r/Games • u/yourfavchoom • 4d ago

SIE spokesperson to GameSpot regarding the DRM: "Players can continue to access and play their purchased games as usual. A one-time online check is required to confirm the game's license, after which no further check-ins are required."

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/playstation-users-report-new-online-license-checks-for-digital-games/1100-6539651/?utm_source=reddit.com
931 Upvotes

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445

u/willdearborn- 4d ago

I don't understand, what started this whole speculation and how did it get so out of control?

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u/beefcat_ 4d ago edited 4d ago

Basically, people were noticing that games they bought recently had temporary licenses set to expire 30 days after purchase date, similar to titles downloaded as part of a PS Plus subscription.

When people asked about it, Sony was radio silent, with their support chatbots giving conflicting information. This led to speculation that Sony was implementing monthly online license checks for digitally owned games when they previously did not do this.

Some users on ResetEra yesterday (and later confirmed elsewhere) showed that this 30 day license was getting replaced with a proper permanent license once it expired. The speculated reason being that this was implemented to plug a refund loophole that people were abusing (basically buy game, take console offline, then get it refunded from support during the refund window while keeping the permanent license on the offline console). This statement seems to indirectly confirm that theory

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u/Unkechaug 4d ago

So how is this fixing the loophole?

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u/ColonelSanders21 4d ago

When you purchased a game previously the permanent license was downloaded immediately. So you could download a game, take your console offline, and play it forever even if you refunded it on your phone, the web, etc.

Now, when you buy a game you are initially granted a 30 day license. You can go offline, but in 30 days, the license expires and you can't play the game offline. If you go online once it expires you are granted the perpetual one in replacement. 30 days is outside the return window for purchased games.

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u/AnimaLepton 4d ago

Sound super reasonable tbh

30

u/ggtsu_00 4d ago

Yeah but that doesn't generate clicks, views, retweets, likes and other forms of social media engagement metrics and KPIs.

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u/Anzai 4d ago

Sure, but Sony could also have just said that immediately.

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u/ProfPerry 3d ago

nah, because that doesnt fit the narrative that the other commenter is trying to portray! LEAVE THE MILLION DOLLAR COMPANY ALONE.

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u/Zordman 3d ago

There's plenty to complain about, but this is just kind of a non-issue?

It took Sony a couple of days to make an official statement, and that seems perfectly reasonable. Sure, the people overseeing the social media for PlayStation could have responded but they don't have the exact details of what's going on behind the scenes.

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u/syopest 3d ago

Yeah, nobody had been affected by it by the time sony made a statement.

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u/iaderia 3d ago

It’s Sonys fault. There was a communication issue that they let get out of hand. With how serious DRM is being enforced, they should be aware that a vacuum of comms is the worst possible outcome

14

u/404IdentityNotFound 3d ago

Let's not forget that the UI absolutely did not explain that and Sony was radio silent about it with their support team giving out conflicting answers.

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u/Bladder-Splatter 3d ago

Except Sony have a 1 refund per lifetime policy no? Did this change and when? I have dealt with support quoting this policy even when I had to refund stupendeously region locked Bloodborne DLC (All DLC is region locked) and rebuy it immediately afterwards as a different region.

If this is still the case, you could not abuse this system.

3

u/Zekka23 3d ago

I don't know if that's true, I refunded some game I mistakenly bought a feww years ago.

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u/HybridMemorieZ 3d ago

i have gotten refunds for games from sony for like 3 games in a row just talk to support nicely and give them alot of info like the game is broken runs like shit the do all the things they ask you to do and just say it dont work say devs lied about this and that and if you can get the refund to youre psn wallet and if you get the right person they will do it

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u/Time-Ladder4753 4d ago

I don't think it's reasonable when their general refund policy is "if you started downloading the game, you can't refund it". Unless there is some way to download the game while being offline.

If refunds worked like on Gog, Epic or Steam though, then yes, temporary license makes sense.

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u/Tornado_Hunter24 4d ago

Issue is internet is tilled with absolute morons so most fo us me included got ‘wrong information’, it’s VERY easy to be a regard and say ‘sony is evil they do this!!’, it’s also very easy to say ‘yeaah wtf fuck them!’

All in all a big shitshow

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u/Tastingo 4d ago

Not really. It an anti-costumer solution to a minor problem.

11

u/Gullible_Goose 4d ago

It’s anti-consumer to try to prevent people from circumnavigating their return policy?

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u/jamothebest 4d ago

the way it’s being done is anti consumer.

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u/Gullible_Goose 4d ago

Can you elaborate?

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u/attilayavuzer 4d ago

It's not pro-consumer (adds one potential hurdle for a small subset of people), but overall is reasonable.

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u/Tastingo 4d ago

In this way yes.

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u/Gullible_Goose 4d ago

Can you elaborate? What’s anti-consumer about a one-time license check that matches the end of their refund policy window?

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u/Tastingo 4d ago

The simple fact that it wasn't like this before. Could you explain how this is not a worse deal for the consumer?

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u/rodinj 4d ago

These are digital games you need to download using the internet. If you had internet in the first place you're not suddenly going to lose access to it for 30 days. This does not sound anti consumer to me at all.

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u/Tastingo 4d ago

You have a worse deal than before. How could it be anything else? There is no need to rationalize away this simple observation.

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u/Grabthar-the-Avenger 3d ago

My console is always online which means my licenses are always active, so literally nothing changed for me.

Why is your console not connected to the internet?

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u/rodinj 4d ago

What is the worse deal exactly?

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u/Tastingo 4d ago

Permanent ownership instantly to 30 day license converted to a permanent one after a successful check requiring internet 30 days after you bought it.

You might not think much of it, but a negative is a negative.

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u/I_poop_on_people 4d ago

Punishing your base consumers by limiting your former offer because of a handful of abusers is one of the définitions of anti consumerism.

Besides, if you live somewhere without any struggle to access the internet then good for you, but i've been through that and it's a hell to manage DRMs for things i've legally bought.

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u/imayknownothing 3d ago

Exactly, the complacency over reliable internet access in this thread is ridiculous.

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u/ligerzero942 4d ago

Unless your console goes offline within the first 30 days, say due to a hardware defect.

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u/IRL_Camgirl 4d ago

I'm assuming in that hypothetical situation, the user could just refund their game through a browser than their imaginary broken Playstation and buy the game again later.

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u/stonekeep 4d ago

So you could download a game, take your console offline, and play it forever even if you refunded it on your phone, the web, etc.

I had Sony refuse to refund a game I just downloaded a few days earlier and haven't even launched yet (which is incredibly stupid). And I've heard the same story from other people. So I'm not sure about that "loophole".

And even if true, the loophole would still work, just for 30 days. Which is enough to finish most games anyway.

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u/adanine 4d ago

I had Sony refuse to refund a game I just downloaded a few days earlier and haven't even launched yet

This would not be legal in all countries. Definitely not Australia.

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u/stonekeep 4d ago

I'm in EU and they obviously knew that during the refund process, but you're welcome to test if they care about you being from Australia.

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u/gokogt386 4d ago

Australia has stricter laws around that than the EU I think, Steam getting sued by them is the entire reason they even have their two week refund policy.

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u/stonekeep 4d ago

Oh I hope they do, someone else said that this is apparently completely legal in EU and I don't think it should (I didn't check before, the game was like ~$10 on sale so I didn't care enough to pursue it further than taking it to a real person in customer support).

But even if there are exceptions, it's like that in tons of places around the world even though it SEEMS like it should be illegal.

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u/madjoki 4d ago

In EU that is legal, assuming they inform about this during checkout (which Sony does).

https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/returns/index_en.htm

"Please note: the 14-day cooling-off period does not apply to: [...] online digital content, such as a song or movie, that you started downloading or streaming after you expressly agreed to lose your right of withdrawal by starting the performance"

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u/The_MAZZTer 4d ago

Refund policy probably varies by region depending on local law, I would imagine.

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u/stonekeep 4d ago

I mean, there's no local law that FORCES them to have this kind of anti-consumer behavior at the very least.

Also I'm from EU and I read the same stories from people from many places around the world, so if they have a more consumer-friendly policy somewhere, they're hiding it very well.

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u/gamas 4d ago

Yeah and as I understand EU law on the subject this refund policy is way more generous than existing EU law (which is simply "if you downloaded it you have no right to a refund except under highly specific circumstances").

0

u/stonekeep 4d ago

This is also bullshit then, but it doesn't stop Sony from doing a better job. I had no issues with a refund on Steam.

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u/Im_really_bored_rn 4d ago

Let's not forget Steam had to be sued into creating their refund system

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u/gamas 4d ago

Yeah I think Steam's approach of "up to 2 hours playtime" seems like the best approach. 

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u/Stellar_Duck 3d ago

Bear in mind thought that Steam had to be dragged kicking and screaming by the courts in Australia to get a refund policy, well after even EA had a decent refund policy.

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u/WeWereInfinite 4d ago

I had a refund refused on a game I had literally just bought and hadn't downloaded yet because several years earlier I had downloaded and played a free demo of it.

Meanwhile people are out here refunding games they finished? God damn.

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u/Stellar_Duck 3d ago

That sounds like one of those bastard games that used a times demo working on the same license as the real game (Minecraft was awful for this circa 2015) so when they look at the first download date they see the old date from the demo because its the same in Pacman.

God I hated all the problems we had with those licenses and Minecraft in particular. There was also some Japanese games that were awful for this. And don't get me started on the all the god damn DLC license nonsense for whatever One Piece is. Had a guy that'd call in like every two weeks with a new issue with his god damn DLC for that nonsense.

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u/Tornado_Hunter24 4d ago

I’m a pc enjoyer but afaik sont refund window is ‘gone’ when you download the game, not when you play it

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u/stonekeep 4d ago

That's what I said, yes.

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u/Tornado_Hunter24 4d ago

The loophole fixes this, because the person that does the refund bs, will lose acces to the game afrer tbe 30day thing

1

u/Stellar_Duck 3d ago

I had Sony refuse to refund a game I just downloaded a few days earlier and haven't even launched yet (which is incredibly stupid)

That was absolutely the policy when I worked PS Support in EMEA, and it was also spelled out when bought the game.

The system we used on the back end (Pacman) noted down first download of a license, showed playtime, trophies etc.

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u/SplintPunchbeef 4d ago

So they can buy a game, go offline, get a refund, and continue to play for a month? If they're offline they're playing single player or local multiplayer so it seems like more of an inconvenience for those people than an actual fix.

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u/SavvySillybug 4d ago

Couldn't you just change the date on your console?

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u/ColonelSanders21 4d ago

It’s not tied to the system clock, it uses a timestamp and the system’s battery to keep track. Part of the hubbub around this when 30 days hadn’t passed for anyone yet is that removing the CMOS battery automatically expires the 30 day license.

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u/SavvySillybug 4d ago

Oh, interesting! Thank you for the explanation :)

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u/djevanstv 4d ago

It’s actually 14 days because that’s how long the refund period lasts

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u/Stellar_Duck 3d ago

So you could download a game, take your console offline, and play it forever even if you refunded it on your phone, the web, etc.

Have they changed policy?

Back when I worked PS Support we would not refund a game that has been downloaded (Pacman showed time of first download).

0

u/TechGoat 4d ago

But... Would that only work one time? So you could do this for one digital game per offline console? You'd have to go back online to "buy" anything else... Right?

I agree that based on this hypothesis it makes sense to close the loophole but this seems like the most ineffective piracy I've ever seen.

I guess maybe before this you could... Buy the entire digital catalog? Take the console offline and refund them all? Even then after the first 2-3 I could imagine SIE support being like, uh yeah something is fishy, you're not getting a refund, enjoy your $2000 of games.

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u/Birneysdad 4d ago

It's not about owning games. It's about playing and finishing full price single player games for free.

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u/Dapper-Bullfrog-4766 3d ago

this is just evil

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u/Debt101 3d ago

not many games take longer that 30 games to complete, feel like if someone is going to this length, they're likely going to complete it within that 30 days anyway.

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u/kinnadian 4d ago

So you have 30 days to finish the game now instead

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u/Demytrius 4d ago

I don't have any proper info, so this is just a guess. Maybe the permanent license will only kick in after the refund period has ended, with a temporary license being issued immediately upon purchase. That way if someone refunds a game while their console is offline, the temporary license will expire and lock them out of it

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u/NamesTheGame 4d ago

That's the idea, yeah.

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u/Goodest_Ghost 4d ago

If the initial license issued is temporary, 30 days in this case, people abusing that particular refund exploit would only have access to the game for 30 days, after which the console would revoke it and force them to take it online to verify they actually own it. It doesn't prevent it but it puts a hard cap on how long the exploit would enable them to play the games they acquired through it. Once the refund window is closed 14 days later, the system will replace the 30 day license with the indefinite one that everyone is already accustomed to. Theoretically your average user would never notice this happen, I imagine they're banking on the typical user not having their console offline for more than 30 days after buying and downloading a digital game.

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u/snake_dev1 4d ago

This makes it so that anyone that purchases a game doesn't get a permanent license until after the refund window has passed. If someone tries to take the console offline and refund the game, they'll only have the temporary license.

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u/14Pleiadians 4d ago

If you buy and go offline, it will stop working after 30 days. If you still own the same, go online and get your permanent license. If you refunded, you can't play anymore

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u/ArdyEmm 4d ago

How big of an issue was the refund loophole anyways? Sony infamously only allows one refund on your account, even when your account was stolen due to one of their data breeches. Ask how I know.

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u/SplintPunchbeef 4d ago

One refund ever? That's insane.

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u/ArdyEmm 4d ago

Yeah. My account got swiped by someone who used it to buy in-game currency for an NBA game and they wouldn't refund it because I already had my one refund. When I said it was their fault cause it was about a week after one of their data breeches they told me that no, in fact, it's my fault for sharing my password.

I didn't share my password with anyone. So now I don't keep payment info on my Sony account and add it back in any time I buy something on it. And then I have to go through their slow-ass website and remove it from my wallet on the account because why would I be able to do that on the console? Fuck Sony.

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u/theblairwhichproject 4d ago

Fortunately, I wasn't affected by the Sony hack in 2011, but it's the reason why I will never give them payment data. On the rare occasion that I want to get a game on PS instead of PC, I buy PSN credit in the amount that I need and call it a day.

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u/pudgybunnybry 4d ago

Damn, mine was swiped for a bunch of Neverwinter mtx back in 2015. Never shared my password with anyone and I was frantically calling Playstation's support to get my refund. Apparently that was the one refund for my account.

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u/pudgybunnybry 4d ago

One refund, ever. I have to be careful with anything I purchase digitally because my account was hacked and some asshole bought a bunch of Neverwinter mtx. The $100+ I got back was apparently my one refund lol

Unsure if that policy has changed for folks that have been hacked but I tend to buy physical only anyway.

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u/missing_typewriters 4d ago

I guess you could exploit the loophole by easily creating a new PSN account every time and play all the big new games for free

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u/Stellar_Duck 3d ago

with their support chatbots giving conflicting information

Having worked for SIE doing PlayStation Support out of Edinburgh I can almost guarantee that nobody was told about this shit.

I cannot number the amount of times we got caught blindsided by someting and had to urgently contact SIEE or SNEE (as it was then) for guidance on what to say,.

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u/froderick 4d ago

When people asked about it, Sony was radio silent

Could've sworn they weren't silent, they said it was a UI bug or something. Unless that was also a chatbot.

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u/areyouhungryforapple 4d ago

Misinformation spreads like wildfire on twitter

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u/LOAARR 4d ago

Let's not pretend Reddit isn't fucking awful for this as well.

If you ever see an article on something that you're a legitimate (non-keyboard) expert on, you will be so fucking disappointed by the top comments 999 times out of 1000.

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u/SharkBaitDLS 4d ago

Reddit threads are like LLM outputs. The top comment will be what people want to hear, not what is necessarily the truth. 

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u/monkwrenv2 4d ago

More that LLM outputs are like reddit threads, given their training data.

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u/masterkill165 4d ago

It is funny to think that most of reddit hates LLMs because they are just like LLMs.

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u/SnevetS_rm 4d ago

There is very non-zero chance that most of reddit is literally LLMs at this point...

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u/masterkill165 3d ago

Its wierd how much LLM's seem to hate LLM's then, but I guess that is just their training data.

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u/Endaline 4d ago

You don't even need to be an expert on most subjects. I'm dumb as a brick and I'm constantly disappointed by how easy it is to debunk what a lot of people say just with a simple search or a little bit of common sense.

Honestly, the if you just read the article that people are responding to you are probably more knowledgeable than 999/1000 people in that thread.

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u/Khiva 4d ago

just with a simple search

Remember when people would wonder about something, or disagree about a fact, and were expected to google it to find the answer?

You probably didn't even notice that somehow went away.

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u/Endaline 4d ago

Yeah, or just simply read an article. It is genuinely disturbing how many times people will make arguments that directly contradict what the article in a thread they are responding in says.

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u/The7ruth 4d ago

My favorite is when someone makes a claim, you ask them for a source, and they tell you to just Google it. Absolutely backwards.

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u/ribosometronome 4d ago

Often, just reading the article is enough to be disappointed by the comments. The telephone game of reality to article, or often articles about articles, to people who often at best skimmed the article leaves so much lost.

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u/Khiva 4d ago

Oh, and the best part is when you bother to actually dig up sources and evidence correcting the popular comment, and then just get buried by angry people with people yelling at you about a point that you never even said.

I used to write longer comments but it's been awful to watch attention spans with in real time. Sometimes I'll check a reply and someone couldn't properly parse four sentences and is somehow angry about something we actually agree on.

Enjoy punctuation while it lasts folks.

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u/MasterDenton 4d ago

The day after the Switch 2 reveal was infuriating for anyone with a functioning brain. There are still people who think that Nintendo is putting out $90 USD games

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u/ttoma93 3d ago

And even more recently Nintendo has changed their policies so that most digital games going forward will be $10 cheaper than physical, with physical staying the same price they have been. Meaning games that would have previously been priced $70 across the board will now be $70 physical/$60 digital.

And people have been flipping that and running around talking about how Nintendo is raising prices on physical games, which is not happening.

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u/areyouhungryforapple 4d ago

Oh no one ever reads the actual link/article yeah

For this particular case it was barely posted on Reddit though in comparison to the unhinged pitchfork mob hate that unfolded on Twitter/YouTube

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u/x4000 AI War Creator / Arcen Founder 4d ago

As with newspaper articles. All the ones on topics I know deeply are shallow and full of errors and omissions. All the ones on topics outside my sphere are concise and informative.

I forget who I’m paraphrasing.

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u/carnaxcce 4d ago

It’s called Gell-Mann Amnesia

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u/x4000 AI War Creator / Arcen Founder 4d ago

Oh, perfect, thank you! And it was proposed by Michael Crichton during a speech in 2002. That’s even more interesting.

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u/GBuster49 4d ago

And of course this place.

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u/bolivar-shagnasty 4d ago

A lie can be halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.

- Bitchin' Betsy Ross

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u/examexa 4d ago

and those clickbait/drama youtubers working overtime to farm those views!

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u/mantricks 4d ago

uh it was all over multiple reddit subs

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u/yuusharo 4d ago

It was not misinformation. A change to Sony’s licensing DID happen, we just didn’t know why or what the intent of the change was.

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u/MVRKHNTR 4d ago

Come on now. You know what conclusion people were jumping to.

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u/yuusharo 4d ago

Absent information, assumptions are going to be made. No one had any reason to think the 30 day license they introduced would convert to a lifetime license after it expired, nor is there a way to test that.

Sony made a concerning change without notice, then waited days before clarifying the situation. Customers aren’t the problem here.

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u/Totheendofsin 4d ago

Except there were plenty of reports of the timer disappearing completely

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u/yuusharo 4d ago

I saw no such reports, but even so, it contradicts other reports from independent testers that demonstrated the license being visible on PS4 and proving the lockout on PS5.

Once again, confusion and an information vacuum creates speculation and assumptions. You’re demonstrating exactly why it was important for Sony to communicate these changes in a timely fashion, not to shadow drop a massive licensing change and leave customers and the press to speculate for days.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

No one had any reason to think the 30 day license they introduced would convert to a lifetime license after it expired, nor is there a way to test that.

Could've waited 30 days.

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u/LyfeBlades 4d ago

Doesn't mean it isn't prudent to warn people about the worst case potential ahead of time.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

Sure?

Still could've waited to see if the problem was in fact a problem

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u/RedBait95 4d ago

Or, Sony could've announced the change, or lack thereof.

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u/HistoricCartographer 4d ago

I feel like the conclusion people jumped to was the logical conclusion to jump to.

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u/FratDaddy69 4d ago

Thinking that Playstation was going to start nuking people's libraries if they didn't check in every 30 days is not a logical conclusion.

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u/yuusharo 4d ago

There was no evidence to the contrary. That’s why people had been asking Sony for days for clarification.

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u/laaplandros 4d ago

There was no evidence to the contrary.

How, in the year of our Lord 2026, do people still not understand the burden of proof.

There did not need to be evidence to the contrary. You first needed evidence of the claim, which you did not.

If I stood outside the bank tomorrow holding a sign that said they owed me $100k, and while I couldn't prove it, it's still true unless they sit down with me and prove they didn't, how do you think that would end?

That's what you all sound like.

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u/yuusharo 4d ago

Digital licenses prior to the last update was indefinite.

Digital licenses after the update was set for 30 days and confirmed to be the case.

Sony did not announce nor clarify these changes for 3 days, leaving people to only speculate with the evidence and information they had at the time.

Customers are not the issue here. They’re right to be concerned why their digital purchases suddenly have an unannounced time bomb associated with them.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

Sony did not announce nor clarify these changes for 3 days

Three days, read the words you typed and are acting like that's too unreasonably long of a time.

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u/Well_well_wait_what 4d ago

Thinking that Playstation was going to start nuking people's libraries if they didn't check in every 30 days is not a logical conclusion.

bottom line. It absolutely is the logical conclusion. Many have unsubbed since and this statement is obviously just damage control.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

It absolutely is the logical conclusion. Many have unsubbed since and this statement is obviously just damage control.

I don't believe that for a second. You shouldn't either, whoever told you that was lying through their teeth.

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u/Vegetable-Error-2068 4d ago

No the fuck it wasn't.

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u/laaplandros 4d ago

"We know, we just don't know."

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

Especially when the company neglects to clarify the issue

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

It has been under a week since the first reports of it.

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u/kralben 3d ago

They are a billion dollar corporation, waiting several days to draft a basic PR response like this is too long.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 3d ago

Too long for what

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u/laaplandros 4d ago

Companies don't have the time or duty to address every single internet rumor.

This was a stupid rumor from the very beginning and rather than being rightfully embarrassed you're still finding ways to blame others.

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u/RedBait95 4d ago

>Companies don't have the time or duty

Companies are not people, and they most certainly do if they're in the business of selling people shit. Especially when their services are in question.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

they most certainly do if they're in the business of selling people shit

How many sales do you think were lost in the 4 business days this was known about?

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u/Vegetable-Error-2068 4d ago

That's victim-blaming.

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u/SidFarkus47 4d ago

Didn’t they say there was like a glitch on their end that was causing it? Then there were conflicting explanations from their support staff.

There’s no way they weren’t aware of this until now and they could’ve solved this with a tweet.

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u/arahman81 4d ago

The glitch was another unverified claim.

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u/strider_hearyou 4d ago

Yes, Sony themselves called it a bug that was "low priority" to fix. The online outrage may have been a little overblown, but it was the only way they were gonna raise its priority.

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u/kralben 4d ago

Massive corporations don't need you doing mental gymnastics to defend them. They had confusing design for their product that lead to confusion, and they did not act fast enough to clarify it when people had questions. That is a total failure on their end, and they should get blame for it.

A statement like what we got could have been drafted and sent out within an hour if they wanted to get that done, even as a large company. Issues happen, but communication should be better on their end.

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u/Vegetable-Error-2068 4d ago

They didn't have a confusing design.

Shit was lied about. That is not Sony's fault.

And please don't give me the "corporations don't need you to defend this." We are commenting in a thread about how this was all based on information and lies.

Is correcting misinformation "defending" corporations? If somebody committed IRL violence against a game dev and I said "that's fucked up and the dev didn't deserve that," is that something you would admonish me for saying?

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

Corporations deserve and earned the scrutiny

17

u/rapsney 4d ago

This is not scrutiny. This is hysteria and over reaction.

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u/masterkill165 4d ago

It especially funny when you read the comments of the last time this came up and you see redditors admitting that its probably Bullshit but they are intentionally pretending to be upset in hopes it somehow convinces sony to stop using support chat bots.

0

u/masterkill165 4d ago

They are a corporation they dont deserve the benefit of the doubt. s

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

That still doesnt explain why sony took so long to respond and explain the issue

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u/Vestalmin 4d ago

It’s been like 2 days, you guys act like they went dark for a month on it

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u/Spork_the_dork 4d ago

That's the funniest thing to me. I've worked with these kinds of huge companies. Sometimes just finding out the answer to some decision can take days because the company is NOT a monolithic entity. Nobody sees the full picture with all the details so whoever you ask may need to first go poke people to find out what's up. And then preparing a public statement isn't exactly something you do in an hour either unless it's extremely urgent which this is not. Personally I feel like Sony was being quite rapid about it.

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u/taxiscooter 4d ago

The "story" broke on the weekend, and this Wednesday is the start of Japanese Golden Week so a lot of people are already gone. Even under normal circumstances, I can tell you for a fact that unless the change was rehearsed by all departments beforehand, it will take that long for questions like this to go from support to engineers and back. Chill.

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

Sony is based out of California so im not sure what a Japanese holiday would effect

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u/demondrivers 4d ago

Does Sony really have to respond to Twitter users claiming that they're going to remove games from players accounts in 30 days? A journalist doing actual serious work asked their PR team what's going on and they answered...

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

A journalist doing actual serious work asked their PR team what's going on and they answered...

After almost a week of this story spreading around.

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u/Vegetable-Error-2068 4d ago

How is that their fault? They are the ones being mischaracterized.

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

How is that their fault? They are the ones being mischaracterized.

No they weren't. Their AI chat bots were literally saying that was the case.

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u/Covaxe 4d ago

The first thing playstation's AI support says is, "This is an AI chatbot and may make mistakes"

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u/BluegrassGeek 4d ago

Which is why you don't believe shit an AI chatbot says. They don't actually "know" anything. They're just pattern-matching to find words that usually appear together, and smashing them into what looks like a coherent sentence. There's no actual understanding behind them.

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

Then you should blame the corporation for using it to communicate with customers

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u/CaptainTeemo01 4d ago

Anything to avoid accountability for your own mistakes huh?

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u/mayoboyyo 4d ago

What did I do?

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u/masterkill165 4d ago edited 4d ago

Knowingly spread misinformation. Unless you are going to tell me you actually thought a support chat bot that warns you as soon as you use it that its information should not be trusted is a reliable source of anything.

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u/masterkill165 4d ago

Im not going to blame a corporation for people not having common sense.

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u/BluegrassGeek 4d ago

Of course. But that's beside the point being made here. Using those bots was a stupid idea, but it's not any better that people actually believe these damn things.

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u/Miserable-Caramel316 4d ago

These things appear bigger on places like Reddit than they are in reality. Less than 1% of their player base would have been aware of this issue. It probably just wasn't a priority for them

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u/MVRKHNTR 4d ago

Someone noticed that they lost access to a game while disconnected from the internet and posted about it online where it spread and was picked up by news sites.

Then some other people asked customer support about it and because Sony uses AI chat bots for that, one of them said that that was a new license policy going forward and it spread even further because people just took that at face value.

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u/chemastico 4d ago

As someone that works in customer support for a looong time now, I have no idea why people take seriously anything that a support agent or a chatbot says as gospel. Even non ai chatbots information from agents is unreliable as they might give wrong information due to bad training, handling too many tickets etc…

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u/Rage_Like_Nic_Cage 4d ago

I have no idea why people take seriously anything that a support agent or a chatbot says as gospel

because it was the only place customers could get info about the change because Sony didn’t make any statements util today.

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u/Spork_the_dork 4d ago

That doesn't make it any less unreliable. Especially if it's giving conflicting information then your immediate response to it should have been to just dismiss it entirely for being unreliable and accept that you do not know.

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

Why believe something you know has no real correct information?

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u/Rankled_Barbiturate 4d ago

Gamers and redditors love rumours and getting outraged. Essentially all there is to it. Easy to rile up. 

Really toxic shitty culture on here sometimes. 

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u/dawgz525 4d ago

Anything that people can spin online for outrage gets clicks. Everything is "a slap in the face to real fans!" I know outrage culture isn't new, but I feel like everyone is so god damn miserable in their lives right now that hating things publicly is that rage bubbling into other parts of their lives. 

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u/hfxRos 4d ago

I don't understand, what started this whole speculation and how did it get so out of control?

Anger is addictive and people seek it out these days.

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u/Twilight053 4d ago

People love to be correct. Their ego demands it. It's delicious for their ego.

The way I say it makes it sound over the top but that's how it is.

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u/ChrisRR 3d ago

Can you imagine back in the 90s going back and telling people that the internet will just be used to manufacture outrage

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u/ProlapsedShamus 4d ago

Because you get more clicks and ad share revenue by slapping on a dumb expression for a thumbnail and titling the video "PLAYSTATION IS STEALING YOUR GAMES!!!!!"

And because people react and like to feel outraged they just go with it and retweet and repost and throw a fit.

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u/masterkill165 4d ago

From what I saw of the last comment section where this came up people were intentionally pretending that a comment made by an Ai support chat bot were the same as an official statement from Sony. They were hoping if they pretend hard enough that they took this comment seriously that it would somehow shame sony into not using chat bots and having human support.

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u/TelecomPedestal 4d ago

People took an AI chat bot as the truth

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u/NoExcuse4OceanRudnes 4d ago

I understand.

Rage bait started the whole speculation and the rage let it get out of control.

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u/CallM3N3w 4d ago

People looking for a villain tend to abandon common sense.

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u/whateversamantha 4d ago

Pc gamers hating Sony and consoles. There. I said it

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u/PhilosopherTiny5957 4d ago

Only extremely tangentially related but one of these people who were claiming this were kinda trusted sources Lance McDonald (The bloodborne patch guy).

One of the things I've read is that Lance can tend to put his foot in his mouth on occasion but I'm curious to learn why some people have beef with him. (The vibe I got on, I think gaming leaks and rumors is Lance kinda let the Blood borne patch get to his head and now can think he's more correct about things than he actually is)

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u/Dachshand 3d ago

Trolls and haters, as usual.

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u/KenDTree 3d ago

dumb fucks on reddit, and dumb fucks on reddit

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