This meme is a pet peeve because sony is doing exactly the same thing that valve did when they released steam, of going digital-only and tying game ownership to digital accounts.
Okay but, so many different machines can run Steam and play a huge chunk of its entire vast library.
I can go to my local college and buy some heavily abused Optiplex from their surplus for like $90, install Steam, and play anything from Half-Life to Stardew Valley lol.
PlayStation will sell you an expensive single-purpose console, then sell you the same single-purpose console with a little GPU and RAM boost as a “PRO” forced upgrade, and then sell you access to back catalogue emulators as a monthly service. Blegh.
…Also Steam’s got family sharing, so that’s cool.
The biggest advantage I thought consoles with physical media still had: You can check out games from many public libraries.
I bet Sony is champing at the bit to put the kibosh on *THAT. *
I’d say in the end, Steam robs the customer significantly less at every turn.
Yeah, the big difference is you don’t have to use Steam on PC, nor does Valve appear to pursue exclusivity agreements to for consumers to get any particular game only from them. For Playstation, you use the PS Store or you don’t play.
i will not say that Steam has a lot of pro-consumer functionality. but in this particular case, the thing that sony is being critizied for is something Valve has already done, 20 years ago
This meme is a pet peeve because sony is doing exactly the same thing that valve did when they released steam, of going digital-only and tying game ownership to digital accounts.
Playstation is a walled garden. Steam is nothing like that, like, at all.
Okay but, so many different machines can run Steam and play a huge chunk of its entire vast library.
I can go to my local college and buy some heavily abused Optiplex from their surplus for like $90, install Steam, and play anything from Half-Life to Stardew Valley lol.
PlayStation will sell you an expensive single-purpose console, then sell you the same single-purpose console with a little GPU and RAM boost as a “PRO” forced upgrade, and then sell you access to back catalogue emulators as a monthly service. Blegh.
…Also Steam’s got family sharing, so that’s cool.
The biggest advantage I thought consoles with physical media still had: You can check out games from many public libraries.
I bet Sony is champing at the bit to put the kibosh on *THAT. *
I’d say in the end, Steam robs the customer significantly less at every turn.
Yeah, the big difference is you don’t have to use Steam on PC, nor does Valve appear to pursue exclusivity agreements to for consumers to get any particular game only from them. For Playstation, you use the PS Store or you don’t play.
i will not say that Steam has a lot of pro-consumer functionality. but in this particular case, the thing that sony is being critizied for is something Valve has already done, 20 years ago