"Your indifference is making these corporations greedy."

Image credit: Eurogamer

Today, Sony announced that it will no longer produce discs for PlayStation games starting in January 2028, citing "consumer preferences" for the reason it's going all-in on digital. The reaction, unsurprisingly, has been pretty bad across the internet and the indsutry at large.

"As consumer preferences and the broader entertainment industry continue to shift away from physical discs to digital, physical game disc production for all new games releasing on PlayStation consoles will be discontinued starting January 2028," Sony announced via a PlayStation Blog post. "Following this date, new games will be available on PlayStation Store and at retailers in digital formats only."

If you've been a gamer for even a very short amount of time, you'll know that the audience is pretty attached to physical versions of their games: even yesterday, Bethesda announced The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered is getting a physical Switch 2 release, and that revelation was met with cheers and thanks. Even though a lot of the gaming industry revolves around digital 'ownership' and online platforms, people really do value actually owning their games.

People online are reacting to the news, and there's - of course - a level of cynicism attached to how people are digesting the new information. Naturally, preliminary reactions consider price. As one user, DragonPup, notes on reddit: "[...] With no competition from used game sellers, the prices will surely go up. $80 is going to be the new norm." A reply reads: "It will be dynamic pricing which sucks for everyone but Sony."

This commentor refers to Sony's (possibly illegal) experimentation with dynamic pricing on the PS Store, a practice that offers different game prices to different people in different regions, depending on their transaction history and buying habits. If there are no physical units left in the world, it stands to reason that Sony could, in fact, charge what it likes: lesser choice for consumers means more leverage for platform holders, after all.

"This is anti-consumer," another commentor, JuanMunoz99, asserts. "I don't care that digital has outpaced physical. You are removing the option from consumers hands. This is why I hated how so many people just brushed off and said 'oh well' when this happened with GTA 6. Your indifference is making these corporations greedy." This person is referring to the recent controversy around GTA 6 not launching with a physical version, which, seen through the lens of today's news, may well have laid the foundations for Sony's shift towards an all-digital future.

Perhaps my favourite insight over on Reddit, however, comes from unfortunatesoul77, who notes: "Very tone deaf for them to announce this the same week they've lifted over 500 purchased movies off consumers, how do we trust they won't do the same to games?" This refers to the swathe of media that will be taken from your accounts - even if you've paid for it - after Sony renewed a licensing deal with Studio Canal, showing that even if you have purchased something on a digital storefront, you don't really own it. And it's not the first time this has happened, either. There is a legitimate and real fear that games you have purchased could be taken away from you if you don't own a disc: there are many such cases of this happening.

But then, even your currently-owned physical versions aren't necessarily future-proof. Well-known Twitter persona Shinobi602 has made a salient point about physical games on the PS5: "Either Sony: sells an optional PS6 disc drive (lol), [or] somehow allows you to transfer your discs into digital on PS6 (lol...lmao even). So I'll keep the PS5 plugged in or these become nice coasters." If you have PS5 physical copies now, there's a large chance they will not work on the PS6... unless you buy an accessory akin to the PS5 drive, which isn't exactly cheap.

Kotaku editor-in-chief Ethan Gach reposted a video from 2014, showing former president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment America, Jack Tretton, on stage at E3 2013. The clip shows the exec extolling the virtues of owning physical media, reiterating how PS4 will support physical discs "that give players full control over their games and what they want to do with them". As Gach points out, Tretton is repeatedly overwhelmed by cheers from the crowd as he takes swings at Xbox's doomed DRM-based talking points from the same E3. The video, it's safe to say, hasn't aged well.

At least some people are having fun at PlayStation's expense, though. Over on X (formerly Twitter), the offical Elder Scrolls account posted a cheeky reminder about Oblivion Remastered on Switch 2. "Exploring across Cyrodiil, you never know what physical treasures you might find," the post states, showing NPCs being very happy indeed to recieve a physical edition of the game. Or at least a physical game key card. Nice work, Bethesda.

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