Back in July, Sony Interactive Entertainment, or PlayStation, announced the end of physical games come 2028. The consumer backlash has seemingly been constant ever since, but it doesn’t look like the company is changing its decision. At least, not outwardly. But there are rumours that the company is surveying developers for feedback about physical games, giving hope that there is at least a non-zero percent chance of the company walking that decision back.
The survey was mentioned by YouTube channel Moore’s Law Is Dead. In an episode of its Broken Silicon podcast, channel host Tom noted “there is a survey Sony sent out to developers that is – what I was told by my contacts – a bigger survey than they’ve sent almost ever before, if not ever before. And there was a question in it … basically asking in a not direct way, ‘is there an issue with how we sell games physically’, or something – asking developers for feedback on killing discs”.
Separately, Kotaku had an interview with Kenzo Saruhashi, CEO of Nippon Ichi Software and president of its NIS America subsidiary, who has expressed concerns about the discontinuation of physical games. For context, both companies produce regular physical releases for games that they develop and publish, but also elaborate limited-edition boxes.
On one hand, Saruhashi says NIS is initially working with the same information that’s available to the general public. When asked if the company would resort to putting codes in a box, he says that it’s one possibility, but maybe not the only one. “In our discussions with Sony so far, I think that they’re hearing a lot of the feedback from customers and so while that may be one destination that we arrive at, it’s possible that the discussion may change in the future, so we’ll have to see what happens, and what comes of it”, he said.
Taking the claim that the company is working with publicly available information at face value, that seems optimistic at best. That being said, game devs and companies like NIS will likely have more sway than the average gamer when it comes to making PlayStation change its mind. To what extent that influence goes remains to be seen.
(Source: Moore’s Law Is Dead / YouTube, Kotaku)
