Sony will stop making physical PlayStation games starting in 2028

[Shawn Knight]

Bottom line: Rockstar made waves last week when it was revealed that "physical" copies of Grand Theft Auto VI would not include an actual game disc, but instead a code to download the game digitally. Now, Sony is taking things even further by announcing that it will end physical game production for PlayStation consoles starting in January 2028.

From then on, new games will be sold on the PlayStation Store and at retailers in digital formats only.

Sid Shuman, senior director of Sony Interactive Entertainment content communications, blamed consumer preferences and the broader entertainment industry for the continued shift from physical to digital. Shuman claimed that consumer demand for digital media has significantly outpaced demand for physical discs, and that the change will allow Sony to better align with how their community prefers to access and play games.

Sony said the transition will have no impact on games already released or those scheduled to launch before January 2028.

For gamers of a certain age, it certainly feels like the end of an era. Physical media has been part of the home video game experience since the very beginning. There's something special about being able to own your games, handle the physical materials like the box and any included extras, and resell used titles when it comes time to move on.

Digital copies of games afford none of that, but they do have some advantages over their physical counterparts. Physical media is more expensive to manufacture and ship, and it takes up space at retail. With digital, there's no worry about a publisher running out of inventory on launch day. But you also can't resell your games, so there's no way to recoup a portion of your investment later, you can't build a physical collection to display, and so on.

What are your thoughts on Sony ending physical game sales? Was it inevitable that we'd eventually get to this point? Will consumer pushback force a rethink, or are gamers ready to move on from legacy physical media?

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Sony will stop making physical PlayStation games starting in 2028

 

[Theinsanegamer]

You will rent the digital game on the digital console, with a digital connection to the mothership, using your digital currency from your digital bank. Your content will be removed when the license expires, and you will have to rent other content instead. You will then have to subscribe to use the device, subscribe again to play online, then subscribe to gain access to the content you rented earlier. You will own none of this, and you will be happy, because if you express discontent we will yank your digital accounts and let you starve.

You were warned about this. Welcome to the digital future!

 

[GeoffreyA]

You will rent the digital game on the digital console, with a digital connection to the mothership, using your digital currency from your digital bank. Your content will be removed when the license expires, and you will have to rent other content instead. You will then have to subscribe to use the device, subscribe again to play online, then subscribe to gain access to the content you rented earlier. You will own none of this, and you will be happy, because if you express discontent we will yank your digital accounts and let you starve.

You were warned about this. Welcome to the digital future!

Marketing translation: "Welcome to the future of gaming. Fast, efficient, modern. Buy once; play everywhere. Prepare to conquer. Game on."

 

[Billybobjoey]

No used games sales, no sharing games with your buddies, no third party stores selling codes (I suppose this is what retail might be if they shift to selling codes in boxes like GTA 6, but at that point why bother?). You will pay the price Sony sets, whether you want to or not. I truly expected Xbox to go this route before Playstation given their ever shrinking retail presence (one small shelf of 5 or 6 games at my local Walmart), Playstation stepping on the rake first is truly a shock.

The list of reasons to get a PS6 continues to shrink. I'm glad I started prioritizing PC/Nintendo over the other two.

 

[scavengerspc]

And any Sony fan boy will tell you its just a coincidence this is announced right after they removed paid for media from their customers library.

How much more clear could the message "we own you" be?

Tech doesn't want customers, they want barking seals, and there is no lack of those.

You will own none of this, and you will be happy

Damn that did not age well.

 

[yRaz]

Marketing translation: "Welcome to the future of gaming. Fast, efficient, modern. Buy once; play everywhere. Prepare to conquer. Game on."

People who work in marketing are almost as bad as lobbiests and politicians

 

[Squid Surprise]

The only reason I have bought PlayStations was for the disc drives… I figured (correctly) that no bluray player would receive longer support than them… but I guess there will be no need to buy a PS6, as they won’t have a disc drive.

 

[GeoffreyA]

People who work in marketing are almost as bad as lobbiests and politicians

Yes, to work in marketing, I think one has got to have no qualms about lying or bending the truth.

 

[texasrattler]

You will rent the digital game on the digital console, with a digital connection to the mothership, using your digital currency from your digital bank. Your content will be removed when the license expires, and you will have to rent other content instead. You will then have to subscribe to use the device, subscribe again to play online, then subscribe to gain access to the content you rented earlier. You will own none of this, and you will be happy, because if you express discontent we will yank your digital accounts and let you starve.

You were warned about this. Welcome to the digital future!

No one really ever owned games to begin with as the disc is just a disc, the content is what the Publisher controls which is the actual game. If they want to change, or even end a game, they can. Which would means your disc is now useless. The old days are long gone. Its an online/digital world now, which they control.

 

[texasrattler]

The only reason I have bought PlayStations was for the disc drives… I figured (correctly) that no bluray player would receive longer support than them… but I guess there will be no need to buy a PS6, as they won’t have a disc drive.

Discs in general will be going away. No reason to support something that is literally dying. In a few short years, discs will be legacy. Digital age is here and coming in full force. Its an adapt or die world.

 

[m4a4]

And with that, PC looks even better (which is why I also want to see the Steam Machine succeed, even if it doesn't have a disc drive like some disingenuous people whined about).

That said, as someone who hasn't bought a disc in several years, the writing was on the walls. The only thing about the current situation is that PlayStation doesn't have the pro-consumer features that a PC store (like Steam) has; where you can share your library amonst family and robust sales that doesn't need to be kept in check with physical media sales (among many other great features).

Sony fanboys are not having a good year...

 

[LordVile95]

Wonder what will happen if Xbox commits to discs

 

[Theinsanegamer]

No one really ever owned games to begin with as the disc is just a disc, the content is what the Publisher controls which is the actual game. If they want to change, or even end a game, they can. Which would means your disc is now useless. The old days are long gone. Its an online/digital world now, which they control.

Incorrect. If I have a game, on disk, I can play it. I can put my PS4 copy of ace combat 7 in any offline ps4 and play the whole game with no issues.

Short of the publishers sending the pinkertons to my house to steal my disk, there is the square root of jack **** they can do about my OWNERSHIP of that game.

Discs in general will be going away. No reason to support something that is literally dying. In a few short years, discs will be legacy. Digital age is here and coming in full force. Its an adapt or die world.

Some choose not to roll over and accept what their overlords demand. Others beg for more of that tasty boot.

 

[Plutoisaplanet]

No used games sales, no sharing games with your buddies, no third party stores selling codes (I suppose this is what retail might be if they shift to selling codes in boxes like GTA 6, but at that point why bother?). You will pay the price Sony sets, whether you want to or not. I truly expected Xbox to go this route before Playstation given their ever shrinking retail presence (one small shelf of 5 or 6 games at my local Walmart), Playstation stepping on the rake first is truly a shock.

The list of reasons to get a PS6 continues to shrink. I'm glad I started prioritizing PC/Nintendo over the other two.

You still have to physically put in your disc every time you want to play the game, so you cannot play it on simultaneous consoles ever. I find changing out discs to be a hassle. I'm not suggesting that removing discs are the solution, but I think they're less ideal than digital copies.

Anyways, at least on Steam I can log into my account on the computer of someone I trust in order for them to play the games I own. That's even more ideal than sharing discs because discs can be stolen, lost, or damaged while accounts require additional authentication before you can steal them. And account sharing applies to PSN too. There's no need to physically transfer anything if PSN is logged into multiple consoles (or even re-authenticate every time I believe), you just can't play games simultaneously on the same PSN account. Of course it would break the TOS, but it's done all the time and Sony isn't banning people for this.

 

[cfenton]

Incorrect. If I have a game, on disk, I can play it. I can put my PS4 copy of ace combat 7 in any offline ps4 and play the whole game with no issues.

Short of the publishers sending the pinkertons to my house to steal my disk, there is the square root of jack **** they can do about my OWNERSHIP of that game.
Some choose not to roll over and accept what their overlords demand. Others beg for more of that tasty boot.

That's going to vary game by game. I have a launch copy of No Man's Sky. I can put that into a PS4 and play the awful launch version, but if I want the good version I'd have to download a bunch of patches. A lot of newer games have a borderline broken version of the game on disk and require a day one patch to get the game into decent shape. The days of counting on having complete games on disk have, unfortunately, been over for a while.

That's not to say I approve of getting rid of discs. I still buy physical whenever I can because I like being able to resell games.

 

[Megalomaniac]

You will own NOTHING.

 

[stewi0001]

Future Phases:
1. A bot plays the games for you (sold separately).
2. You watch the game play itself.
3. You are not allowed any form of interaction with the game besides purchasing.
4. You keep giving money to a company, but you do not know why.

 

[Stoly]

I can't remember the last time I bought a disc, I don't think I ever bought a disc game for my son's 360.

BTW Valve didn't invent digital downloads, PIRACY invented digital downloads.

 

[Squid Surprise]

Discs in general will be going away. No reason to support something that is literally dying. In a few short years, discs will be legacy. Digital age is here and coming in full force. Its an adapt or die world.

Yes… but just because something is dying, doesn’t mean we should welcome or hasten the demise… especially if you’ll lose quality…

I don’t care about game disks… I care about watching my 4K bluray movies. Streaming is less quality - but few notice or care… upsampled 720p seems to be fine for most…

 

[Axeia]

Same company that literally deleted media off your device (more than once) that you purchased btw.
Have fun buying digital only games from them.

 

[GABulldog]

You'll live in the pod, eat the bugs, own nothing, and be happy. Pretty soon the console will be a subscription service.

 

[Rumiku]

I wonder if Microsoft will capitalize on this. Bad publicity killed the Xbox One before release and they never recovered. A commitment to physical discs could flip the script once again, allowing the newer Xbox console to emerge the victor in a "history repeats itself" sort of way, killing the PS6 before it starts.

Definitely worth watching...

 

[OortCloud]

Wonder what will happen if Xbox commits to discs

I'd be very surprised. MS seem to do everything they can with Xbox these days to make it as unappealing as possible so following Sony's lead on this seems likely.

 

[LordVile95]

I'd be very surprised. MS seem to do everything they can with Xbox these days to make it as unappealing as possible so following Sony's lead on this seems likely.

Honestly they don’t really even need to be discs, just a cart like Nintendo you can trade in. Games are mostly downloaded with little or nothing on disc anyway now

 

[texasrattler]

Incorrect. If I have a game, on disk, I can play it. I can put my PS4 copy of ace combat 7 in any offline ps4 and play the whole game with no issues.

Short of the publishers sending the pinkertons to my house to steal my disk, there is the square root of jack **** they can do about my OWNERSHIP of that game.
Some choose not to roll over and accept what their overlords demand. Others beg for more of that tasty boot.

You dont have to accept or like it, its simply happening.
The disc doesnt represent ownership for modern gaming. Publishers own the content and at any time can sell the company/studio and shutdown servers. This has been a thing for a long time. As I already said, the old days n games are long gone.
Of course you can play offline if a game supports it. But sadly a lot of games dont, more so the modern day games.

Point of all of this is disc's are ending for the next generation of consoles. Sink or swim, adspt or die, this is happening whether we like it or not. Most players won't even care or notice since this isnt all that new of an idea.

MS is already working on a way to bring disc to digital for players that have a disc version.

Yes… but just because something is dying, doesn’t mean we should welcome or hasten the demise… especially if you’ll lose quality…

I don’t care about game disks… I care about watching my 4K bluray movies. Streaming is less quality - but few notice or care… upsampled 720p seems to be fine for most…

Its not about welcoming or anything else, its happening no matter what. Companies are going forward, digital is becoming the future, which has been known for a while.

I personally dont care. I dont use my bluray player, havent in years. Only been using streaming for about 2 years. I use my pc for watching streams. TVs sometimes but not all that often. Ive had prime for almost a decade and never streamed any movies till 2024. Wasnt a thing I did till then but I used my pc not my tv. I have since got newer TVs that can do streaming much better but I like using my pc better.