IGN has reported that Xbox’s approach to transitioning from physical to digital games is superior to PlayStation’s. The report details plans to let owners digitize their disc-based games so they can be played on PC, handhelds, and next-generation hardware.
On 5ch, some praised Microsoft’s emphasis on backward compatibility, while the discussion expanded to touch on the Sony acquisition lawsuit and advertising contract disputes.
Xbox is handling the shift from physical to digital far better than PlayStation.
A little respect for users goes a long way toward building real trust.
Xbox has announced plans to let players digitize the packaged games they already own, making them playable across a range of devices — PC, handheld gaming devices, and even (likely) the next-generation PC/console hybrid “Project Helix.”
Source: jp.ign.com / Original article here
Sounds like Shitty Sony (クソニー, a common insulting nickname for Sony) never did that at all
I'd guess it's because we're in the Blu-ray era now — can't the company that made the Blu-ray standard do something like this too?
I was sure it'd be another acrobatic defense of PlayStation
That's just a fancy way of saying 'Sony can't afford the ad budget'
The UMD Passport wasn't a license transfer though — it just let you buy digital versions of supported titles at a discount. Similar, but not really the same thing
Retailers stopped carrying Xbox software, so there's no point releasing discs anyway
Well this gen, even if they did release it, it'd be XSX-exclusive anyway
They're not gonna bother unless it's something big
It's not a Japan-only service, you know
Funny how you people always go on about 'the whole world' until it's convenient to make it just about Japan
Also, it's not that retailers stopped carrying it — it's a Sony block
Part of a lawsuit settlement contract that excludes Xbox from advertising
Ignoring that and just condemning them for it is pretty gross
What are you even talking about — getting criticized isn't the same as being 'condemned'
Though it probably won't sell
Counter-move: let people buy and sell those paper packages too (valid for 170 days)
Just how hated are MS and Xbox around the world
Isn't it just that those things have no value, hence the crushing defeat?
That wheelchair basketball game (a specific title) was hyped up like a god before release
Didn't even crack the weekly top 30, confirmed under 1,800 copies sold
And yet something like that was sitting at around #6 on the eShop — wild
Impressive that they can even put out experimental stuff like that
Building up tech know-how and reusing it is exactly the kind of strength a software maker should have
Total opposite of the idiots who go around crushing developers
Don't run away from the Activision Blizzard acquisition trial documents, lol
That massive acquisition itself was clearly aimed at obstruction
LOL, imagine dying because parity clauses got in your way
What obstruction???
What's obstructive about Activision Blizzard being acquired? Are you okay in the head, lol
They were trying to sign a deal to cut COD multiplatform after 10 years, remember?
'Trying to'?
It's a 10-year contract. Get real.
You should really check your facts before making bold claims
If I'm buying an Xbox, I'd just buy a PC instead
But that Xbox is turning into a PC, lol
It's absorbing both Steam and Epic, lol lol
Feels like players are moving from PS to Xbox
Looking forward to the August worldwide hardware sales figures
Though July's sales came right after the disc-discontinuation announcement
You can't just ignore how much of a real-world impact those things actually had
What impact?
PlayStation pulling out of discs?
Background and Key Points
Xbox has sold in vanishingly small numbers in Japan for years — weekly hardware charts often show low three-digit or even double-digit units — and major Japanese retailers such as Bic Camera and Yodobashi have largely stopped stocking Xbox software, which is the retail reality behind the “no point releasing discs” comments above. Sony, by contrast, effectively owns the Japanese console market with PlayStation, and its move away from physical media (following Digital Edition pushes and rising disc-drive costs) has been read domestically as Sony optimizing for its dominant position rather than serving players. The “14 years of serial numbers” reference is to Xbox 360-era licensing, where disc ownership has long been tied to a Microsoft account — a system Sony never replicated, apart from the PSP-era UMD Passport, which (as one poster correctly notes) only offered discounted digital repurchases, not a true license transfer.
The thread doesn’t converge on whether Microsoft’s move is a genuine consumer win or simply cheap goodwill from a company with nothing to lose in Japan; it also splits hard on the Activision Blizzard lawsuit — one side treating Sony’s opposition and the alleged “no Xbox advertising” clause as documented fact, the other demanding evidence, and neither side settles it.
What’s easy to miss: this is a US-market-oriented Xbox feature being read through a Japan-specific retail collapse that has almost nothing to do with digitization policy — Xbox software vanished from Japanese shelves years before this announcement, for reasons tied to sales volume, not backward-compatibility philosophy. Framing this as Xbox “beating” PlayStation in Japan overstates a market where Xbox barely registers at all.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Hardware/Industry (Geha)) thread “IGN: ‘Xbox is handling the shift from physical to digital far better than PlayStation’.”
