140°

PlayStation confident in PS Plus strategy as it readies PS5 game streaming

Head of subscriptions Nick Maguire tells us the service has been a hit, highlighting stats such as 'a billion hours of gameplay since that catalogue launched'. He also says that users of the service are, on average, spending seven times as much time on PS Plus than they did with PlayStation Now in the year prior to launch.

Maguire highlights some standout titles in the service, including Dead By Daylight, The Legend of Dragoon, Rainbow Six: Siege and, of course, the indie game Stray, which launched day and date in the service in July.

"Stray has brought in the highest number of players that have accessed that title over the first 12 months," Maguire says. "And Ghost of Tsushima has brought in the highest number of hours of gameplay. People have really stuck around and really invested in that game. That goes to the strength of our PS Studios titles, which have seen great engagement and lots of excitement.

Read Full Story >>
gamesindustry.biz
Tacoboto352d ago

One thing I wish for from either Xbox or PlayStation on their services would be to let me play a disc game without needing the disc in after I install it.

Idk how the logistics could work to prevent soft-piracy like disc sharing and playing at the same time (I.e. if there's an ID for the disc their servers can track and you have to be online), but I think of how nice a feature that would be every now and then.

Horizon for example - it's been a year and my disc is put away in storage. Burning Shores came out and HFW being on PS+ now meant I just bought the DLC on my phone, and played it a few minutes later, no need to disc swap out with Hogwarts Legacy.

It would be a very For-the-Players move and, imo, would encourage both physical purchases and maintaining a concurrent subscription. A disc for the collection with the ease of digital.

crazyCoconuts352d ago

I'm guessing mass production of discs would be quite a bit more complicated if they had to alter some part of the data to embed a unique id on each one. Also, then to prevent piracy the console would have to make an online call to a central server to verify the code hasn't been "redeemed" every time you play, so now you have an always online requirement. I'm sure they'd rather us disc users just give up and buy digital in the end...

Tacoboto352d ago

Yeah, thinking about the logistics makes it messy once you go more than one layer deep.

It's unfortunate that games are both the most expensive digital entertainment medium and the least interoperable/shareable.

You can burn a CD and forever save and copy those MP3s.
Buying a DVD since 2007 or so, you get the Digital Copy code for free! That was fractured at first - Platform A, Platform B, "iTunes", but now it's been centralized to this Movies Unlimited platform that can be linked to any major movie download store and some movies receive free enhancements - Apple TV grants me 4K Dolby Vision access to my 2008 The Dark Knight. Last year's The Batman came with a Download Code + 4K Blu Ray + Regular Blu Ray. Before 4K Blu Rays, we'd get the DVD version alongside the regular Blu Ray.

The closest thing we've had to a concept like Movies Unlimited is Xbox Play Anywhere (especially combined with Smart Delivery), but that's restricted to just one ecosystem and only for your digital purchases... and requires using the Xbox PC app.

Slipping in a nice download code with the disc (since we don't even get manuals anymore) would've made the bump to $70 very welcome I think. That's kind of what happened with movies - as Blu Rays came out, prices increased, but value actually did too because every purchase was almost like two copies.

andy85352d ago

It'd mean you could never sell a disc I assume though and that isn't the way

Tacoboto352d ago

In my thinking...

The disc user can do whatever offline with it. The PSN (or whatever service) account "linked" to it would have the disc-less access revoked if the disc is ever detected online on another account without the need to alert or notify the current user. It's less of the disc being "tied" to your account (making reselling unimpacted), but rather - PSN would grant you a digital license until it becomes known you're a sharer.

With it as a perk of the service, they can apply any restrictions they'd like - insert the disc again after a month, unable to play discless offline, Max Limit of N "Expanded Access" titles at a time.

darthv72352d ago

Technically... you can do that. If you install a disc game, and that game is also on game pass (and you happen to be a GP member) you can then play the game without the disc. I believe Sony has recently done the same thing. It used to be on PS that disc games were seen as different than digital ones of the same title. I believe it was a very recent update that they dropped the separate installs and now just see the data as the same. They just verify your license and it lets you play the games without disc if they were also made available in PS+

I know on XB, the game data is seen as the same regardless of disc or digital. I remember going to play Quantum Break and it showed the GP logo on it on my screen so I clicked and sure enough it started playing. I had installed it from disc like a couple weeks before joining GPU. Its been rather cool when i can install a game from GP and that game is later removed, i can pop in my disc and continue playing and vice versa.

Tacoboto352d ago

You're right about the first paragraph - it was only recently changed by Sony. All I had to do for my disc Horizon install to get it playable was to go to the PS Store listing and tap Add to Library. Want to say that was a February or March random thing in addition to the ever-stabling of the PS5 firmware lol.

One game I know of on GP that doesn't treat save data equally is The Outer Worlds. It is the rare game that was GP Day One, without Xbox Play Anywhere support and therefore has no shared data between PC and Xbox. Only one I've come across like that, points for irony of the developer being MS owned now.

crazyCoconuts352d ago

""I was personally surprised that Premium has ended up being a bigger share of the base than Extra. We all thought that Extra would be where the majority of people went to first, but actually Premium has been more popular and bigger," he reveals.
I didn't expect that...

GhostScholar352d ago

The only two problems I have are

1. They should be putting more ps1 and ps2 games in the service
2. There’s no incentive to have premium really. Essential is just as good for less money.

gold_drake352d ago (Edited 352d ago )

After playing wildarms and most of the ps1 games, i whole heartily disagree

but people should be subbing (or not) what they can afford.

shinoff2183351d ago

I played some of legend or dragoon and some wild arms and was perfectly fine. I agree more ps1 and ps2 games are needed. There thousands.

ChasterMies352d ago

"Stray has brought in the highest number of players that have accessed that title over the first 12 months,“

What a great game. Quality over quantity.

250°

Days Gone Director Says Bend's Project Costs Over $250M; Says PS Co-CEO Doesn't Want 2 Zombies Games

Days Gone director claims Sony has already poured in at least a $250M in Bend's project; says Days Gone sold more than Death Stranding.

shinoff218319h ago

Well that sucks. Seems they want more online trash. I'd rather of had the sequel if it was single player

MrNinosan4h ago

What online trash games did PS Studios release last 10 years?

Notellin2h ago

The past has nothing to do with the future. This is such a terrible argument. Everyone knows about their current live service push.

_SilverHawk_1h ago

It's so tragic what happened to days gone. It is such an amazing game but bandwagoners trashed it and it underperformed in it's launch year. Days gone is the best open world zombie game released in the past five years. I was recently playing it on pc and I'm still amazed by it.

Games are very expensive to make and it seems like it's normal for a AAA game to cost over a quarter billion to make so if a quality game like days gone greatly underperforms then people shouldn't be upset when they see a lot of GAAS. I still remember a lot of bandwagoners calling days gone trash but years later it's now amazing when it's considered a failure by sony.

If a game isn't the best thing seen since hats with pockets then a lot of gamers who haven't played it automatically calls it rubbish and whoever made it should be incarcerated

Cacabunga11m ago(Edited 10m ago)

Co CEO prefers gamers to boycott.. so be it. I’ll never buy a gaas.
Just imagine buying a game you cannot replay in some years.. this shit must stop.

Days Gone did zombies in a very original way. The story was also so engaging. You actually only meet Zombie hordes later in the game. There are many more enemy groups to deal with.

-Foxtrot19h ago

It would be a shame if it was true that Hermen never gave the franchise a chance simply because he didn't like it and they already had a "Zombie" game with TLOU.

NaughtyDog are most likely moving onto a new IP next so it would have been the perfect time to do it.

ThinkThink11h ago

Here's where xbox steps in and releases state of decay 3 day and date on ps5.

Grilla4h ago

Days gone 2 was canceled before Herman was in charge. That happened like 4 years ago.

vfl5233h ago

4 years ago he was head of Playstation Studios. He would've probably had a hand in the cancelation.

Notellin2h ago

Man two seconds of research could have saved you from this comment. Amazing work Grilla you fit in with the uniformed N4G community who speaks before verifying anything that they say.

Redemption-641h ago

Maybe encourage people to buy the game at full price and not when it's heavily discounted or go on plus. If this game had sold well when it was full priced a sequel would have been in the works. They made a single-player game that most people didn't support until they dropped the price.

excaliburps5h ago

Yep. Kind of weird since it wasn't a sales flop, no?

I know we have to take what Ross says with a grain of salt since we're hearing just one side of the story, but even so, the game wasn't bad at all. Heck, it's my brother's favorite last-gen game from what I recall.

The amount of zombies on screen, imagine that with the PS5 and SSD? That would be insanely fun!

Grilla4h ago

Most copies were sold on sale. Not enough ppl bought it at full price. I paid 20$ for it 6 -7 months after release.

Notellin2h ago(Edited 2h ago)

Yeah we should never believe the creators side until we hear the corporate/big business side as history has shown we should always believe billion dollar corporations.

What a bootlicker statement.

P_Bomb4h ago

Well I don’t want 10 live service games, but they have no problem doing that lol. Ugh.

CrimsonWing694h ago(Edited 4h ago)

Oh great so we only get what the big wigs want… y’know, the people that really have their fingers on the pulse of what their consumers want. Faaaaantastic!

rippermcrip1h ago

Well consider they know the sales... they do know what the consumer wants.

It sold shit.

Show all comments (33)
110°

Can FSR 3 frame generation deliver the 120fps dream on PS5 and Xbox?

Frame generation technology has arrived on consoles, amplifying frame-rates and potentially transforming experiences.

Read Full Story >>
eurogamer.net
purple10122h ago

adds between 8.3-15.3 milliseconds of latency on the game they tested, - no thanks

darksky4h ago

Base latency is 130.8ms and frame gen takes that up to 139.1ms. A 7% increase in latency is hardly a deal breaker.

Zenzuu4h ago

That's hardly a deal breaker and not really noticeable. Even the folks at Digital Foundry said so as well.

darthv7222h ago

Impressive results... sadly I don't have a 120hz display. I was thinking this technique could increase fps on any game that supports it regardless of the display.

purple10121h ago(Edited 21h ago)

I have a vrr telly in the lounge,

On another point, what if it were the other way around where the developer aims for higher fps, then used something like pssr to make the resolution higher, that might be better?

Any which way, PS5 pro sure looks interesting now, being they have already doubled frame rate, with JUST just this fsr3.0

sagapo2h ago

It’s up to dev’s to implement FSR 3 support tho but most probably will I guess (hope).

andy853h ago

Now I've extensively tried it I'm not too fussed about 120 fps. Give me a locked 60 and more details and I'm more than happy

230°

Trying to push players over from PC to console is a terrible idea, PlayStation

As PlayStation announces its new strategy to encourage PC users to choose PS5 it is a bitter-sweet moment for PC gamers.

Christopher20h ago

I mean, it's a business based on hardware market. Do we expect them to not even try? It's not like Nintendo doesn't do the same by not putting any games on PC and Microsoft until recently did the same. I don't care what they attempt, as long as they don't abuse the community or lie about their goals/requirements.

Will it work? Not likely. Should we care? No. Let them waste their time, it doesn't affect anything.

RaidenBlack20h ago

let them try ... at the end of the day, we get few extra PC games ... yay ... and also promotes game preservation via PC ... so double yay.

LordoftheCritics3h ago

If only Playstation games provided the ease of pc gaming features.

Primary being very few PS games support m/kb.

Fishy Fingers19h ago(Edited 19h ago)

I wish them the best of luck.

But PC players are often a patient bunch, many will even wait for Epic launcher exclusivity to end until a game comes to Steam.

If they didnt buy the console when its games were exclusive, why would they do it now theyre not?

MrNinosan5h ago

Way more do than you probably think.

ravens525h ago

All you need is that one game that'll make a few switch at a time. Like a game a PC player REALLY wants.

outsider16241h ago

I mean if there's 10 million pc gamers out there...getting atleast just 1 million from there is probably a good thing..right?

-Foxtrot19h ago

PC gamers are just too patient and loyal to their gaming set ups, something they've spent a lot of money on to perfect. They have backlogs of games which many never get round to finishing or get round to at all and will always have other multiplatform releases to keep them going.

Over the many years Sony has published so many awesome titles such as The Last of Us, Uncharted, Heavenly Sword, Infamous, Killzone, LittleBigPlanet, Dreams, Puppeteer, Resistance, Heavy Rain, Gran Turismo, Motor Storm, God of War, Horizon, Ratchet and Clank, Spiderman, Ghost of Tsushima, Bloodborne

If none of those games BEFORE all these PC ports convinced a hardcore PC gamer to get a PS5 console then why on Earth would porting them them to PC now make any difference? All PC gamers now know 100% is that they just have to be patient, which they are good at anyway to get a PS5 game 2 years later.

I get GaaS games or multiplayer focused titles but if people really want to play these games they'd have gotten a PS console years ago.

Crows901h ago

Not sure they're aiming to convince the hardcore PC gamer.

Not sure why people are obsessing over his comment...it seems pretty simple to me.

He will do all he can to entice gamers to move to his ecosystem. As you say....exclusives existing hasn't moved many gamers over. But if they get to try them and love the games then they might change their mind about waiting 2 years.

We're in an echo chamber on this site...I've Personally seen people with Xbox and PC setups but no PlayStation. I've also seen people with small PC setups but no console. Not every pc gamer invests thousands and many may decide to put one in the living room.

They're not looking to convince all of players to buy a PlayStation...just a few...and really it is just a PR statement after all...they have to give a reason why single player won't release day 1....not to mention they also have to ensure current PlayStation gamers don't jump ship to PC. It goes both ways and they're ignoring the big L by putting any of their games off their platform.

anast57m ago

"Not sure they're aiming to convince the hardcore PC gamer."

Right here

Kakashi Hatake1h ago

PC gamers think tomorrow is promised. Sorry, don't have time for that.

Michiel198929m ago

it's not just about loyalty or sunk cost, pc is an open platform while consoles are closed platforms. If you for example want to mod, you will play on pc, no question about it. Also if you like indie games, steam is a fucking goldmine for that. I've been playing a lot of indie games over the last years and there just seems to be an endless amount of them on steam. Also not having games locked to a certain fps is a prettty big deal for me and I assume a lot of other pc players.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 29m ago
helicoptergirl18h ago

Who cares? Then just stay on PC and play the waiting game. No big deal. Sony wins in the end anyway.

Number1TailzFan18h ago

I mean if there's any single player Sony games that I actually want that aren't on PC then I would buy said console to play them on. But the ones that I like that aren't on PC are few and far between anyway so no loss for me.

If I game, it's usually multiplayer titles, otherwise I like playing around with some other software.

Show all comments (31)