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Will Sony expand PS NOW to rival Gamepass? (All major first party games included with service)
- Thread starter g23
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It blows my mind that people are STILL asking this, especially now that Gears 5's sales have clearly been hurt dramatically by being included in GamePass. I guess it shows how clueless a lot of gamers are, even on this forum.
Ya'll realise how many subscriptions Sony would need to sell to even come close to the amount of money they made off Spider-Man alone? Tens of millions. So why exactly would they abandon a model that's worked incredibly well for them to risk it all on trying to grow a subscription service that would take years to be even remotely sustainable? Sorry but it's completely delusional and Microsoft's situation isn't even remotely comparable. Microsoft were in a situation where most of their games were selling well below expectations, especially in their two biggest franchises, Halo and Gears, so they made a big move and are investing a ton of money into a service that won't be profitable for a long time but they hope will pay off for them eventually.
I do think Sony should do more with PS Now, like expanding the downloadable service worldwide, adding their first party mid-tier, VR and remasters to it day one (as those games aren't going to be huge hits anyway) and moneyhatting some third party games to put on it. But the idea they'd add games to it that'll easily sell 10+ million and make them hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars is laughable.
Ya'll realise how many subscriptions Sony would need to sell to even come close to the amount of money they made off Spider-Man alone? Tens of millions. So why exactly would they abandon a model that's worked incredibly well for them to risk it all on trying to grow a subscription service that would take years to be even remotely sustainable? Sorry but it's completely delusional and Microsoft's situation isn't even remotely comparable. Microsoft were in a situation where most of their games were selling well below expectations, especially in their two biggest franchises, Halo and Gears, so they made a big move and are investing a ton of money into a service that won't be profitable for a long time but they hope will pay off for them eventually.
I do think Sony should do more with PS Now, like expanding the downloadable service worldwide, adding their first party mid-tier, VR and remasters to it day one (as those games aren't going to be huge hits anyway) and moneyhatting some third party games to put on it. But the idea they'd add games to it that'll easily sell 10+ million and make them hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars is laughable.
Yea if that makes you sleep well at night business is business and when Microsoft , Google, Amazon & Tencent really start taking this gaming serious it's a bleak future for anybody else but the Googles,Amazon,Tencent and Nintendo because they don't need 3rd party.
ms does own the outer worlds ip private divison just owns the publishing rights for now
Didn't the "sales charts that showed gears down only include the ultimate edition sales since that one was the only one out 4 days early. And didn't it cost 80$?
So I think we should at least wait for npd to see if gears is down from 4 or not. Take in mind that digital went from 20ish% to 50%ish in the meantime.
We do however have Phil spencer and 3rd party studios saying gamepass has actually caused an increase in game sales.
At least someone who understands they have a different path.
I don't think AAA single player is a good model for Gamepass. It is the same with Blockbuster movie arriving later on Netflix than in theater.
I think single player AA games with no mp , single player AAA games with mp and GAAS will be king on Gamepass...
Same things PSNow and Gamepass have a different philosophy. The only things maybe Sony will is a tiered option with PSNow and the possibility to download only games without streaming...
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Yeah had I thought about it for another 30 seconds I probably wouldn't have said that
You're confusing consoles with subscription services. PSNow has only 700K users and grew a tiny 40% yoy. Consoles are irrelevant to the overalls ubscription market.
If Sony had better leverage we would have seen titles like a Metro, Tomber Raider on PSNow but we don't. It's because Microsoft paid them better than what Sony would offer.
Sony realises that they cannot compete against the aggressive subsidising of Game Pass, hence why they are going a different path.
Even if Sub gaming is the main form of entertainment Sony likely will still focus on traditional purchases. Since Sub gaming will kill their business model and games.
Like I say PSNow is likely going to be irrelevant. Because MS gives more money for indies and third parties to be on Game Pass and because Sony doesn't put their games on PSNow.
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Halo Infinite was the 4th most watched after Cyberpunk 2077, Marvel's Avengers and Star Wars.
Honestly though, these metrics are kind of ridiculous.
Ya I just looked it up. 4th still seams pretty good for a game that's only coming out on half the platforms.
It's true that MS jumped onto the sub model early because it was not selling enough games. But it's not just them, EA, Ubisoft, Apple, the industry is shifting. Just like music already did and movies currently are. Sooner or later most people are going to stop buying games, as they did with music and are well along the way of doing with movies, because the sub model is far more enticing and as that happens Sony's individual sales will diminish to the point they have no choice but to play ball the new way instead of the old way.
Nobody buys music. Soon nobody will buy movies. Eventually nobody will buy games. The writing is on the wall.
Doing an EA Access model where once a game drops to $20 MSRP it gets added to the PSNOW library would be a better bet.
No, they're from the proper launch. Gears 5 sold 16k at retail in the UK, which even if we assume digital accounted for 70% of sales, still means it's down significantly from Gears 4 (which sold 72k at retail).
Phil was probably right that GamePass helped sales initially but that was never going to last. When GamePass wasn't as well known, the word of mouth games got from being added to it would've helped them sell. But after all the heavy marketing Microsoft have put behind GamePass, that seems to have changed and people are more than happy to just sub to it to play the games they want to play.
Did Netflix kill the box office? No because people are still willing to spend a premium to watch blockbusters like Avengers Endgame, which have the budget and scale that subscription services just can't support. The same thing is true for games. If subscription services hurt anything, it'll be mid-tier and indie games but blockbusters like TLOU2 will be fine.
That would be nice, but it won't happen. It will depend on how the sales of each title evolve as well as their individual profile.
I mean, the big thing about cinemas is that they are the only place you can watch films for a time and the FOMO kicks in that leads people to see big movies (also the bigger movies tend to work better on a big screen that most people can't emulate at their own homes unless they have really great equipment and the space for it).
The difference in using a video game subscription service and buying a new video game is almost entirely non-existent. Especially in the way that Xbox Game Pass currently does things. Gears 5, for example, plays the exact same if you own it or are just playing it through game pass, so there's very little practical benefit to owning games when there's no change in experience. Especially since you can also just usually wait a few months if you really want a physical copy and get it cheaper while still potentially playing the game at launch through the pass.
I'm not sure this comparison really holds up.
You are making many assumptions and wrong correlations. Netflix never aimed at competing with theatres, they compete with blurays and other TV models, and the scale of their productions is consistently increasing. Yet, playing Gamepass or a disc game doesn't affect the experience in any way, unlike a giant screen or a crowd can, and the scale of the productions is exactly the same in both models; they both offer every possible production size.
However, a movie ticket is a few times cheaper than last of us 2 will be at launch, and here's the main point: unlike examples like the avengers, Sony's first party will live in a world where there will be other major productions competing with them, from both Microsoft and other publishers, available at launch for a much lower fee but that, unlike your example of theatres vs Netflix, offers exactly the same kind of experience. If Sony makes a new Gran Turismo, it'll compete with a Forza that you can play just as good but for ten times less money, and that's not an easy scenario for Sony to be.
Microsoft wasn't the market leader either when apparently the entire industry follow them adding MTX on everything, and Nintendo and Sony were forced to adopt paid online.
Bullshit. The whole company is moving towards services and subscriptions.
I'm not sure Sony is interested in competing with Microsoft in this fashion. They would be expected to put their first party releases on PSNow and I don't see them doing that. I could see them putting all their PS1 PS2 and PS3 games on a Netflix like service and making a bundle, or even adding that service to their PS Plus instead of the 2 free games, but competing with Microsoft and a Google seems like a mistake.
Everybody remembers blockbuster right?
Movies, tv, music it's all gone subscription for the most part. Theatres still exist, you can still buy a CD but the big platforms are where you can stream content. Sony will go the same way and to be competitive they'll have to put their first party offerings.
Movies, tv, music it's all gone subscription for the most part. Theatres still exist, you can still buy a CD but the big platforms are where you can stream content. Sony will go the same way and to be competitive they'll have to put their first party offerings.
No. They shouldn't and I don't get why folks would want to homogenize platforms. The more each differentiate themselves and offer something unique the better the gaming market as a whole will be. So let MS serve their own part of the market with their own unique services and ways of making, producing and selling games and let the others serve their parts of the market by doing the same. The more homogenized we get the worse of everyone will be and the more fragile the market as a whole becomes
I don't see Sony responding any time soon.
Microsoft is coming out hard to win the subscription war against Google and other streaming "play anywhere" concepts. Day 1 for their exclusives is a great way to get people into the ecosystem and keep them there. Once the threat of Google/Apple and whoever else is gone- they've got no reason to keep it up unless their numbers are really good. And at that point, they might not care. But if numbers aren't good, they'll probably pull back those offerings. Sony has no reason at the moment to respond, because the market hasn't said it's a good idea yet. They'll let Microsoft test the waters for a bit, see what comes of it and then respond because they know the power of their game series.
Microsoft is coming out hard to win the subscription war against Google and other streaming "play anywhere" concepts. Day 1 for their exclusives is a great way to get people into the ecosystem and keep them there. Once the threat of Google/Apple and whoever else is gone- they've got no reason to keep it up unless their numbers are really good. And at that point, they might not care. But if numbers aren't good, they'll probably pull back those offerings. Sony has no reason at the moment to respond, because the market hasn't said it's a good idea yet. They'll let Microsoft test the waters for a bit, see what comes of it and then respond because they know the power of their game series.
Halo may be the most anticipated game among the hardcore Xbox fanbase. Outside of that bubble barely anyone gives a shit.
Don't you think it'll be too late by the time Sony responds? By the time Sony responds Game Pass, Apple Arcade would have been established and have a big user base.
I'll repeat what I said. PSNow is will have a tough time competing to get deals of third parties to appear on PSNow because MS will likely always outbid them and because Sony doesn't want o put their games Day 1.
Why MS don't outbid marketing deals like COD?
And I don't think games need to be exclusive to one service, some GP games are in Origin Access and PS Now too.
UPlay Plus is only available on PC and only in their store.
Are they planning to expand to every other platform. Because if they do, their full price sales will take a huge hit.
It's just a matter of time.
The effects of the pass is both on revenue and cost. Steady revenue stream makes financial planning easier.
And subscriptions reduce marketing cost. If your users are already in your ecosystem, you don't need to spend marketing dollars to convince them to make a transaction -- they already have.
There is zero technical ingenuity with this model so implementation cost is purely operational and time. There's no rush and Sony can pull the trigger anytime.
Shouldn't pull trigger before TLOU2 -- 15-25m seller right here.
If PS5 uptake is a little slow or if the scene looks challenging because competitors are gaining ground, that could be a time.
The effects of the pass is both on revenue and cost. Steady revenue stream makes financial planning easier.
And subscriptions reduce marketing cost. If your users are already in your ecosystem, you don't need to spend marketing dollars to convince them to make a transaction -- they already have.
There is zero technical ingenuity with this model so implementation cost is purely operational and time. There's no rush and Sony can pull the trigger anytime.
Shouldn't pull trigger before TLOU2 -- 15-25m seller right here.
If PS5 uptake is a little slow or if the scene looks challenging because competitors are gaining ground, that could be a time.
This isn't true again but alright. The only bubble is on this website.
I'm not arguing that it's still as popular as a decade ago but Halo Infinite is still highly anticipated, Halo MCC is literally just a remake of old games and is one of the most wished games on steam and had among the highest upvotes on reddit. It's definitely not at its peak but it's not irrelevant. The past 2 games were stuck on a near failure of a console, Infinite is going to be available almost everywhere and that will lead to it being the most popular game since Halo 3 by a good margin.
I would be surprised if the game doesn't hit 8-10 million players in its first week.
As I said it's highly anticipated among X Box fans. What it's not going to do is pull in new people. It simply does not have that mass market appeal anymore, partly because the quality just wasn't there these last entries. And there is little reason to assume 343 suddenly turned into a top tier developer over night.
I don't. Xbox is way more popular on era than where I'm from or most markets outside the US for that matter.
The reason Microsoft started doing it was because their games weren't selling so it made sense for them to try and get what they could out of subscriptions. Sony has had multiple 10 million+ sellers this generation and hasn't had a game that sold poorly in a good long time. So long as that remains the case they won't put their games on psnow day one.
Xbox is more popular in the world then on this website by a pretty big margin.
If halo and gears had just physical/digital release the last of us 2 would outsell both of those combined easily, even if ms released them on pc. I mean the eventual PS5 rerelease of last of us 2 would probably outsell any ms exclusive.
That kind of selling power and quality you don't relegate to a $2 service that someone will cancel after a month.
I'm sure eventually they will added it to psnow, maybe a 1-3 years after release.
That kind of selling power and quality you don't relegate to a $2 service that someone will cancel after a month.
I'm sure eventually they will added it to psnow, maybe a 1-3 years after release.
It really isn't big in the world not even close and it is dwindling bigtime. And nothing is changing that fact.
User Banned (1 Day): Platform wars
I mean if you live in a bubble then yeah I guess Xbox is big in the world.
Yes really.
A healthy Sony that can properly fund the blockbusters we've come to love from them and give them enough time in development is what is good 4 the players. There is no guarantee that Sony will be able to maintain their level of quality if all first party games go on ps now day one.
Of course Sony will have a better idea of their options than us but for the fans that is certainly something to be concerned about.
