At the end of last month, Sony confirmed reports that it would be shutting down the PlayStation Store for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, and PlayStation Portable later in 2021. After being dragged online for this decision and how it would affect game preservation in the weeks since, Sony has now confirmed it will be keeping the PlayStation 3 and Vita stores online “for the foreseeable future.” The PSP store will still be shutting down as planned on July 2.
News of this comes from a PlayStation Blog post by Sony Interactive Entertainment President Jim Ryan, where he says that “upon reflection” the call was a bad one. Which, yeah, you’re right. But it was also such a blatantly harmful decision in a way that I’m surprised at Sony’s surprise.
When we initially came to the decision to end purchasing support for PS3 and PS Vita, it was born out of a number of factors, including commerce support challenges for older devices and the ability for us to focus more of our resources on newer devices where a majority of our gamers are playing on. We see now that many of you are incredibly passionate about being able to continue purchasing classic games on PS3 and PS Vita for the foreseeable future, so I’m glad we were able to find a solution to continue operations.
More Sony:
- First Big PlayStation 5 Update Addresses Storage Issues, Cross-Gen Compatibility
- I Guess Sly Cooper’s Gone For Good Now?
- Naughty Dog President Says He Wishes the Studio Was Making a New Jak and Daxter
While it’s obviously damage control, Sony could use some good will right now after a storm of bad news coming out of the company. Even if this was self-inflicted and shortsighted as fuck. A recent report from Bloomberg revealed a sequel to Days Gone was pitched but shot down in favor of developer Sony Bend working on an Uncharted game, as well as the company essentially dismantling a team working on a remake of the original Last of Us in favor of handing the project to Naughty Dog.
What remains to be seen is if this decision will affect a recent string of PlayStation 3 users no longer being able to download updates for their games as services were being gradually taken down.
