The news had started to leak last week, Sony has present on March 29 its response to its major competitor Microsoft. A reworked Playstation Plus, with two new offerings, must meet Xbox Game Pass in the race for subscription games. Estimated arrival, June 2022.
Playstation Plus, Extra, Premium…
The first novelty is a disappearance, that of the streaming service of games selected on old Sony consoles, the Playstation Now. It will merge with the Playstation Plus through two layers of offers, when they are released in June.
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- Playstation Plus Essential : Basically, nothing changes. Same price, 8.99 euros per month, same benefits as the current service, namely online multiplayer, cloud save, two downloadable games per month;
- Playstation Plus Extra : the advantages of Essential with, in addition, a catalog of 400 downloadable PS4 or PS5 games for 13.99 euros per month;
- Playstation Plus Premium : Essential, Extra plus 340 additional games, streaming PS3 titles, streaming and downloading PS2 classics, Playstation, PSP, available on console or PC. Limited trials will also be offered. It will still cost 16.99 euros.
These offers do not equal Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. For 12.99 euros, the latter is the equivalent of the Premium offer, nothing less. Microsoft’s offer mainly offers the most recent and well-known games, which is not the case with Sony.
Popular titles have already been announced at the launch of the service, god of war, Spiderman and Spider-Man Miles Morales, Mortal Kombat 11…so many known and celebrated franchises, soon to be joined by others, but the latest games are missing.
The subscription service, Jim Ryan and Sony believe in it moderately
This choice Jim Ryan assumed with the specialized site gamesindustry.biz“ it’s not a path we’ve taken in the past. And that’s not a path we’re going to take with this new service. “. He believes that there is a virtuous circle in the video game market, which could be broken, ” The level of investment we need in our studios would not be possible, and we believe the ripple effect on the quality of the games we make would not be something gamers want. “.
The CEO of Sony still expects to attract most players already subscribed to Playstation Now and Plus to the two new offers that he considers complementary. He stated to GamesIndustry.bizto have ” combined subscription numbers over 50 million now, and we’re happy with that. That’s a good number “. In January Microsoft claimed 25 million subscribers on its Game Pass, which is constantly increasing.
Unlike its competitor, Sony is not convinced that video games are following the path of other major entertainment industries such as music or video. Jim Ryan believes that the Netflix or Spotify subscription model cannot be transposed, ” gaming is such a different medium to music and linear entertainment “.
A position that contrasts with the current dynamics of the environment. Jim Ryan himself admits that Sony could change its strategy if it were to realize that it is wrong. In the meantime, the Japanese company remains the second largest in the sector and the new offer should convince its aficionados.