Former PlayStation boss Shuhei Yoshida has shared his thoughts on Sony's decision to stop producing physical discs for new games from 2028 onwards, and he doesn't "understand if it's such a big issue," actually.
Sony's announcement last month went down extremely poorly – the uproar from consumers, devs, and publishers alike has been enormous. Despite major concerns about the future of game preservation, ownership, the second-hand game market, and how Sony's decision might influence the likes of Nintendo and Xbox, the company isn't budging – in fact, Sony chief financial officer Lin Tao recently said that the PlayStation owner doesn't "see that there will be any negative impact on our business," despite being aware of the "strong views" against it.
Speaking to GamerBraves in a new interview, Yoshida – the former president of Sony Interactive Entertainment Worldwide Studios – is asked for his thoughts on the decision. Of course, he wasn't involved himself, as he left the company early last year, and notes, "I didn't know they were planning that." However, he doesn't seem opposed to it.
"Personally, I'm a totally digital consumer," he begins. "I don't want to manage discs or swap discs. I want all my games on my dashboard, and I just select a game and play it. So, I'm completely digital."
With that said, Yoshida does see the appeal of physical games, especially for collectors. "It would be a shame if physical games were no longer available to collect," he adds, suggesting that collector's editions of games could still be possible even after discs are killed if publishers offer a GTA 6-style code in a box instead.
Crucially, though, Yoshida suggests that an all-digital future isn't really a big deal since even the discs you can buy currently often require further updates or downloads, meaning you don't always have the complete package in the box.
"Even with physical disc games, in most cases, developers are constantly updating and adding game data anyway," he explains. "Anyone who chooses to purchase a physical version will still need to download new patches, DLC, or updates. So, not having a disc, I don't understand if it's such a big issue."
This argument is definitely up for debate – DoesItPlay, a community dedicated to game preservation, tests whether games can be played offline and how reliant they are on downloads in order to actually play them. According to stats on the site, at the time of writing, the majority of the 3,527 physical games tested – 73%, to be exact – don't need an additional download at all. In fact, only 10% fall into the category of having "a hard-coded prompt for a download, misses essential content or is not on the physical medium at all," or having bugs that are "so severe that they either make playing the game extremely unpleasant or downright unbeatable" without a patch.
Of course, that's still a significant number of games that can't just be played straight out of the box, and it also discounts the many updates you can expect for most games with bug fixes and stability improvements that aren't strictly necessary, but sure are nice. Even so, though, Yoshida's statement doesn't necessarily reflect the complete picture.
Again, though, he's not unsympathetic to players' concerns. Acknowledging the impact that killing physical games could have on the second-hand market, he says: "For those people who choose to buy or sell games, the lack of discs may become an issue."
However, while physical copies are often one of the cheapest ways to pick up games after their release, Yoshida doesn't seem to think that their absence will be a problem for more budget-conscious customers.
"People will be able to wait for a sale and buy the games they want at a cheaper price," he suggests. "I think publishers and platforms will continue to offer these opportunities for people who aren’t able to pay the full price at launch."
Regardless, it seems unlikely that the backlash from fans who want the reign of physical media to continue will die down anytime soon. Yesterday, Sony made the brave decision to keep the chat switched on for the Phantom Blade Zero State of Play, and the whole thing was flooded with disc defenders chanting "no disc no buy" – something you can see across PlayStation's social media posts and YouTube videos, too.
PlayStation killing discs is bad for everyone, whether you care about physical games or not.
