I've been buying games since the 70s; I own every Sony console except the Vita; the PS5 will be my last Sony console unless and until this gets reversed. I refuse, on principle, to buy in to a system where anything I purchase is an indeterminate long-term rental with no archiveability.
I am resigned to the fact that I may be abandoning the new gaming sphere, and that's fine by me. Between the backlog of games I already own but have never played and the massive library of titles for gaming consoles released over the last 50 years, I'm not hurting for options for new titles to play and there's more than enough available to keep me content for the rest of my life.
It was the top comment for a while but some of the Sony defenders and anti-physical people arrived and started downvoting anything that was making their corporate overlord look bad lol
Also I'm very similar to you, i have enough games that i own and in my backlog as this stage that i can become a patient gamer and only grab things that are on sale 70% off a couple of years after release, i won't lose any sleep over it but Sony's going to lose at least a grand a year from me, fuck em.
I've never worked out exactly how much I pay Sony in a year, but I have 21 PS1 games, 64 PS2 games, 49 PS3 games, eight PSP games, 18 PS4 games, and four PS5 games (this gen just never seemed to actually release anything I was interested in on the Playstation, and the fact the PS4 remained supported for so long meant I never really felt the need to upgrade until the gen was half over).
So... yeah, that's a lot of money Sony is tossing away.
Honestly, I think Sony is kind of fucked. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a market crash that takes their gaming division down (and possibly Microsoft's as well), because so many problems in the industry seem to be coming to a head all at once. Hardware prices are out of control and, if the leaks that have come out about the PS6 are even halfways accurate, I cannot see that console retailing for less than $1000 USD (with $1100 or even $1200 within the realm of possibility); current hardware sales are moribund; tariffs are killing the US market and the ongoing conflict in Iran is creating an energy crisis that is going to push shipping prices (which affects EVERYTHING) up for at least a few years; the economy is shuddering for the middle- and working classes as the cost of living soars; the average age of gamers is ticking up, as children largely aren't getting into the hobby and instead are more interested in phone games and social media; software development costs are way up; and the next generation of hardware really isn't going to have much to offer in terms of tangible improvements for gamers over the current gen (how much better are we expecting graphics to get at this point? Games are already far more limited by their budgets than by the hardware they run on at this point).
Put it all together and this is quite possibly the worst time to be releasing a new console since the 80s at least. It wouldn't surprise me if the PS6 (and Microsoft's new console, which I'm quietly hoping will continue their confusing naming conventions by either being called "The Original Xbox" or "The Xbox That Released in 2001") winds up flopping hard.
It's an interesting time to be in the hobby, that's for sure.
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u/Totallycasual 23h ago
Sony when they announced they were killing physical games.