From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action


So, Sony has officially announced an end to future ports of
Playstation games to the PC platform. This was rumored some months ago
and is now confirmed. PS5 exclusives --the next "God of War", the next
"Last of Us", the next "Ratchet and Clank", etc.-- aren't going to be
making it to PC.

Meanwhile, they've also announced that they're raising the price (by
about 10%) to their PS Plus streaming plans. Also, Sony has been
pretty vocal about raising game prices to the $80USD level. Oh, and
the hardware's getting more expensive to produce too, so that's
getting a price increase as well.

So even as they jack up the prices, they are purposefully limiting
their audience. All this while console gamer numbers are dropping.

How's that phrase go? "It's an bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it
pays off."


#


That said, I suspect this isn't Sony betting so much on exclusive
games as it is on streaming games. A PS5 is more than adequate to
stream super-high-end games that --with the proper server backend--
could make even the visuals of a $10,000 PC beg for mercy. More, the
console wouldn't need to be upgraded every five years. I think Sony's
aim is hoping to snag all that lucrative subscription cash rather than
capture the hardware market. Whether gamers will actually go for it is
a different matter (issues of lag can't be solved even by the most
powerful back-end servers) but this might be Sony's hope.


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From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote at 15:29 this Tuesday (GMT):

So, Sony has officially announced an end to future ports of
Playstation games to the PC platform. This was rumored some months ago
and is now confirmed. PS5 exclusives --the next "God of War", the next
"Last of Us", the next "Ratchet and Clank", etc.-- aren't going to be
making it to PC.

Meanwhile, they've also announced that they're raising the price (by
about 10%) to their PS Plus streaming plans. Also, Sony has been
pretty vocal about raising game prices to the $80USD level. Oh, and
the hardware's getting more expensive to produce too, so that's
getting a price increase as well.

So even as they jack up the prices, they are purposefully limiting
their audience. All this while console gamer numbers are dropping.

How's that phrase go? "It's an bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it
pays off."

#

That said, I suspect this isn't Sony betting so much on exclusive
games as it is on streaming games. A PS5 is more than adequate to
stream super-high-end games that --with the proper server backend--
could make even the visuals of a $10,000 PC beg for mercy. More, the
console wouldn't need to be upgraded every five years. I think Sony's
aim is hoping to snag all that lucrative subscription cash rather than capture the hardware market. Whether gamers will actually go for it is
a different matter (issues of lag can't be solved even by the most
powerful back-end servers) but this might be Sony's hope.

Wasn't there also a controversy a while back about renting a PS5?
They're definitely going all in on subscriptions...
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom
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From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

candycanearter07 wrote:

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote at 15:29 this Tuesday (GMT):

So, Sony has officially announced an end to future ports of
Playstation games to the PC platform. This was rumored some months ago
and is now confirmed. PS5 exclusives --the next "God of War", the next
"Last of Us", the next "Ratchet and Clank", etc.-- aren't going to be
making it to PC.

Meanwhile, they've also announced that they're raising the price (by
about 10%) to their PS Plus streaming plans. Also, Sony has been
pretty vocal about raising game prices to the $80USD level. Oh, and
the hardware's getting more expensive to produce too, so that's
getting a price increase as well.

So even as they jack up the prices, they are purposefully limiting
their audience. All this while console gamer numbers are dropping.

How's that phrase go? "It's an bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it
pays off."


#


That said, I suspect this isn't Sony betting so much on exclusive
games as it is on streaming games. A PS5 is more than adequate to
stream super-high-end games that --with the proper server backend--
could make even the visuals of a $10,000 PC beg for mercy. More, the
console wouldn't need to be upgraded every five years. I think Sony's
aim is hoping to snag all that lucrative subscription cash rather than
capture the hardware market. Whether gamers will actually go for it is
a different matter (issues of lag can't be solved even by the most
powerful back-end servers) but this might be Sony's hope.

Wasn't there also a controversy a while back about renting a PS5?
They're definitely going all in on subscriptions...

There was a recent controversy that PlayStation will make practically everything subscription, and you won't own any games. It's laughable.
PS5 was a big improvement over PS4, but this will take them back to Fred Flintstone & Barney playing on the PS6. I'm not falling for it.
--
War in the east
War in the west
War up north
War down south
War War
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From Newsgroup: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action

On Sun, 24 May 2026 18:00:04 -0000 (UTC), candycanearter07 <candycanearter07@candycanearter07.nomail.afraid> said this thing:

Wasn't there also a controversy a while back about renting a PS5?
They're definitely going all in on subscriptions...

I don't recall a subscription PS5; there was a recent kerfuffle about
online activations requiring you to check-in with the Sony mothership
every now and again to keep your licenses active. Sony walked that
back after this was prematurely discovered, however.

The thing is, while I personally detest the subscription model, I can
totally understand its appeal to both consumers and publishers.

For consumers, there are advantages. Most gamers don't have the same
long-term connection I have with my games; they see them as more
disposable commodities. You play "Call of Duty 87: Warriors of Warring
War" for a while, then move on to CoD 88, then CoD 89. Worrying about
if you can play "Call of Duty 83: Battalions of Battle Lions" from ten
years ago just isn't that important to them. Thus, what I see as one
of the biggest problems with subscription models --your lack of
control over your games and when you can (and cannot) play them-- just
is a big concern to them.

And yes, costs with subscription models are --all told-- tend to be
higher than buying games outright... but that's only in the long run,
and generally people aren't good at long-term planning anyway. Paying
$15 per month for 100 games (even if 99 of those games you'll never
play) sounds better than paying $60 for the two games per year you
actually WOULD play.

Plus, there's a significant hardware advantage. You don't need a
powerful machine to stream games from the cloud... which means you
aren't as tied to the upgrade cycle. Forget paying $2000 for a
high-end gaming PC every five years; you probably wouldn't even need
to pay $500 for a new console!

And on the other side... well, obvious a guaranteed subscription fee
every month makes publishers salivate at the idea. Throw into that all
that user data, and the possibility of advertising and upselling and
its no wonder Software-as-a-Service is the dream. But there are other advantages too. If you're streaming the software to clients, you can
make the back-end gaming machine as custom and powerful as you need it
to be. No need to work around the limitations of a general-purpose
computing device, especially one that may have multiple
configurations. Just the reductions in QA and tech-support make it all
worth it!

And it also has the additional benefit that the cost-of-entry would be
much higher, which would mean that only the existing big-name
publishers would be able to offer it. It kneecaps most competitors
before they even get off the ground!

I don't think subscription services will ever fully replace retail
sales, but I do think it is going to -eventually- become the dominant
channel for video gaming. The apparent benefits are just too strong to
argue against, and most people just don't understand the downsides.


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