Boycott Backfires: Ghost of Yotei Is Sony's Biggest PS5 Launch Since Spider-Man 2

Another day, another gamer 'boycott' that fizzles. Ghost of Yotei just launched like a rocket in Europe, drama and all, and the numbers are loud enough to drown out the noise.

'Ghost of Yotei is the biggest Sony launch since Spider-Man 2 in October 2023 in Europe, based on boxed sales.'

- @RinoTheBouncer, citing The Game Business, Oct 14, 2025

To translate: among Sony titles, Ghost of Yotei is the strongest European retail debut since Marvel's Spider-Man 2, which makes it the second-biggest recent launch behind that same web-slinger. And yes, Spider-Man 2 had its own pre-release headaches and still blew the doors off. Same story with The Last of Us Part II. At this point, 'boycott' chatter mostly reads like people planting a flag, not moving the market.

So why did Ghost of Yotei shrug off the outrage?

Short version: the game looks great, plays better, and Sucker Punch didn’t coast on goodwill from Ghost of Tsushima.

• Built-in trust: Ghost of Tsushima earned Sucker Punch a ton of credit, and that carried over. But the studio didn’t just rely on that reputation.
• Upgraded combat: the new system leans on weapon variety and disarming tools instead of the old stance-break routine, which makes cracking enemy defenses feel fresher.
• Showpiece visuals: it’s one of the prettiest things you can play right now, which always helps on day one.
• A sharper story hook: this time it centers on Atsu, who is out for revenge after her family is wiped out. It’s not the noble-warrior arc of Jin Sakai abandoning tradition to save his home, but it hits hard all the way through.
• Villains with teeth: the antagonists actually pop, which gives the whole thing more edge and personality.

Sucker Punch’s streak is kind of ridiculous

Quick history lesson, because context matters. Back in 1999, Sucker Punch surfaced with a project called Rocket that showed they were serious about building games from the ground up. The real break came when they pivoted into something in the mascot-platformer lane and delivered Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus. That first Sly did roughly a million copies, which got Sony’s attention and kept the franchise going for multiple entries.

As the PS3 era rolled in and open-world sandboxes became the vibe (even as linear juggernauts like Uncharted still cleaned up), Sucker Punch shifted gears with the Infamous series. Every Infamous release landed, enough that people assumed that would be their forever franchise. Instead, they gambled on a samurai epic, Ghost of Tsushima, which blew past expectations. Now its follow-up, Ghost of Yotei, is repeating the trick. At this point, Sucker Punch has pretty much avoided an outright flop.

Bottom line: Ghost of Yotei didn’t just 'survive' a boycott; it parried it and kept walking. If the game is good, it turns out the market still notices.

Do you miss any of Sucker Punch’s older series? If you could resurrect one, what’s your pick?