Poll: What Are Your Thoughts on the PlayStation Plus Price Increase?

We in america already suffered it.

I accidentally bought a couple of years worth last year. I wonder if I'll get the second year at the original price?

Luckily I renewed before increase so I'm safe til next June

I stopped after I had no use for it and this isnt doing it any favours.

Whats weird is right now thr polls say they arent happy with the increase amd its too much for what is iffered...but theyll renew anyway. What?

To be honest haven't played my PS4 for a while now and I only get exclusive on it as I am more of a PC gamer than PS4 I think its good bye Plus

well to be fair it's their service and they are free to increase it's price if they want to even if we don't like it

but remember PS+ isn't mandatory so if you don't want to pay the increased price then don't, yeah you lose access to online play but that's about all you lose

besides it's not like it's only happening in one place, America got it last year and everywhere else is getting it too

yes it's annoying and disappointing but it's only a price increase of an optional service, there are bigger more important issues in the world than the price increase of a console online service

@BLP_Software Being tied to cloud storage, it's a tough call to cancel. I've lost a hard drive with of game saves back in the PS3 days... it isn't fun.

Plus, if they already have a big library of online games that require plus, they will pretty much have to pay the rates. No one is forced to pay for PS+, but on PS4 it can be difficult not to have it.

It probably worked out to Sony's advantage, but REQUIRING a paid online service to play 'unrelated' multiplayer games (some of which aren't even on dedicated servers) is horrible for the end users.

At 5 euros per month, for what it offers I still think it is an ok price. Of course I would also like to see better service, better quality of games and maybe some kind of backwards compability even if it is digital only.

@kyleforrester87 I moved out when my landlord agreed to me paying a rent plan in monthly installments only to then say 6 months later with no warning im actually underpaying and ive accumulated charges. 6 months to say but no, wait until there is charges.

@NathanUC Yeah i suppose if your content is tied digitally its a requirement once youre in. Suppose thats how they get you.

@kyleforrester87 I tend to get 12 months in my xmas or biffday gifts. Rather £50 ps plus than a lynx deodorant set and knitted jumper. Throw it out to the family.

@get2sammyb how does this affect current subscriptions, I'm sure I have 18 months left.

Had a PS4 for 2 months and have no interest in PS+.

I personally feel they can do what they want and we have to deal with it really. I would like to see more value for my extra £10, like new features or keeping the quality/value up on PS Plus games.

It's a mixed problem.

The new price at that moment in time isn't worth what's being offered by what we know, but you need it to play online multiplayer. Then again, they can charge what they like as it is their service.

Either way, I recommend stacking up for the current price before the end of August.

The thought of returning to the darkside, with the new Xbox X, is starting to appeal to me.

I only really play one game online (GTA) and haven't actually played a game from PS+ for about a year but I'm a sucker and still pay £6 a month for it. It's only £6 though, the amount of a good pint from Cask in Manchester.

@ApostateMage

Bloody hell mate, I'm a Manc' and I've never paid 6 quid for a cask pint. Try Wetherspoons, lol, cask beer is around £2.50p per pint.

Real world, over the course of the year it isn't that much of an increase. Its been the same price for a while. Netflix has gone up as well. It's just inflation which is quite normal. Houses go up in value, wages increase with inflation...so does PS Plus.

@get2sammyb

Keep mentioning what, the price of cask beer in Manchester? That's the first time I've mentioned it.

If I have repeated something, then perhaps it's due to repeat articles on the same topic, that invite you to make a comment... Just a thought.

This is old news for the us audience

@Hengist Why, because of a $10 increase to an optional online service? Or were you thinking f getting the X before this?

@kyleforrester87 Yeah, I am in the same boat. I have loads and I am wondering if I need them all. I have Prime, Netflix, this, Spotify and one other I think that I can't even remember.

I do like that I can pay yearly with PSN and Prime and I can remember when they are due so they aren't just going out of my account but this is the issue with everything going subscription - people just can't manage too many.

@wiiware Yup. Its been months now and we survived.

@3Above

Both mate.

Didn't it get raised like 2 years ago as well, or did I imagine that?

My only issue is that eventually the price increases will make it not worth it, and when that happens I'll cancel. You know what we need now?

Knack permanently free for PS+ users.

@Hengist Thats cool. I honestly dont know but has XBL prices increased recently? Im under the NA PSN so had to deal with this last yr. I let Plus expire and i won't renew it till Battlefront 2. I can wait till then.

@ShogunRok Here's another option: Guarantee dedicated servers, that was the whole premise of paid online to begin with, wasn't it? I don't think we need more free and/or exclusive stuff to justify the price. It needs to go back to basics: dedicated servers and a small fee. Keep the free games separate and allow us to choose what we subscribe to.

Well I've just bought a further twelve months from a certain online retailer named after a river for £35 as Sony say it will stack (it's not due for renewal until December) but doubt I will renew it ever after that.

The amount of games they offer that are of any interest to me via PS Plus has been limited to Rocket League & Until Dawn (which I haven't played yet).

The only benefit I can see I get is the system auto update feature... maybe I'll cancel that back order thinking about it.

@get2sammyb

Please explain why you percieve my post as 'bait' (as I'm not sure of your definition). Not once have I stated that one system is better than the other. For whatever reason you attach the term 'bait' to my post, I can assure you that it is, on myside, completely unintentional.

I'm too old to be concerned with stuff like 'baiting' (whatever that means), I just post here, as I value the adult discussions.

The writing was on the wall with the price hike in NA, so I was expecting it & stocked up 3 years worth when the price dropped down to £30/year in June.

As a whole I'm very happy with PS+. I don't even game online, but the discounts across PS4, Vita, PSVR & preorders are good enough for me. The freebies are the cherry on top. People evaluate the IGC month-to-month rather then letting the whole year play out. I think you'd be hard pressed not to find value in that.

I'm sorted for a while, but if I had to place a £value on what the service is worth to me I'd probably go as high as £70/year.

Got a couple of codes in recent sales so good till December 2019. 27months for £60. But always thought the store discounts alone pays my subs. So monthly games a bonus and rarely not worth the few quid a month they cost

Ill probably pick up another year before the price hike which will take me through September 2019. And we will see what the position is then. 50 pounds is a lot of money for what plus currently is. I do think that we will start to see a better selection of titles making their way to plus on a more regular basis as a result - although that will be as much to do with the ps4 now having a much stronger back catalogue

@adf86

I think that you maybe right mate.

I would have fewer issues with the price of PS+ if they offered more subscription options. Like, I'd gladly pay a reduced price for a plan that just gave access to the PS+ deals and cloud storage.

€50 is ok for 24 games a year plus the discounts... Dunno why people are complaining...it's a good service.

@Ralizah Yes please, I'd glady pay a few bucks a year for cloud storage alone. I don't need the games however.

@blah01 That's the problem, they're using them as a justification for their paid online. I just want the online play (with dedicated servers, otherwise there's no reason to be paying for it), and cloud storage. I don't care about the games. Drop the games and half the price, and add dedicated servers.

So if they're not providing anything new, why the price rise? I only have it because I have to for online games. To be honest though, we should all have made a stand when PS4 came out; after all, on PS3 we paid nothing. Too late now really. Not happy but have too many games I play online to say no.

@Octane

I totally agree with your suggestions mate.

depends how much you use the service if you'll pay it not if your always online if you never do you shouldn't pay for it

It's only about 3p a day. They haven't made any increase in price since launch. If you add average inflation every year since then you get about £48. So it's not too bad in the whole scheme of things, it just looks worse in one bigger hit

tbh - I save more than £50 when they have the PSPlus sales. People tend to forget those extra 10-30% discounts they get throughout the year along with the PSPlus games they have + are going to get over the next 12 months. I have PS+ Games from Jan 2014 on my PS3, Vita and PS4 - that's a lot of games I'll lose over a 10 quid increase.

It really doesn't bother me tbh - I pay more for a lot less from other companies

@Turniplord

My problem with these 'discounts' is that you can often go on Amazon and find the same item for a quid less than Sony's discount price.

Whew I thought this was US and was going to throw a fit that we were getting a hike again.

Fit being because I've seen 0 improvement since the US rate hike, so if any of you think it will get better, or didn't notice a grand change when the US hike occurred, don't expect it to happen now!

It all goes to how much you value/play the free games. For me it is low but I do use the online service from time to time so there is value, but for the current cost? That's a tough call. I'll definitely reevaluate when my year is up in November.

This is old news for us in the States. Of course, this revenue stream is part of what is helping Sony's financials. Remember the fanboy argument that Sony was going bankrupt? Not such an argument anymore:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-spider-man-playstation-4-electronics-have-pushed-sonys-stock-nine-year-highs-1024423

Consider this. As of May 2017, Sony announced that 26.4 million PSN users were subscribed to PS+. Now they could be month to month or yearly, but for this scenario we'll assume yearly (month to month is more expensive). Figuring an average of $49.99 USD a month, that comes out to nearly $1.3 billion a year.

That's a lot of cheddar.

Maybe they're bringing Qore back.

Or Home.

So an eye water 20% annual pay increase. In reality £10 isn't gonna break the bank but what are we getting fot this large percentage pay hike?

A free AAA game a month will help.

What won't help and will leave people justifiably annoyed will be a recurrence of long periods of downtime (or in fact ANY downtime from now on). Also, if they feel the need to do this again in the next 24 months they WILL lose customers. Fool me once etc. Its a good service and has been stable for quite some time now but soon it may become netflix or PSN. I know which one my wife would choose.

And finally, just a god damn plain english explanation for it from Sony would be good PR. This currently isn't.

@Throb The price has gone up in the UK before you know...

@Hengist Golden rule.

Dont speak well of the competition unless the staff do so first.

And even then dont, because we are winning the generation to two to one sales and somehow talking even remotely about other options (which is a good and healthy thing in a market I must add) is sacrilege.

Think of it this way. Every time I speak well of Switch its fanboyism and a warning. If I slam it, its an a-ok discussion and I get labelled a numpty a lot of the time for doing so because thats a thing here.

Basically, keep it PS and PS only and dont speak ill of the God Kaz Hirai.

I just compared Sony fans to a cult. Wow.

And in talking with some staff a year or so ago, I found out this site has a much higher ban and warning rate for things like I just mentioned than the others.

Again, dont speak out against Sony. Or suggest you are jumping ship.

@Throb But I remember when playing online was free on my PS3.

@BLP_Software I don't remember it going up, I always thought it was this price. Must have missed it. What was it originally then?

@BLP_Software Yes, but it doesn't make it any less bad PR does it?

Its OK this time but if they increase it again with the next 24 months I'll have to think again about renewing. There's plenty of other entertainment options out there....

@BLP_Software I just found this article. Look at the bottom of the page. https://blog.eu.playstation.com/2010/06/23/playstation-plus-explained/
It was £39.99 back in 2010 according to this

@BLP_Software

Thanks for your advice and insight, I see that you have great wisdom in your words. I think that I'm slowly beginning to understand the appropriate level of etiquette, which should be employed and applied here.

@Throb https://www.slashgear.com/playstation-plus-subscription-prices-to-increase-in-uk-11396339/

Thr lower two went up.

@BLP_Software I've only ever got the annual one so that's why I'd never noticed a price change

@Hengist Its weird isnt it? You can discuss the competition just fine on sistersites but not here.

The trade off is on those sister sites unless you talk about the competition positively and the primary subject of thw site negatively a few come along with megaphones and berate you.

But it promotes discussion

I believe the term we are looking for is....dictatorship. Say what you will and enjoy your freedom in the market and how you spend your money that you earn, as long as we agree to it.

@Throb Fair play. Price hikes have happened here to PSPlus before just not as drastic.

Nowtv has put their price up too, inflation inflation inflation! As the years go by things get dearer. It's life.

@adf86 And it shouldnt be a surprise that when discussing if people are happy about the service they will soon be paying more that they bring up the competition. Where it either is better service, cheaper, or god forbid on PC FREE!

@Hengist If you aren't into sony exclusive games no need to hold back really.

@Scollurio

I totally agree with you. In reality, I'll probably end up buying the product (which shall not be named) and purchase a subscription for both platforms.

If you take inflation at an average of 2.7% since 2010 and apply it yearly to the original annual subscription of £39.99:
Year SUB VAT
2010 £39.99 £1.08
2011 £41.07 £1.11
2012 £42.18 £1.14
2013 £43.32 £1.17
2014 £44.49 £1.20
2015 £45.69 £1.23
2016 £46.92 £1.27
2017 £48.19

That's not too far off to be fair

@BLP_Software That's why Sony does it, people will moan but then open wide anyway.

@Hengist all depends on your own preference. I prefer Digital as I share my account so both accounts get the game (so I'm basically paying 1/2 for each machine) and a lot of the games I get in the sales are either decently discounted or PSN games that don't have physical releases.

Personally, I've saved probably over £200 or Moreno this year on the discounts + the 6 free games a month that I'm basically renting over the last 3 years doesn't make the 50 a month sound that bad. Plus most places will have it for around 40 anyway

@adf86 PC is still providing online multiplayer for free.

Xbox Live is Xbox Live but EA Access and Origin are simply alternatives that keep the price down. Sony doesnt have that so watch the price go up with no on platform options.

And Switch is a third of the price in the US. The value is therefore proportionate. But at least Switch downloads fast and has often better speed than my PS4 does, both over wifi. Thats probably my router settings though.

£20 for 3 months or £20 for a year with lower quality? Better games and online infrastructure, or no fees at all on PC? Your choice.

My choice is PC, for the record. I aint paying anyone for online

It's a bit of a shock at 25%, but as it's been shown above it's still good value for money over 12 months. If they use this extra revenue to bolster or improve the PSN, all the better. It's my hobby, so an extra £10 a year makes no odds to me

@adf86 thats fair

@JoeBlogs Im blunt.

This does not affect me but I already came to the conclusion that I will not be renewing my membership once it runs out. I don't really play the free games that I download and most of the games I play on the PS4 I play for the single player experiences. In fact, the only time we utilize online features is on FIFA or MLB.

If Sony hikes the price up in the US, I wouldn't even think about renewing again.

I blame Microsoft If they didn't invent pay to play online(i.e Xbox LIVE) then SONY wouldn't of had the idea to do this + I guess it could of been worse to if Microsoft's Xbox ONE's DRM policies succeeded to for all us Gamers :-/ Saying that i got my 1 years PS PLUS for only £27'ish a few weeks ago from ShopTo(+ I have never payed full price for PS PLUS in the past with various deals)

@Turniplord

From your post, I completely understand your rationale in favouring digital.

For me, the driving factor when considering a digital purchase, usually concerns the fact that I'm often too lazy to get up and change the disc.

@sketchturner I think this is a brilliant idea. Nintendo once did something kind of similar with digital downloads on the Wii U. I thought it was awesome and purchased games that I would have not purchased otherwise. It would also combat what stores and Amazon are already doing. I would also consider upping my membership again too.

But I'm doubtful we'll see any changes or additional content for the price increase.

@kyleforrester87 love that picture 😆😆😆

Can't say I'm too bothered about the price but it's certainly close to an acceptable limit for me, shame they can't throw in some limited version of PlayStation Now as a bit of a sweetener.

Next year Nintendo want to charge me £20 For the privilege of using my own mobile to talk to people and borrow Nes games, so PS+ doesn't look too bad

@Hengist haha just don't mention the other console, obviously still a delicate issue six quid for a pint in Manchester?? Unless it's on a matchday reet close to Old Trafford I wouldn't bother!

Wow, I keep seeing the "blame Microsoft" for the online service fees comments. Blame them for beating Sony to the punch? I find it hard to believe that Sony didn't already think about it before Microsoft actually did it. This just seems like a petty argument. Plus, didn't Sega kind of do this before both with the cable thing?

Uh oh! I just mentioned Microsoft!

I'm happy to pay more if they stop the 'PSN is offline for maintenance.' And reduce disconnections, etc. I get disconnected from party chats every 2 minutes sometimes. Error messages all over the place.

Happy to pay good money for a quality service. Sony can and should do better. If they don't improve it by next year, I'll strongly consider pc gaming instead.

If there was a cheaper option without the monthly games/discounts etc and just for online I think people would opt for it.
£50 is high but I play online so have no choice but to pay it...

I think I still subscribe to Plus to feel like I'm not missing out on something but I don't really use it. I never play online because of my terrible internet connection and I don't even remember the last time I played one of the free games they offered. I just use the discounts every now and then.

Well, the US already has the price increase, so welcome aboard for everyone else.

In my honest opinion, it's still not that bad considering what you get out of it...the store discounts are enough for it to be well-worth it (at least to myself), and if you add up (as long as you're one that downloads a lot of games), add up the money you saved, add up the (basically rental costs) of the free games to keep for the months you have it...it's basically worth it considering that you don't have to have it for every online game and Sony is not 'making' you purchase it. However, there will be nintendo-fans that will state that they're only going to be paying 20 for nintendo's service without even considering the difference between the two. (just thought I'd throw that out there, even though I do love nintendo too). Anyways, the price difference isn't that bad considering all of this...it's when they decide to raise it to $100 per year that I'll step away.

It is going to cost just under £4 20 a month

Why do Sony have to justify that.

You people have a very very good deal here.

There are idiots that pay a crazy amount each month for Sky yet the adverts alone would pay for the service.

If you want to rant why not have a go at British telecom landline rental oh my oh my people.

@nathanSF I'm pretty sure that if you've bought it and paid for it already, you've got it at the price you paid at the time. You should be free from the price rises I think.

@BLP_Software Huh? Sometimes I talk about the switch in the comment (because I just bought it) but got no warning from the staff, I think it's okay as long as the comment is not click baity.

I like the comment section here is moderated, it's really annoying to see the comment section become the battleground for fanboys like the comment section in gamespot, ign, eurogamer, etc.

I would be fine with it if there were a cheaper option where you could just pay to play online, and leave the free games and discounts and stuff out of it. I'd rather pay a lot less money to just be able to play online than have to pay way too much money for features I don't even use the majority of the time.

I don't think there's any reason Sony can't have a cheaper option for people who just want to play online and don't care that much about stuff like downloading "free" games that are years old and are already really cheap. They just keep it this way for money, which I understand is their sole motivation, but it's still irritating.

I stopped subscribing to PS Plus a few months ago. I am not really interested in online multiplayer games anymore, and what I would save in discounts wasn't really worth it for me.

I would gladly pay more money for them optimizing and polishing up the damn network. No bonuses; just make it run better. Because right now its running like it did on the PS3 8 years into that console's lifecycle - i.e. terribly.

They are so concerned with loading ads and background "screensaver" videos and other bullsh** now that it detracts from the actual functionality of the thing, big-time. I know what I'm there for; just load the "See All New Releases" button at the end of a row with seemingly 2 dozen virtual box arts and ads, and let me get to searching for what I actually want. And also, stop bombarding me with auto-playing trailers in the background when I finally get to the game's page - just load the "Purchase" or "Download" buttons first, ffs.

Also I hate searching for stuff by alphabet too, with that weird vertical letter bar scroll interface? In some other regions, like the Japanese PSN, they just bring up the software keyboard like typing in any game. WHY DON'T THEY DO THAT WITH OURS (the US one, not sure if the EU one uses the software keyboard)!? Not to mention give us Wishlists and Gifting already, jeez.

The PSN always feels janky. And I understood it back when it launched on the PSP & PS3 a thousand years ago; they had to quickly adapt to the digital distribution that people like Valve and Microsoft were preparing for while Sony wasn't, and so they just sort of jury-rigged the functionality into a PSN that wasn't really built for it. But the PS4 WAS built for it, and its not got the performance, or the streamlined design, it should by a long shot.

You want more money? Fix that sh** up. I'd deal with a price hike if they properly upgraded the whole shebang.

@Dru196 exactly the point you made, in the summer sale alone I saved like £80 I know not everyone spends loads on digital content but I mean that's 2 years plus(current price) in savings. When you think practically it does pay off having plus, depending on your use of the network itself

I pay $60 a year. In a years time I save way more than that with deals and free games, but I buy my games mostly digitally. So at that price it's definitely worth it to me. As long as im saving more than im paying I guess I really can't complain...

One thing that would entice me maybe is if they offered an automatic 20% discount on the digital version of retail games for PS+ subscribers. I purchase the majority of my games physical due to Best Buy's Gamer's Club Unlocked 20% discount. I would gladly go with digital versions if the digital prices could compete with it. As it stands now, for a day one buy, I am either looking at $48 for a physical copy, or $60 for digital, and that choice is easy.

The price was already up in America, but I pay monthly, so I'm not really affected. I only have Plus to play Tekken with friends, but occasionally I get a decent discount from using it too. It's not amazing, but it's done me no harm yet.

I bought a 15 month sub for £29.99 on Amazon's Prime Day a few weeks back, so I'm good until something like June 2019. But I'd re-subscribe anyway.

Surely no-one is shocked by this, though? It happened in the US not long ago, and to be fair it is - I think - the first price increase since PS Plus began. I can't be certain of that though, as I didn't use it in the PS3 days.

Granted, 25% is a large increase, but it's still a good deal. £4-something a month for up to 6 free games (depending on what platforms you own), and discounts on the store. And I say this as someone who rarely takes the free games (I either own them, or simply am not interested), and mostly benefits from the smaller discounts.

I do think that they need to change the service with this increase, though. Discounts should be a fixed percentage store-wide, and not only on selected titles. And there should be an alternative to the free games for those who already have them or don't want them; for example, allow 2 free movie rentals each month as an alternative - again, store-wide and not from a limited selection.

The one thing I do feel they have to do after the increase, at the very least, is be sure to offer 'bigger' PS4 games than they have been. This month and next haven't been too bad, but prior to that... pretty woeful, in my personal opinion.

@AlejandroMora You Americans always payed less anyway. So you did not suffer anything.

@DerMeister Isnt paying a year upfront way cheaper?

@Deadstanley Guaranteed acces to Beta's would be awsome.

@kyleforrester87 I think you said it correctly nobody likes to pay more but thats it i want to play online. And i make my money back with the sales.

@Flaming_Kaiser Probably, but I'm not bleeding for cash now, so ehh.

As others stated, two of the answers here sum up the whole issue. People are ticked but they'll still pay. What Sony has to hope is some of its poor decisions (no EA Access, no backwards compatibility, PSN price hikes) don't come back to bite the PS5 in the rear. It's not usually the current gen when bs catches the market leader, it's the one after that.

It's absolutely lame. A price hike for a service that isn't very stable to begin with. But they know they could do it, over half the games releasing are going to have some sort of online component that's integral to enjoying the game. Destiny2 is a perfect example.

Problem is, they've sold over 60million PS4's and only about 24million are active subscribers. The well will run dry.

Get the bloody service working. Why is that not an option? Ps messaging is shambolic.

@mrjakku I juat bought an extra year! In case Sony really can't get enough of our cash and do the same in 12 months time, or a bit longer.

The alternative would be to pay for online MP only for those games we'd want to play online.
Then it occurred to me that there might be network validation and routing complexities with the pay-per-MP route.

49 quid for a year is reasonable value considering the free games that you get throughout regardless if you play online or not. Also re: UK, the pound value has dropped and is likely to drop further meaning the money going back to Sony in Japan is worth less. Its been 40 quid since the beginning.. it was to be expected at some point.

Regardless, if you keep your eyes peeled then you can get discounts on PS plus sub also.. cough cd keys.

The amazon deal recently was good too.. managed to get 2 subs somehow which has stacked me up till 2021. All in all, £50 quid a year isnt exactly much to get 24 PS4 games.

In North America we already suffered through this (in Canada it's $69.99 CAD/$56 USD for a year subscription) and though it's not horrible, it would be nice to get better games and exclusive sales for ppl worth playstation plus. Personally I rather they get rid of the stupid Vita games and give away 3 ps4 and 3 ps3 games a month.

My main console of choice is the Xbox, So I will carry on to pay for Xbox Live (Better Online Service) EA Access (Great for the Consumer) and Game Pass (Not shody streaming). I also pay For Netflix, Spotify and Origin Access. I only use my PS4 for its exclusives so I have no problems dropping the additional cost of PS+

All I use ps plus for is to play multiplayer on Call of duty. I do not play any other game. I do not care for the free 'games' or anything else plus membership offers. Now that one game will cost me £140 a year to play, including season pass.

Why can't Sony have levels of membership, one for people who only want multiplayer access and one for people who want the full works?

I'm considering ditching the PS4 and continuing my 35 years of gaming on a PC. At least I won't be subjected to the cheek of having to pay twice, my ISP and Sony, to play online.