It sucks that the rumors were true. Got a Vita earlier this year and I'm gonna get some more digital games than I already have before the shop closes.

I've preferred PC for gaming for a long time already, but it has become increasingly clear how longevity is not really something that is valued on consoles. Nintendo has handled this poorly for a really long time, and while Sony did pretty well in this regard for a good while, Sony's direction has been simply awful. Surprisingly, Microsoft is handling this the best. Still, only PC seems like a fairly safe bet in this regard, and the situation on consoles has participated in my PC focus, and this is coming from someone who has owned a (home) console each generation starting from the first PlayStation. PC is not without its problems either, but this particular issue practically does not exist on PC.

This seems like a PC-centric post in a thread about consoles, but it's because this seems like the proper thread to voice my unhappiness about the issue. I have an issue with this, and PC happens to be the best solution I've found to this problem. It doesn't fix this particular issue but it helps me minimize the effect of similar events in the long run.

Nintendo has kinda had last gen tech since 2006 so it's not so cutting edge that it is as prone to breaking as a modern console. Or at least that used to be the case. The phrase "made of Nintendium" existed for a reason. Switch Joy cons drifting and Wii U's accidentally bricking themselves if you turn the power off during an update really changed all that. So far the Switch seems to be pretty durable outside of the inability to change the battery, and the Joy-Con drift issue. But we'll see how long Switch consoles last. Hopefully there's a Switch 2 that's fully backwards compatible with Switch games, and hopefully Switch 2 is sold at retail all the way until 2033.

Anyway, it's kind of mind boggling how modern console makers don't bother to make something that will last at least ten years on average. All of them use the same faulty analogue solution that leads to drift. The cooling solutions on PS5 and Series are really bad compared to a well built PC. Fixing a PS5 or Series system is not easy. They really make it hard for your average consumer to get and replace parts. It's like consoles are slowly becoming more and more like smartphones. Just these shitty machines that don't last very long, and break, and are meant to be replaced instead of repaired. Except consoles can potentially last 7-10 years, while smartphones are useless after 3 years.

I really feel like Sony and MS really count on the launch version of their consoles breaking around the time a new generation comes out. It's like repairs are a part of their business plan. "Oh we'd better make this as a shitty thing prone to breaking so we can charge people $100 for a simple $5 repairjob!"

I mean, how hard is it to build something with quality parts that are designed to last? Maybe too hard, since everything is made in China these days.

But anyway, the closing of the PS3 and Vita stores is shitty, but it's nothing compared to the time bomb that is most PS3's losing their Mobo battery, and most consumers simply throwing them out. It's a pretty easy fix for me, but your average consumer is just going to toss their PS3 and this is going to make PS3's very rare in the next ten years. And that in turn makes sourcing parts to fix PS3's difficult, which causes even more people to toss their PS3 instead of opting to fix it. As a whole, I think this is going to make retro-gaming on a working PS3 in 2040 or 2050 next to impossible. Meanwhile I can see SNES, and Sega Genesis units still running all the way until then. Possibly PS2, Gamecube and Wii units as well (but most working units will probably have been repaired by then).

As a final note on this I'd like to say that MS doesn't really care about preserving games either. It just happened to be one of the few things they were good at during last gen when they were getting their butts kicked. So they made it a marketing point. Prior to getting their butts kicked they tried to saddle all physical disks with 24 hour online check-in DRM. The Series S doesn't even have a disc reader, and neither does the SAD edition of the XB1. It's pretty clear that MS secretly wants to kill physical media, which is far worse than shutting down a digital storefront. Sony led under Jim Ryan want to do the same, which is why they released the discless version of the PS5.

Double Post

Preserve games? Those games will be deleted from existence just because they are shutting down the store? I doubt it 

Tip: There is absolute no way for a game to disappear in digital world. You can be sure o that, and that's more of a issue for media creators than for consumers 

About games from past gens still being playable, that's why emulation exists. Cloud gaming will solve all those problems near in the future. Always online is truly an annoyance in current days, but it won't be forever let alone in 2040 or 2050

The planned obsolence of hardware is what really make me anxious for cloud gaming just take over. Digital stores being closed are bad, but I agree hardware that stop working is unsolvable without more hardware. The idea behind this is your hardware must stop working ASAP, so you buy more hardware. If you hardware doesn't die, then shut down stores and, if the game has potential buyers, release it as a remaster in the next hardware and repeat. I'm just waiting Sony to release their first collections of PS2 and PS3 games for PS5 lol 

In a cloud world this thing won't happen. All the disposable tech will be somebody else's problem to deal with, for customers it will be as transparent as choose a movie on Netflix

With cloud gaming, what games are available and when will be decided by the publishers. Many less popular games are bound to be missing, some games will be missing due to rights issues (No One Lives Forever famously still has no digital release anywhere), and some games will be missing seemingly for no reason. When you don't pay for access to any particular games, individual games are bound to be taken down occasionally. Additionally, there will be a split between different cloud services.

Streaming movies isn't really my thing (I don't watch them enough to justify paying for any subscription), but I bet the issues I described are already there for movies - except that it's technically much easier to distribute both old and new movies, because they all run 'natively' on the same hardware. For games, you start from needing several kinds of hardware because server hardware cannot natively run all games ever made. The situation can be improved by emulation, but it brings its own issues as well. Then there's the fact that you might need to ensure that everything runs properly, especially if using emulation. It's quite a bit more work than with movies, I imagine. The bottom line, to me, seems to be that there probably are tons of issues even with streaming movies, and it's going to be even worse with games. It'll get better, but the only thing cloud gaming will be great for is new games, and lag might still be an issue for some games (for many locations at least). Ideally cloud gaming could largely solve the problem, but I'm not so optimistic about it.

I'm sure a couple of videos have been shared about this topic already but here's what I consider the best one that has all the details, step by step:



What blew my mind is that as bad as the situation is with the PS3, it's worse with the PS4. If that internal battery is dead and PSN for the PS4 is down then you can't even play physical games.

This is the same for any media though 

If publishers don't want to sell their games for whatever reason they will not sell it, and that's their right,  how many japanese games take years to be released in west? We as customers have no power to decide whether a company have to sell their product to us or not, as long I'm not spending my money I don't care, it's them who are losing money, not me 

What cloud is coming to solve is this dreadful scene where the hardware is created to be replaced soon. You buy tons of games and then must pray for your hardware not stop working or pray for the manufacturer release a next gen console to be backwards compatible (and then spend more money buying a console that sometimes you don't even care just for the sake of keeping your library playable) 

Is this scene I'm losing my money buying some disposable piece of plastic that was never created to last in first place, it's the case of smartphones. Granted it's not annoy me quite as much as smartphones because consoles last at least 5 years, but still sad your library software is bonded to be unplayable eventually 

With Cloud as long the services keep going on you can play them. I understand the fear or services being shutdown if the company bankrupt or something alike, but I just don't see it happening. Gaming is the biggest and most prolific entertainment industry, it would need a true catastrophe for all cloud service games stop working 

Also, unlike hardware manufacturers I'm on the side cloud services will be much more competitive, not like our current oligopoly that's alone make my perspective about them being positive

Unless of course you jailbreak your PS4.

There's not much to argue here, so fair enough. You're looking at this from a somewhat different angle than I am, but cloud gaming sounds like it might eventually (or maybe even now) fit your desires. It does not and probably never will mine, but to each their own.