This whole situation seemed really overblown. Oh well Sony should just make it optional but give players cross progression and some rewards for signing up. Just make the rewards really worth it and that will get most of the player base to sign up.

There is still an issue here. It's not fair console players have to pay a subscription to play multiplayer but PC players don't. If Sony is going to continue supporting PC like this the issue is only going to grow.

 It would require a massive, and expensive, undertaking for Xbox, Nintendo, and PlayStation to change how their infrastructure functions that would allow for them to still receive the necessary funding to keep an absurd number of servers up and maintained while still making a profit. They already take losses on console sales, minus Nintendo, so idk how willing they would be to also take losses on server infrastructure. 

Valve was pretty smart in keeping themselves to just be an online store and not also a networking hub for all multiplayer games on Steam.

Completely, as I'm sure that a lot of the players of HD2 on PC via Steam play(ed) Apex as well, which requires an EA account. But all those suggestions seem like seems like the good compromise. "Here's some free stuff for doing it." But the key is that if it was like it from the start (as in no issues) then there might never have been an issue and people that didn't have a PS account and bought it wouldn't have even carried on playing and just refunded.

It's the fact it was removed then added later as a forced thing was just stupid and how it was handled sounded like some idiot executive was oddly more concerned over consumer data than profit. You know, useless data of fake emails and burner accounts.

Yes, agreed. Blame MS for that though, they started it. Sony would have been stupid to not follow suit whether we like it or not.

That or game costs go up. Again. And people are very against that even though in the modern gaming era where game costs are more expensive than ever. With massive teams to fund, server costs etc, seems the best way of maintaining those costs is subbed online.

MS, Nintendo and Sony do add a lot of features for this price though, free games, cloud storage, share play (only PS right?) which PC does not have.

My friend recently booted up the PS4 version of Last Of Us that was free on PS+ and imported his PS3 saves from like a decade ago.

The funny thing is I read it was removed because of the server issues. There are some people on Steam who already had their account linked because it was there day 1 and later removed. It's hilarious because Sony removed it to help the users out and then get spit on when trying to add it back.

Yeah, those who were able to link their accounts were in countries where PSN was supported. That really wasn't the issue since hundreds of online games use the exact same system. Unfortunately, well over 100 countries did NOT support PSN and yet Helldivers 2 was still being sold in those 100+ countries knowing this was going to be an issue when the server issues were eventually resolved. 

I'd prefer not to downplay this issue because it was a massive oversight where instead of working on the issue, Sony just pulled the game from those 100+ countries. At least Sony can use this as a learning experience. 

There is still an issue here. It's not fair console players have to pay a subscription to play multiplayer but PC players don't. If Sony is going to continue supporting PC like this the issue is only going to grow.

This whole situation seemed really overblown. Oh well Sony should just make it optional but give players cross progression and some rewards for signing up. Just make the rewards really worth it and that will get most of the player base to sign up.

There is still an issue here. It's not fair console players have to pay a subscription to play multiplayer but PC players don't. If Sony is going to continue supporting PC like this the issue is only going to grow.

 It would require a massive, and expensive, undertaking for Xbox, Nintendo, and PlayStation to change how their infrastructure functions that would allow for them to still receive the necessary funding to keep an absurd number of servers up and maintained while still making a profit. They already take losses on console sales, minus Nintendo, so idk how willing they would be to also take losses on server infrastructure. 

Valve was pretty smart in keeping themselves to just be an online store and not also a networking hub for all multiplayer games on Steam.

Not surprised. 60 fps takes a large memory bandwidth, 120 fps even more so. I think the series x and ps5 are around 450 gb/s. The 4090 is 1000 gb/s. Consoles can't do high graphics and high fps.

Idk if that's ever going to change. On PC, the developer/publisher is responsible in providing the servers for their games and only their games. They also aren't paying money towards dev kits or anything like that, so the cost to put your game on PC is free allowing for additional funds to pay for your own online infrastructure. A storefront like Steam is all that it is, a storefront. Valve does offer additional services like anti-cheat but Steam is primarily just a place to put and sell your game on.

Whereas on console, the platform holder is who builds and maintains the online infrastructure for ALL online games that are available on that platform. 

So on PC, Arrowhead and/or Sony front the bill for the servers for Helldivers 2. On PS5, console players front the bill for the servers for Helldivers 2, Call of Duty, Rainbow Six: Siege, NBA 2K, Fall Guys, Monster Hunter, etc. etc. etc. 

It would require a massive, and expensive, undertaking for Xbox, Nintendo, and PlayStation to change how their infrastructure functions that would allow for them to still receive the necessary funding to keep an absurd number of servers up and maintained while still making a profit. They already take losses on console sales, minus Nintendo, so idk how willing they would be to also take losses on server infrastructure. 

Valve was pretty smart in keeping themselves to just be an online store and not also a networking hub for all multiplayer games on Steam.

Completely, as I'm sure that a lot of the players of HD2 on PC via Steam play(ed) Apex as well, which requires an EA account. But all those suggestions seem like seems like the good compromise. "Here's some free stuff for doing it." But the key is that if it was like it from the start (as in no issues) then there might never have been an issue and people that didn't have a PS account and bought it wouldn't have even carried on playing and just refunded.

It's the fact it was removed then added later as a forced thing was just stupid and how it was handled sounded like some idiot executive was oddly more concerned over consumer data than profit. You know, useless data of fake emails and burner accounts.

Yes, agreed. Blame MS for that though, they started it. Sony would have been stupid to not follow suit whether we like it or not.

That or game costs go up. Again. And people are very against that even though in the modern gaming era where game costs are more expensive than ever. With massive teams to fund, server costs etc, seems the best way of maintaining those costs is subbed online.

MS, Nintendo and Sony do add a lot of features for this price though, free games, cloud storage, share play (only PS right?) which PC does not have.

My friend recently booted up the PS4 version of Last Of Us that was free on PS+ and imported his PS3 saves from like a decade ago.

This just is not true. not at all. each game has their own servers or direct ip connections etc Sony or MS is not doing anything different then steam....