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Last month, Sony surprised the industry when they announced the end of physical disc production for PlayStation games from January 2028. Since the announcement, the backlash from the community has been very loud, and now during its latest earning call Sony have finally responded.
During its latest earnings call, Sony CFO Lin Tao responded to a questions on the topic and the reasoning behind the decision, as well as the potential impact to retail partners and other industries.
In the webcast attached to Sony’s latest financial results, Sony CFO Lin Tao shared the following comments translated into a English
On Ending Physical Discs
So we announced that from January 2028 onwards, we will no longer be manufacturing game disks. So one and a half years ahead, we made this announcement at this time. There are various reasons we made this decision, the biggest being that the digitalization of contents overall has been progressing. That’s the big factor.
It’s not just for PlayStation, but for all kinds of contents, digitalization is progressing. And so when we think about the future – and we put in a lot of thought and time – we cautiously considered this and we came to this conclusion and we’re going to cautiously move this forward.
And to this decision, we have received various opinions and people have strong views and we understand that the community has put forth those views to us. Games are loved by many people. It’s a form of <a href="https://comicvibe.com/dubai-summer-surprises-enters-final-week-with-sales-entertainment-and-prize-draws/” title=”Dubai Summer Surprises enters final week with sales, entertainment and prize draws”>entertainment that’s loved by people. And it’s connected to people’s fond memories in many cases. And so we understand those emotions. We want to consider that. And in the future digital ecosystem, how do we engage the gamers is something that we would like to continue to explore.
On the Impact on Retailers and becoming ‘more like PC’
For the last 30 years, we have been selling PlayStation and the retail partners have been always important to us. And with the completion of the disc production, we communicated this at an early stage so that we have enough time to be able to listen to various partners’ voices.
And in North America, this has already happened, without disks in the package – there’s a code included. That’s how they sell in North America. And about the retailers, there are regional characteristics, and for each regional partner, we try to have thorough dialogue so that we can end up in a win-win situation.
Now, the differentiation from PC. We don’t feel that the disk is the factor to differentiate from the PC. For PC, there’s certain ways to play with the PC as a user. It’s a long tail. Our strength is the curated content, and the game environment being stable – that’s another strength. And compared to the high-end gaming PC, our product is more affordable. So we don’t feel that the disk itself is a strong factor for differentiation. So going forward, we can coexist peacefully with PC games.
Do you wish Sony would reverse the decision, or are you all digital? Or do you not care either way? Let us know in the comments below.
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