A former Microsoft gaming executive and Blizzard Entertainment's ex-president, Mike Ybarra, has reacted to the news of PlayStation's all-digital, disc-less future with some notes for console makers.
Sony Interactive Entertainment yesterday announced that physical production for new PlayStation games will end in January, 2028, effectively meaning games released after that point will no longer be printed on discs for the PS5, PS5 Pro, and inevitable PS6. A huge blow to game preservation and consumer rights, to say the least.
Former industry leader Mike Ybarra reckons platform holders have a lot of work to do before they're ready to ditch physical games and force gamers into an entirely digital future, based on a lengthy post to social media. "Sad to see this happening across the entire gaming industry. I guess it was going to happen at some point, but I didn't think it would be this soon," he tweets.
Top of the list? "You need to establish a digital promise for consumers. We can't live in a world of fear if our games will work in the future or not. You owe everyone a clear vision for our 'digital locker' that gives us confidence our games are actually our games. You don't get to just turn the games off (I get [multiplayer] games are different from [single-player] games, etc.)."
Reactions to PlayStation's decision have been heated, which might be putting it lightly, and a big worry is that games can simply be scrubbed offline or revoked for people who have spent real, hard-earned cash on them. Digital consumer rights in most countries haven't totally caught up yet, so nothing's legally stopping Xbox or PlayStation from going down this route.
"You need to innovate game sharing," Ybarra continues. "Lending my game to my friend should be as easy as handing him/her a disc. It's possible to do, I've lived it and looked into it before. As players, we should be able to share our games. You can have restrictions on it but fundamentally this should 'just work' 75%+ of the time. A 'friends and family' of 3, 6, 9, or whatever number is a solution others have in place. Mirror it and make it industry standard."
The former Blizzard boss then pitches a pretty radical idea that would let people "have an open marketplace" on consoles to resell their digital games to other players "for store credit or cash" – with the platform holders taking a cut of that money. "Game developers will not like this," Ybarra acknowledges, "but being consumer friendly has to go both ways here. A used game marketplace is a must have in my view."
He then asks console makers to make digital libraries more public, like achievements are, and to communicate what this all-digital future looks like more clearly. "All of this is possible. Make your platform the best place to play."
