Ventillation over PSN...Part 2

Okay, my last blog post was on April 29th, 2011.  That was 3 days before I went on a cruise for vacation.  In the time I was gone, I had high hopes that PSN would be restored when I returned.  However, upon my return after a week away, that PSN was still down.  As I was thinking on the whole PSN outage, I got to thinking a little outside the box.

All of us gamers are asking, "When will PSN be back up?" or "What is Sony going to give us for our troubles?". But to be fair, without vendors making software for the PS3 (or utilizing PSN services), what good is PSN?  Think about it from a business aspect.  Business are in a certain market for a reason.  Companies make video games because we buy the video games to play.  These games and software don't just fall out of the sky.  Real time and real money has to be invested into this software in order to make it something we will want to play.

So how are these companies losing out?  Easy.  Once a game is released, it is common that the public release is just the first stage in a game's life cycle.  A lot of companies then role out DLC (Downloadable Content) for player's to purchase and enjoy.  The rollout of this DLC content is solely dependent upon services like PSN or Xbox Live.  If those platforms go away, so does the access and availability of that content.

On another side of the plate, say a game company makes a game that heavily relies on online multiplayer experiences.  That online aspect is lost when it's host service is disrupted.  So why would someone buy a game on a system that would rely upon an online experience that isn't currently available?  After all, we all want what we want, and we want it now; right?  Especially since households having multiple consoles are so popular now.  You may say: "Well, regardless of the platform I buy a game for, I'm still buying it.  The still get money right?"

Sure, that's a correct statement.  However, back to basic Business 101: "Provide in the market where the demand is."  High sales go towards one particular platform, guess which platform gets better support for that title...The one that made them money.  So not only does this whole PSN fiasco trouble us as gamers.  It screws the game makers as well.  If game makers are losing money on a game, label, or brand they have invested millions of dollars on in hopes to make back that money plus some.  Guess who gets the bad end of the stick now?  We do.  The price of games go up.

So when you're trolling the Playstation Blog please try to keep it in mind that Sony had better be busting a$$ to get PSN back up.  I'll be the first to say they haven't been as "transparent" as they should have been.  But at least their are trying to be honest.  Today's post basically reads:

"I know you all want to know exactly when the services will be restored. At this time, I can’t give you an exact date, as it will likely be at least a few more days. We’re terribly sorry for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience as we work through this process."


Is it good for their business?  Nope.  Is there anything we can do about it...Nope.  But, it is what it is.


On another note, Sony is saying that we will have a choice of 2 games from a list of 5 games (that's not that bad, as I am fairly new to the PS3 and probably can find 2 games on the list I haven't played yet).  They are also offering a year of credit/identity monitoring, supposedly offering a free month of PS+ access, and offering a free period of the newly launched music streaming services.  So don't worry fellow PS3'ers, Sony has heard your cries as well.


Now it's unfortunately a waiting game.  Sony is still touting that the service should be back up in a few more days.  But it feels like all along they have been saying: "Just a couple more days."  It'll be interesting to see how the general public handles this in the long run, and don't 
be surprised of any changes that they may make to PSN in the meantime...


Happy Surfing!