Physical Media - A Slight Return
Whilst I’ve written about my fondness for physical media already, the recent announcement by Sony that it was ending the production of physical PlayStation games from 2028 lit a fire up the internet’s metaphorical rear-end and I think I need to talk about it again.
This announcement from Sony coincided with the news that they were removing around 500 movies from the collections of PlayStation users who bought StudioCanal movies like Terminator 2 through the PlayStation Store, hot on the heels of its decision to remove Discovery content from the same users in 2023.
Oh, while we are at it, they also said they’re turning off the PlayStation store for PS3 and Vita, erasing the content still tied to those platforms in the process.
Games
Whilst I’m not too surprised to see the end of physical games on PlayStation, I fear this has largely been the result of three big problems in the industry.
- Games broken at launch - Sure, you can buy the blu-ray with the game on, but you will likely be faced with a download just as big as the data stored on the disc, because it was rushed to print with the intention of fixing it later. You effectively buy a disc with a closed beta on it.
- Bloated games - Considering ‘AAA’ titles like Call of Duty are more vapid than they have ever been, pray tell why it requires a 280GB download when they have just been repackaging Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 1 (the first time around from 2007, I know they’ve been recycling names too) for about a decade. That arrived on a single DVD. Not a blu-ray, a DVD. Nintendo has shown that it can be done. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild weighs in at around 15GB for the Switch 2 edition…and that’s a whole open world stuffed with dynamic physics-based systems.
- DRM - Sure, you can have the DVD or blu-ray, but when they turn the activation server off for commercial reasons, it becomes a coaster.
I think the games industry is emblematic not just of the irresponsibility of corporations as stewards of our culture, but of corporations and their ability to take good ideas and ruin them.
I’m hesitant to mourn the loss of physical games without first mourning the loss of an ecosystem where completed titles could be committed to physical media and allowed to stand the test of time. Many of the titles releasing today, particularly on PlayStation and Xbox aren’t worth the plastic they would be burned onto anyway.
The best games these days are being made by small teams, largely on a shoestring budget and with more heart than Microsoft’s rapidly depleting headcount could muster. Buy them from your chosen PC store-front, preferably on Linux and give your money to people who actually care about what they are making.
Movies and Music
I feel differently about physical media for movies and music. These usually arrive complete and anything released since the advent of DVD for movies or CD for music is going to hold up pretty well in terms of audio or visual quality.
We should all be buying these. VHS continues to hold a special place in my heart, but cassette not so much, but if they work for you, great. Whatever your choice of format, hold onto that stuff, because it will never, ever charge you rent or disappear from your library.
If corporations or platforms are not going to preserve the things we hold dear, it is up to us to do what they won’t.
Whilst I have your attention, you should read my Mastodon friend Jake’s recent post on physical media too.
