Despite all the doom and gloom surrounding the games industry right now, Sony actually achieved record high profitability for its gaming division this past fiscal year, ending 31st March.
One contributor to that success is PS Plus, the PS5’s semi-mandatory subscription service which unlocks online multiplayer, monthly games, and more. It’s a huge driver of PlayStation’s business, and moving forward the format holder hopes to strengthen this sector.
As part of a massive new financial report, the organisation said:
“Sony is focused on driving profitable growth of PS Plus by increasing user engagement and continuously improving its service proposition and content, as well as inviting users to shift to higher tiers.”
There’s a debate about whether, in this day and age, console players should be forced to pay to play online – especially when those services are generally offered for free on PC.
I think there is merit to the way PlayStation’s online ecosystem works, although PS Plus is not exactly cheap anymore. Generally I think the monthly games in the Essential tier have been decent, though, and do add inherent value to the service.
Personally, I think if you’re a new PS5 customer or someone who likes to play a variety of different games, PS Plus Extra is really good value for money – especially if you pay for a year upfront.
PS Plus Premium could use work, though: while I appreciate the cloud gaming experience is actually quite good on PlayStation these days, it’s not something everyone wants to interact with. And while I love a lot of the retro games being selected of late, there needs to be more of them added quicker.
I am hopeful Sony will continue to improve on PS Plus, because if it wants to upsell the higher tiers and even just retain customers, then it needs to continue to deliver excellent value.
In this age of ever-increasing prices, it’s hard not to be sceptical, but this is a foundational part of PlayStation’s business – it really can’t afford to lose members en masse.
