PS3 & PSVita digital stores closing altogether

[Asura]

It hasn't been confirmed yet...

https://www.reddit.com/r/vita/comments/manxwx/psvita_digital_store_shutting_down_august_27th/

But there's a persistent rumour that this is going to happen in the middle of summer. This happened with the PSP a while back; you can still buy digital PSP games but you need to use a PS3 to transfer them to the machine. Now this'll happen with the PS3, where you can still buy the games but you have to do so via PC.

Admittedly not the biggest change because I never shop for PS3 games via the PS3's store; it debuted as a slow, broken mess and it remains a terrible storefront, but even so... It's a shame.

[Hohum]

As far as I'm aware there's no way to purchase PS3 stuff from the store via the website anymore, so if this does happen then it's goodbye to all digital content you haven't already downloaded. Guess I better buy Daytona USA whilst I can!

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2020-10-09-playstation-store-on-web-and-mobile-to-stop-selling-ps3-psp-and-vita-games-this-month

Edit: Unless they just prevent purchases and still allow downloads, but who knows.

[chopemon]

There's still a way to download games through a browser if like me you want to make sure all your stuff is downloaded.

[Neon Ignition]

Go! Go! Digital future!

[teddymeow]

This is still a rumour, right?

Sony haven't confirmed this?

[MonkeyJuggleDX]

This is still a rumour, right?

Sony haven't confirmed this?

Nope. Just hearsay at the moment. Doesn't affect me as I'm physical only and anything I want digitally, I just get by nefarious means.

[chopemon]

There is a problem even with physical copies though. When the PS3's CMOS battery dies (think I got that right) it has to ping the server to update the time. If it can't do this the game won't boot. Same on PS4. This isn't a near future thing but eventually Sony are going to render physical games unplayable if they take the PS3 servers down. This isn't the same as the store going away but unless you're opening up consoles and putting new batteries in, eventually your physical games will be useless as well.

Thanks Sony.

[fuse]

Unconfirmed yes, but inevitable - whether it's months from now, or years. I do have plenty of digital titles even though I've tried to keep physicals wherever I can, but even if I didn't I'm not so blinkered to think that this doesn't suck.

I am already seeing lots of community effort fire up on the back of the rumour to curate lists of exclusives and things that'll fall by the wayside, and some of it is pretty shocking. One that's really blowing my mind is House of the Dead 4 - only ever ported to the PS3, digital only in all territories, and from what I've heard, even the original (Lindbergh) arcade hardware is prone to having graphics card errors over time.

[briareos_kerensky]

Not to mention patches...if the HDD dies and there's no way to recover the data, how many games without day-one patches will be left nigh-unplayable?
The only way would be to mod the console and inject patch data through that, if even possible.

[Cassius_Smoke]

This is going to be a lot of games that vanish forever.

[hudson]

It would be nice if you could access your games on PS Now without a subscription.

[Neon Ignition]

This is going to be the big one down the line:

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[speedlolita]

Probably have to fall back on shady means to keep your console usable. Bit crap.

[fishbowlhead]

Can’t you just replace the cmos battery?

[Asura]

Can’t you just replace the cmos battery?

I think so, but it's not like the Saturn; they're not designed to be replaced by a user.