Well, at least the installed from disc version will still work if Sony's authentication service goes offline again (I think it was due to Amazon's AWS going down?) as all digital only versions that required online auths were stuffed.

I'd love a character creator option, perhaps the same as the PC mod or something more advanced as per the OTT Black Desert character creator. Creating my own protagonist usually engages me a bit more with RPG style games rather than being forced to play Mr Beard.

@RPG121 It's a good idea but it seems the days of teams of play-testers seem to have gone,. Some devs rely purely on unit tests/AI generated tests, both of which are written by blinkered devs or, in the case of AI, idiots.
Thinking back to the PS2 days, what went out on disc was the final game - no PSN to allow patches. Small patches appeared on the PS3 era but from later on in the PS4 era, some of the disc contents just got utterly replaced by Day 1 patches so what was sent to the pressing plant was clearly broken.

@Wiceheid Yes, after Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance , Snowblind was asked by Sony to take their Everquest IP and produce a dungeon crawler (hence why BG: DA2 wasn't handled by them though it did use their engine)
That gave us the sublime Champions of Norrath and Return To Arms. I think after those games, Snowblind hinted at them working on a LOTR RPG but at some point I think they get acquired by Warner Bros and this eventually plopped out. To say it was a disappointment was an understatement and left a lot of fans wondering how good a Tolkienverse top down crawler could’ve been.
Still play BG:DA1 & 2 on the PS4 from time to time.

Sony have a history of shoving adverts on the dashboard, such as the PS4 receiving mysterious new tiles arriving on the front screen but they were normally irritating links to the latest PS Store sale which you could delete until the next time they tried bombarding you with more ****. This could be even more irritating?

PS4 = for the players.
PS5 onwards = for the payers, investors and mugs.

My next "play station" will be made by Nintendo...

So, utterly irrelevant for the base PS5 then?

Ooh, didn't realise the PS4 & PS5 had a Spectrum emulator built in!

@nomither6 I tend to finish a game and then that's it?
Someone as ancient as me that grew up with the ZX Spectrum, C64 and Amiga never mind the PS1 & PS2 wasn't bothered about virtual medals as I'd rather concentrate on the game.
Only game I replayed to death was the Lego Star Wars games where some parts of the levels were only accessible 2nd time around with different characters. Much more fun collecting minikits!

@ShadowRJ Not heard much from Phil since he was demoted/retired but Shawn occasionally pops up and still has more of a clue as to what made PS popular than any of the current vacuous suits.

@ShadowRJ Gaming seemed a LOT more customer-centric when we had Shawn Layden and Phil Spencer in charge.

Still don't get Trophies after al this time - yeah, I see them pop-up on screen but really don't care.

Given all Xbox's current problems, this should be a fair distance down their 'fix list'.

FOMO caused me to buy a PS5 so this is my stepping off point with Sony. Never thought it'd come but here it is. Sony has gone downhill ever since Shawn Layden was ousted in favour of 'Mr Accountant' Ryan.

From an overweight, over priced PS4 Pro console (4K at 30fps? I already have one of those) to joysticks that constantly go left after a year, constant irrelevant remasters, inability to back up game saves to USB and now removing the £10-£20 cheaper physical discs (due to COMPETITION) in order for Sony to fund their corporate champagne lunches from existing customers, that's the final stick.
Given their 50/50(ish)% split of physical and digital games, Nintendo will be getting my money next. Never thought I'd say that either!

Can't help but hope that either a) Codemasters get freed from the EA behemoth or b) all the staff leave and form a new company ("Masters Of Code" if EA still own the Codemasters IP) as they have got a lot of talent to create games on the PS5, Xbox Series and Switch 2.

@Slippship Definite concerns for Codemasters - I kind of hope they get jettisoned from the EA fold so they can go it alone and produce some good games again.
I mean F1 25 was the first non-PS4 version of the F1 franchise but was it any different? No - apart from the engines sounding much worse but that's the fault of the FIA/Mercedes regulation changes.

@DennisReynolds Never said it didn't have games. I believe I said I was referring to the PS5 launch?

@ShadowRJ No, I've got about 50 PS4 games, collected over many years, some disc some digital (normally when there wasn't a disc).
For me, the PS5 releases have been a bit of a busted flush - more fun, playable stuff on the PS4 than the 5.

@ShadowRJ My son and I have got about 15 PS5 games between us, I think? That includes a few PS4 discs with upgrades? Why do you ask?

@get2sammyb I was referring to the PS5s launch, and when it launched, PS5 was little more than a PS4 Pro impersonator! PS6 could easily suffer from the same problem, especially given game development timescales these days.

Main complaint with the 5 (apart from the ever inflating price for 6-7 year old tech and ugly looks) are the creaking Driftsense controllers - just had another one go even through we have 4 original DS4s and 3 original DS3s which don't suffer from the same problem. Will I bother buying another controller? Doubt it.

Sony's recent attitudes and screwing customers just to fund their corporate lunches means I don't care about a PS6.
I mean the 5's been bad enough but about a grand for an unspecified console with probably even scarcer games that it's predecessor?
Take me back to the PS4 days!

@GamingGod Yes, couldn't put my finger on it either as I'm normally a total sucker for fantasy RPGs (including the original Dragon's Dogma on PS3/PS4) but this one....? Dunno.

I wonder if Sony will release this on Blu-ray when it comes out for home purchase?

Another month with nothing added to my library. Might just go and buy a few 2nd hand PS4 discs...

@Dogbreath If my local CEX is anything to go buy, they're doing it already - fatty (disc & digital), slim and even Pro PS5s in plentiful supply, gathering dust in their display cabinets. Curiously, barely a PS4 to be seen anywhere though?

My PS5 disc fatty cost me £344 from Music Magpie in Dec 24. Came with a 1TB SSD expansion that the previous owner cou;dn't be bothered to take out. I'd dread to see how much they go for now but I can see more and more people opting for a mint/vgc used PS5 rather than a new one - and that's even if they can be bothered to play their PS4 games with slightly quicker load times.

Probably being "cautious" due to the number of anticompetitive lawsuits homing into view...

In that case, I'm going to "cautiously move myself off this platform".

Thank you, Sony, for the magical memories from PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4 (less so the overrated PS5) but this is me out after nigh on 30 years.
Can only hope that Xbox rise from their self-inflicted ashes and put up a fight to bring arrogant Sony some competition.

Couldn't happen to a nicer company.

PS4 was probably still selling like hot cakes at this point in its lifetime but even the Pro was only about £300 by this point. Probably would've sold even more had Sony not killed their 4K console as it feared it'd take sales from the PS4 Pro Plus.

In the wake of this, I kind of hope the Codies can separate themselves off so they can reform and produce some decent fun games rather than the ever more dreary F1 monetisation games

Offering a trade in wallet credit when you digitally 'sell' a game would be a good option. Also making the PS5 Store work more like the PS4 Store app as the current one is a restricted mess.

My main complaint with this whole 'no physical' option is that if you want a game, you have to pay whatever price the Sony Store dictates it is.
Compare that with a pressed, packaged, distributed disc from a variety of stores where there is COMPETITION. Often the disc version is £10-20 LESS than the digital Store which makes no sense apart from Sony being able to fleece digital only users.

Sony are going to have to do something because otherwise they'll find themselves in the crosshairs of various competition watchdogs. See how profitable their 'no physical' decision is when various million dollar anti-competition lawsuits have to be paid.

In other news "Avowed" sold 100% on digital - because no-one bothered printing discs!

@ButteredCrumpet Just out of interest, which console did you play it on? I played through on the PS4 Pro and it looked and ran great on that?

PS5 only got successful due to it being able to stand on the PS4's Arnie-like shoulders.

PSVR2 was (presumably?) deliberately made incompatible with the original PSVR games - in what universe did that make sense? Then Sony publish less and less for it and they wonder why it became their latest Vita-disaster?

@Max_the_German "Only 512 GB SSD without an upgrade slot" - only problem with that is the PS5 chomps up about 160GB of that with 'other' stuff (OS mainly) so you'd barely have enough space to install 1-2 games.

Crikey, at this rate Sony might as well start up another PS4 production run as the components are cheaper though the HDD -> SSD standard upgrade option has gone from about £40 (1TB Crucial) to about £240!

As for the PS6, I was excited until New Sony turned out to be a bunch of anti-consumer, money-grabbing bar-stewards. My next Playstation is likely to be a PC or made by Nintendo.

Often wondered what happened to Core as they did some brilliant arcade games on the Amiga before shifting to the PlayStation.

And there's also proof that PlayStations look best in black!

Veilguard was OK - a bit strange in places and frustrating in others.
Trouble is, it is always going to be compared to Dragon Age: Origins (which was a true epic), DA:2 which was OK but the samey scenery destroyed some of the story and DA:Inquisition which was also rather good, better than DA:2.

Japan Studio gets shut down and now the Switch has the best version of Everybody's Golf - who'd have thought it?

Sony should do something but probably won't because a) they've got players over a barrel and b) they'd have to spend their own shareholder corporate lunch cash to fix their iffy network.

PS4 = For the Players
PS5 = For the payers
PS6 = WTF?

@NishimaruX I was being ironic (‘simulated ignorance’ if you'd prefer) - thought anyone would've seen through that? Apparently not.

As someone in my 50s, I still have some vinyl from the 1st time around.

How do I play my digital MP3s on this physical turntable?

"there was a period during the latter days of the PS3 and throughout much of the PS4 era where it seemed to genuinely care about its fanbase. "

Says it all, really.

That said, I'll be on holiday that week so the PS5 will be silent - on the other hand, my PSP and Switch will be getting a hammering!

"become more global"

...provided that the country has decent internet speeds or you work on a military base.

Eeee, let's hope Anonymous aren't fond of physical games eh?

@Andy22385 February last year, the online authorising system went down for several days and all digital games were unavailable as it couldn't validate the game & account.
However, disc based games were fine - I had Fallout4 digital and that was a no go, quick install from disc and all was OK.

This is pointless as Sony will just remaster everything again for the PS6 to screw more cash out the gullible.

Last Of Us: Remastered Remastered Remastered anyone?

@dodgykebaab No it hasn't.

Don't count the pretty pointless Welcome screen as a 'theme' if it disappears once you're off that one screen and as for the dreary funereal "music", can't change that either.

No folders/themes as usual. Let me know when the XMB comes back into fashion.
PS5 UI really is a mess and they refuse to improve it - typical New Fony Sony.

Surprised they haven't started charging for OS updates.

Sony are pretty all but irrelevant in the Japanese market.

Weirdly, the Switch/2 digital to physical split seems to be about 50:50 and some of that will be driven by games too big for a cartridge.

@Almost_Ghostly Yep, I did the same with Driveclub - bought a disc from CEX/eBay/somewhere and as soon as I loaded said physical media into the PS4/PS5, it downloaded all the patches, even though the game cannot be purchased digitally.

"only seven PS5 games have sold more than 100,000 physical copies in 2026."

If Sony don't master discs, we can't buy physical so the figures are always skewed (I'm looking at you, Avowed!)

Question is how many digital copies of those unnamed games were sold in the same period?

Nintendo will be getting my money next time I upgrade consoles.

"it’s hard to say whether this will be a good move or a bad move for local players."

I think we all know how that will work out.