I've been an engineer in the AA/AAA games industry for almost 2 decades, my job often involves assessing the technical feasibility of games that big publishers like Sony want to invest in/ acquire.

Someone somewhere at AW agreed to shove PSN sign-in requirements in the deal, hoping it would blow over like many games before. (e.g rocket league / epic account debacle). Now the devs are sorry it's not working out and say "their hands are tied", but they must have known this was coming. There are way too many legal ramifications for this to be a random power-move by Sony.

Edit: sony apparently lifted the requirement today

[–] Sanctus 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

I'm gonna be honest. It didn't matter to them at the time. Look at it. They made their game and we all played it and loved it. For that time they were on cloud nine. They definitely got what they wanted, for a moment anyway. I can't say I wouldn't end up in the same situation if I was ever more than a shit dev.

Edit: but to add, I'd put huge banners in game saying it was a requirement at login. As far as I know I was never bothered in game for it. And if I was it was too easy to click and ignore.