because all your games went offline? where are you playing on now, i am guessing pc right?
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Push Square Opinion: Sony's Server Shutdown Strategy Is Making the Publisher a Laughing Stock
- Thread starter Equanimity
- Start date
Lmao don't be so paranoid. Sony is definitely the worst of the big three by a large mile. To think that anybody who has any criticism against your favorite company is just out to get them is fucking pathetic
There are easy technical solutions for this (spinning up servers when they are needed). I hope next gen Sony manages to keep up with MS when it comes to backend architecture.
I am more inclined to believe that Sony may simply be too incompetent to keep up with Microsoft in regards to server infrastructure. They're incompetent in most regards except studio acquisition.
i think laughing stock is the wrong choice of words, but it certainly is not a good look, and indeed a bit worrying
Even if online play is dropped, I am sure this will have little to no effect in terms of subscribers at all.
Anecdotally but among my friends, PS Plus subscriptions shot up when the PS4 released and online play started to be pay-gated - I'd hazard a very good guess (I say guess, most have told me this was the sole reason for signing up) that they'd get rid of them again if they ever removed online play as a pay-feature
MS couldn't do it until they eventually shut down the legacy servers and moved to Azure, there's nothing to stop Sony leaving the old network behind next gen - which I expect is their plan going forward.
Because people want to feel like the subscription price is justified
I really don't think servers for a game should be shut down in the same gen the game came out, that seems really awful
We can only hope they go aws so shutting down services is not necessary anymore.
The company (GameSpy) that provided the server infrastructure for the Wii and DS games closed in 2014 around the same time Nintendo ended the services for those games, so they at least had a reason for that when it was combined with DS games and DS hardware not being patchable, as well as a decade old at that point. Wii retail games weren't really patchable either, so updating all the games would have been tough even if Nintendo wanted to.
Laughing stock is the perfect word in fact. And it's downright insulting for customers so I ask again: If that PS+ money doesn't pay for even 1st party servers, what do they have online play behind a paywall ?
to make ridiculous amounts of money
that was an easy question, lol
How many months ? As long as they make people pay for online play. :)
I mean, people are PAYING.
...Do you just enjoy defending sony when it comes to Sony's poor support of its online infrastructure?
Online play being gated behind a paywall is absolutely the biggest contribution to subscriber numbers. It went from sub-10m prior to PS4 launch to over 30m today, and only one thing seriously changed from the PS3 generation, and it rhymes with bpaid bfor bonline.
Thanks Blizzard for keeping the servers online for my favorite game of alle time. The game will turn 18 this year.
Sony could learn a thing or two from it.
Sony could learn a thing or two from it.
With Sony now charging for online, it's a little ridiculous to be shutting down servers for games from this gen while this gen is still going on. That's what makes this a laughing stock to me. This is one of the reasons why I don't get into online games much anymore outside of PC MMORPGs.
I'm off one year. The game turns 17 ;) wc3
But Diablo II and Starcraft 1 are also still online. Even more impressive.
They also pulled the plug on Gravity Rush 2's servers after only 18 (!) months. At this stage it feels like a lottery.
Nintendo literally just turned off any and all access to the Wii eShop. Not just purchasing, but redownloads as well. The PS Store for PS3 is still fully active, and you can still redownload any PSP digital games even though that shop is closed. Meanwhile Wii and DS online multiplayer has been gone completely since 2014 because Nintendo, despite racking in enormous profits with those systems, decided to outsource their online completely, and just shrugged their shoulders when Gamespy went under.
So, it's not about anybody's favorite company at all, just arguments being made in bad faith like your own.
That would not work for DriveClub. The entire server architecture is built around persistence. They can't do anything "on demand" because the whole idea is that it's all dynamic, immediate and asynchronous. In fact, if you will all remember, the reason DriveClub was originally delayed, and the PS Plus version was put off for so long was because, as designed, the servers were a huge bottleneck and the server demands were more taxing than anticipated. They didn't want the experience for people who bought the full game to be crippled by the load the PS Plus version was anticipated to create. It's fairly obvious to conclude the server side processing is much heavier and constant than many other games that just track leader boards and create lobbies. You can argue that's a fault of the original design of the game, but it is what it is, and after 6 years, if no one is using these inefficient servers anyway, it's perfectly sensible to plan their retirement.
Yeah, they were initially due to go off exactly a year after release (18th Jan 2018)
Driveclub (in the future) and Warhawk being unplayable are hurting me. Why would you kill off games with a cult following like these. Knowing it would hurt the image. Just shut down below the radar games, not high profile ones. At least you get to keep your good guy image right?
I wouldnt care as much if Evo were still alive... and planning DC2. :'(
Good editorial.
I'm annoyed at the online servers being shut down. I am in the process of updating my PS4 to catch up on the gen and Driveclub and VR are the first games I was looking at wanting to play again. VR especially is annoying as its not even that old.
And MS Gave away Froza Horizon for free when it was being delisted. Sony should offer the full game and add-ons with plus and keep servers on even if it is for a couple of extra years!
I'm annoyed at the online servers being shut down. I am in the process of updating my PS4 to catch up on the gen and Driveclub and VR are the first games I was looking at wanting to play again. VR especially is annoying as its not even that old.
And MS Gave away Froza Horizon for free when it was being delisted. Sony should offer the full game and add-ons with plus and keep servers on even if it is for a couple of extra years!
The fanboys*girls will stay and defend whatever Sony is doing or not doing. But a lot of people are going to vote with their wallet, just like consumers did at the start of this gen with Xbox One. I was a PS+ subscriber since day one and let my sub lapse last year and moved back to Xbox as my go to 3rd party/online platform. Better deal, better service, BC and all on better hardware. Sony has to deliver to get my money again next gen.
Sometimes, quite often actually I play games from years ago, games like Wipeout and would probably play Driveclub but I wont be able to soon. Sony even have a whole system based on playing games from the past PSNOW. I dont understand are the current games the only things that are allowed to exist, does old just mean its instantly rubbish. There's very few racing games currently, very few good arcade racing games, and none quite like DriveClub.
Its ridiculous, and pathetic that Sony cant even support a game through the lifetime of console, the lifetime of a console means its manufactured lifetime, they will still probably be making PS4, for a few years into next gen, beyond 2020, they cant even support a simple game for that long. They should be supporting them for at least 10 years in my opinion unless literally no one is still playing it, which I highly doubt is the case currently for Driveclub. If Sony don't want to support these games as a service for a good amount of time, it doesn't cost that much to keep online a few small servers, then Sony shouldn't be selling them and no one should be buying these games from them.
Rushy (game director) confirmed that the game is being delisted because the licensing reasons (it had a 5 year deal with the manufacturers, like most racing games). Shutting down the servers was a financial/business decision by Sony. Probably if the game was still selling well and had plenty of active players, Sony could have renewed the licenses and maintained the servers.
3 cheers for this article.
I miss all my old PS3 (and PS4, amazingly enough) online experiences. Stuff like MAG and Killzone were the goddamn best.
I know numbers dwindle and all that, but, that hasn't stopped MS from keeping the servers on. There is no excuse for Sony to not be able to keep these games alive.
I miss all my old PS3 (and PS4, amazingly enough) online experiences. Stuff like MAG and Killzone were the goddamn best.
I know numbers dwindle and all that, but, that hasn't stopped MS from keeping the servers on. There is no excuse for Sony to not be able to keep these games alive.
Is it standard to shut down other racing games for this reason? Honest question, I'm not really a racing game guy
Maybe MS have more active players on old games though, as they have a big focus on older games this gen, with BC on Xbox. Also they have more money and probably a lot more servers too.
It's a shame but if no one is playing, then it's money and server space that can be used for newer games.
Removing the game from sale is common if the licence is up and isn't going to be renewed.
Shutting down the servers is down to not enough people it and money saving.
i believe so. For example Fh2 is no longer able to be bought but the servers for the game are still up
If nothing else, this exposes PS Plus for the shameless cash grab that it is. Show me one first party Xbox game that had its online components disabled before its entire console was taken off XBL. At least they can tout that as a justification for the paywall. PS Plus's free games are becoming laughably bad and now you have to make sure enough other people buy and play the game you like for it to keep working.
It's definitely not a good look. If the PS5 were to have BC I would also like to be able to jump online with my PS4 and maybe PS3 games. Them taking the Gravity Rush 2 servers offline after like 2 years was also total dick move. I love Sony for their first party output and the creative freedom that they appear to give to their partners and developers, but they really need to start doing something about these anti-consumer practices.
Only way Sony keeps the servers up is if people start playing the game again. I know of 1 racing that got brought back online, after enough people complained to EA about the game being shutdown. In my experience it's very rare for games to be brought back online. But in this case Burnout Revenge came back online after being shutdown for 1 month in 2012, and was online for 5 more years. The game was eventually shutdown in 2017.
It's not a good look, but realistically I have never really been impacted by such a shutdown beyond vague "that's a shame" feelings for great games like MAG and Warhawk that I hadn't played for months/years by the time they shut down the servers. Hell, if those games had enough people to justify continuing those services, they likely wouldn't be shut down. I feel like this is a topic that gets a lot more air time than it truly deserves, like people railing against the shutdown of that one shitty VR game that nobody bought or had really even heard of until the shutdown announcement, or the three people actually using Gravity Rush 2's online. I understand being wary of digital purchases from a company with such a record, but sometimes games fail and they get shut down. Such is life in the internet gaming age.
It's okay to be mad at it, but I don't personally think it's particularly reasonable to expect them to keep servers on for failed games that have miniscule populations. I'm glad that there are people who care enough to call companies out when they do it, though, and I hope that more services move to better cloud implementations that would allow small scale games to continue indefinitely for little cost.
It's okay to be mad at it, but I don't personally think it's particularly reasonable to expect them to keep servers on for failed games that have miniscule populations. I'm glad that there are people who care enough to call companies out when they do it, though, and I hope that more services move to better cloud implementations that would allow small scale games to continue indefinitely for little cost.
hahahaha okay I'll give you that.. a product of the dark age of mattrick.
But yeah, I think it's kind of poetic that Driveclub will end up much like it launched. With online functions not working 😂 😂 😂
I actually managed to get a refund from Sony for my digital PSN purchase of this game after I waited for quite a while for these issues to get worked out. I never experienced the game fully working.
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I think now is a good time to stop giving Sony guidance. We need to accept them for the company they are going into next generation.
Sony are not the first to do this, I play a lot of old games also and most of them won't work online now from this gen?
Try buying Forza Horizon or the Lego Lord of the Rings games.
How long and for how few people do they keep these servers going for?
5 years?
10 years?
Forever?
I imagine because of the playerbase of the two titles.
I loved Driveclub, but does anyone still play it?
I'd say the game never getting a Pro patch two years ago is a bigger offense than the game getting shut down in 2020.
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Project Spark and Xbox Fitness. You couldn't even access content you paid for after it was shut down.
It's subjective but Games with Gold has been laughably bad for a very long time. They didn't even give free games for the first 8 years.
while im sure people are upset about it being delisted i think most people are complaining about the servers. So while yes you can no longer buy FH as far as i can find you can still play it online. same situation as Fh2