Comment by neilv
17 hours ago
> This is a weird marketing strategy. They must feel free to do as they please since they know consumers are trapped.
I've been on PlayStation family since PS2, and used to think I was married to it, with my game library and my player character stuff/gear/creations in various games.
But the platform no longer lets me play many of those games, anyway, whether due to console gen or server shutdowns. And nobody cares about my PlayStation gamer score or trophies. So there's little tying me to the platform for the next game I buy.
Sony, please don't make me move to "Linux" gaming, via Valve/GOG/Epic (since I don't want to endorse Microsoft hegemony over the low-level gaming "standard"). PlayStation should be a beloved brand and platform that can be trusted to keep games working -- not one that throws away history, nostalgia, and community. You already impose rules on publishers, so this is within your power.
Related: Project Aces, I was fairly highly ranked in a couple of the Ace Combat installments, but when you shut down the servers, you took away what I'd invested in. I reluctantly bought AC7, but found I didn't have the heart to invest in it, just to have it taken away again, and I won't be buying AC8 nor anything else in the franchise.
Server shutdowns are a problem regardless of the platform.
There used to be a time when PC games allowed you to connect to random servers. These days Minecraft is the only one that still allows it. And even there, Microsoft go hard on the upselling of their Realms.
Some studios kill their servers after just a couple of years. Even for games that are online first.
Is this a place Sony could differentiate from other platforms?
Contractually require (and technologically support) that the servers are kept running for n years after the last sale, for example?
"Linux" gaming on Steam deck or Steam in general is a lean-back experience that's got almost nothing in common with the sweaty PC game experience of the past with the big chunky joysticks that were always falling apart and had to be recalibrated all the time and the too-sharp graphics and all.
I picked up some ACER handheld at Best Buy and it was a complete joke, the first thing I saw looked like a Windows PC with comically small fonts. My Steam Deck looks more like a Switch or PS Vita.
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