-party studios, including those made by Guerrilla Games and Media Molecule.
By the early 2010s, London Studio emerged as Sony's central division in England following Psygnosis' closure and Cambridge Studio's reconstruction in 2012, which followed with the closure of both Evolution Studios of Motorstorm fame and Cambridge in the mid 2010s. In the meantime, London Studio spearheaded the development of Sony's own virtual reality headset, the PlayStation VR, which went on to sell over 5 million units.
In 2024, as part of massive layoffs within SIE, London Studio would close its doors.
Nowadays, London Studio is best known for their VR Rail Shooter Blood & Truth - originally meant to be a revival of their long-forgotten The Getaway IP - which became somewhat of a Killer App for their VR headset. It even topped game sales charts in the United Kingdom, a first for a virtual reality game.
Compare with SIE Japan Studio, who are essentially London's counterpart as a smaller first-party division with focus on experimental titles.
Video games developed by Team Soho:
- NBA Shootout '96
- NBA Shootout '97
- Porsche Challenge
- Rapid Racer (known as Turbo Prop Racing in the U.S.)
- Spice World
- This Is Football
- This Is Football 2
- This Is Football 2002
- The Getaway
Video games developed by London Studio:
- Aqua Vita
- Beats
- Blast Radius
- Dance Star Party
- Dance Star Party Hits
- Dropship: United Peace Force
- Eight Days (PlayStation 3)(Cancelled)
- EyePet
- Eye Pet & Friends
- Eye Toy: Chat
- Eye Toy: Groove
- Eye Toy: Kinetic
- Eye Toy: Kinetic Combat
- Eye Toy: Operation Spy
- Eye Toy: Play
- Eye Toy: Play 2
- Eye Toy: Play 3
- Eye Toy: Play Sports
- Fired Up
- Hardware: Online Arena
- Kingsley's Adventure
- PlayStation Home
- Sing Star (PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3)
- Sing Star '80s
- Sing Star 90s
- Sing Star ABBA
- Sing Star Amped
- Sing Star Anthems
- Sing Star Dance
- Sing Star Guitar
- Sing Star Legends
- Sing Star Motown
- Sing Star Party
- Sing Star Pop
- Sing Star Pop Edition
- Sing Star Pop Hits
- Sing Star Queen
- Sing Star R&B
- Sing Star Rock Ballads
- Sing Star Rocks!
- Sing Star Summer Party
- Sing Star Take That
- Sing Star Vol. 2
- Sing Star Vol. 3
- Team Buddies
- The Getaway:
- The Getaway: Black Monday (PlayStation 2)
- Gangs of London
- The Getaway (PlayStation 3)(Cancelled)
- Blood & Truth
- This Is Football 2003
- This Is Football 2004
- This Is Football 2005
- Untitled Project (TBA)
- Wonderbook
- World Tour Soccer
- World Tour Soccer 2
