I'd say yes, it's pretty obvious they are, although the details are possibly negotiated on a per title basis. (exclusives/console exclusives get a better deal?)

Likewise, the devs behind the free games are getting money somehow, othewise they wouldn't be offering them free.

I didn't read anything but the OP so it might have already been mentioned but the only reason PS Plus DOES offer free games is because Sony needed some of that online subscription money and nobody would have been happy if they suddenly started charging for what was already free. If they weren't trying to compete with Live, their service (both free and paid) wouldn't have been nearly as feature packed.

Activision basically said they were getting small piece of Xbox Live money. I recall Sony fans getting angry about that and saying Activision is taking money from people not playing CoD. Considering they are big reason people subscribe, it seems fair to give them a piece of Xbox Live money.

EA operates their own servers and I think we can all agree it would be best if they didn't.

Anyhow, from my understanding publishers benefit financially from not having to operate their own servers on Xbox Live. I'm not sure who else is getting money directly from MS.

I completed ME3, but I never played it online so I don't know anything about "galactic readiness." I'll just say single player and online play should be kept seperate.

wow amazing point never looked at it that way

You're right that free games aren't the draw for PS+. The only way to make people pay for it is to require it for online play. Since online is free for PS3, nobody really cared even if the free games were available.

However, the only reason people are now saying that PS+ is better than XBL is because if we have to pay in order to play online, then that isn't a bullet point for why one service is better than the other. You have to look elsewhere: the games. And PS+ compensates you way better than XBL.

Agreed, when PS+ was announced i said it was a stepping stone that would lead to paying for online play. Obviously some people were reluctant to believe it.

However, I'm surprised the amount of subscribers they had before PS4 launched was so small.

The only reason XB Live Gold has so many subscribers is because its needed to play COD.
Face it, XBox is a COD box.
If the next COD is announced as a FREE to play game, XB Live Gold subs would drop faster than a sack of potatoes.

If Sony can get two million PS+ users before locking online behind a paywall, it means that the service is good enough for users to pay $50 a year only knowing 13 games you'd receive for free, not knowing if anything in the future is going to be worth your while or not.

Another thing is I don't know how many people I've seen ask about Playstation Plus running out are you able to keep the free games. It's not that difficult to comprehend yet you have to repeatedly explain it to people over and over again before they get it.

Those are the main reasons. Not knowing what you're getting free in the future and so many people not being able to comprehend the concept behind it all.

The thing is, with the forced PS+ due to online. Lets say some people just decide they don't want to play the online any longer, because not everyone plays CoD, etc, not everyone stays playing the same online games over and over again. If those people want to drop the service and they've been enjoying the free games offered each month, then they might keep the service for that reason alone, to make sure they keep building up their library of free games. I've known some Xbox fans to not resubscribe for a few months then pick it up later, whether it was due to financial issues, etc. You don't resubscribe for a few months on PS+ you're missing out on three games for PS4 and many for the PS3 and Vita. If it's because they don't have the money, that might get them to just pay the overpriced $10 for one month until they can get more money for a full year.

Anyways, the more people that get a PS4, the more people that will talk about the free games per month.

There are a lot of online games now but I understand your point, it would be hard to really tell.

The PS+ Free games are obviously compensated else they'd never let them have them so early. Borderlands 2 is currently on PS+ in the EU, their GOTY edition only just came out, sales from that would be hurt by it being on PS+, in other words it might have been as high as £2 per download or something. Who knows.

While OP point is oddly true, do you not think that now that those subscribers have paid to be able to play their 8th gen console shooter online, that they didn't also make use of the free-games?

I mean it seems everybody on PS4 has played Resogun. Must be the most commonly played game on the system.

Anyway, do you think now the free games will be part of their value compare when comparing PSN with PS+ vs. XBL Gold?