Sony mulling over 'gold, silver or platinum' options for PS4 online
- Posted February 25th, 2013 at 11:43 EDT by Mike Harradence
- 11 Comments
The president of Sony Worldwide Studios has hinted that PlayStation 4’s online features may adopt a tier-based subscription format.
Shuhei Yoshida told The Guardian that Sony’s next-generation console could utilize a model not unlike Microsoft’s Xbox LIVE service.
"As more and more services and contents become available digitally, we'll have more of an option to create attractive packages," he said. "So hypothetically we can look at different models – like a cable TV company.
"We could have gold, silver or platinum levels of membership, something like that. We can do subscription services when we have more content – especially now that we have the Gaikai technology available. With one subscription you have access to thousands of games – that's our dream."
Sony lifted the wraps off PS4 last week during an event in New York City. While the console itself wasn’t shown, the company did talk at length about the system’s online features, which include the ability to share and stream content with your friends via PSN.
As Yoshida-san mentioned, the console will take advantage of the cloud service Gaikai, which will allow users to take the latest PS4 games for a spin instantly via the PS Store.
Read our man-on-the-ground Ernest Lin’s experience at the PS4 reveal here.
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Comments
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darkprince650
- 11:49am EST - February 25th, 2013
- 1
If Sony charged for online play, i wouldn't care. I just hate how MS makes you have a Gold account in order to use streaming services. (This coming from a person who uses Netflix, Crunchy Roll and Amazon Prime WAY more than the online gaming aspect).
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GoldenPlayer
- 12:03pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 3
pls dont make us pay for online, if its something like psn plus then its fine
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Coconut_Crunch
- 12:21pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 4
They will not charge you to play online for a game you bought. I consider this nothing more than Xbox discussion of people that like Xboxlive. For the people here, I wouldn't worry to much about it and don't listen to people saying otherwise, they basically want PS4 to be Xbox and it's not going to happen.
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PS3-The Ultimate Machine
- 12:31pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 5
So long as all the current base-PSN (non-plus) services remain free, I really don't care how they setup subscriptions, but I do appreciate more flexible packages, provided that they price DOWN from the current $50/year price for PSN Plus, i.e. the gold and silver be cheaper than $50 instead of platinum going above $50.
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Gameoholic007 |
Demented007- 12:49pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 7
I can see paying $50 a yr for the best packege, but no more than that. I pay $50 a yr for Plus right now, but its worth it with all the free/discounted games I get. If your just going to play online, Sony should keep it free.
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Alpha2
- 1:41pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 8
Plus might be worth it for the discounts but not for the "free" games that you lose access to when you stop paying for them. I said it from day one all that fancy social/share/streaming stuff was going to get locked behind a paywall, at least they finally admit it here. Good luck to who ever decides to blow their cash on it. I remain in the camp of people who work too hard for their money to throw it at another needless subscription service. And frankly depending on how badly they choose to hobble the PS4 with this, it may determine if I even bother buying it at all now. With all this Digital Distribution talk I had a feeling the PS4 was going to be the last console I ever bought, but it might end up the with the PS3 being my last.
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hush404
- 2:00pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 9
"As more and more services and contents become available digitally, we'll have more of an option to create attractive packages,"
Read: "As we find more stuff to charge for, it's possible we could get more money out of people".
I like PS+, it's a great service that isn't mandatory to expereince your system, it gives you access to some free games and discounts for agreeing to sign up. Packing in stuff like Gaikai into that would make sense. Deciding that you want to chunk up a bunch of services into subcription formats ala XBL, is just grabing for money. -
OsborneLV |
Eric_Osborne- 10:57pm EST - February 25th, 2013
- 10
Well in my case I would most likely go Platinum - I just hope its not more than $100 per year. with that I'd expect cloud gaming, saves, and cloud DVR (up to 500GB), all access to apps, and free games plus beta testing. automatic updates for all games I own, free random DLC, and pre release demos on games i like. DOES ANYONE USE VIDEO UNLIMITED? the music unlimited is pretty sweet, but I havent tried the video app yet, is it better than netflix?
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princevegeta1980
- 4:43am EST - February 26th, 2013
- 11
Funny, I never payed to stream videos on the net, I always manage to find what I want for free!
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