This November, the PS5 will celebrate its second birthday. Despite some first party bangers – Returnal, I’m looking at you – so far, Sony’s machine’s got off to less of a running start and more of an agonising crawl. It’s a problem that Microsoft’s new boxes aren’t immune to either, but cunningly, Xbox has pulled a rabbit out of a hat. The name of its new floppy-eared friend? Game Pass. While Microsoft has been quietly collecting studios and Sony releases a steady stream of exclusives, by Year Two, there’s one clear winner of this console generation: Game Pass.
Boasting over 25 million subscribers and winning over the hearts and minds of value-loving gamers, the slow-build service has been genuinely disruptive to the video games industry. It’s seen this console generation defined less by ‘next gen’ release and more by a shiny new way to consume them. WIth fan twitter accounts happily parroting Xbox’s ‘best deal in gaming’ and fanboyism now gleefully extending to subscription services, it seemed the battle lines for this generation have already been drawn. It was inevitable then, that Sony would throw itself into the subscription service skirmish. It’s chosen battle-ready champion? An all-new, three-tiered PS Plus offering.
Rolling out worldwide last month, in these early days, it’s hardly been the valiant comeback Sony hoped for. Following months of leaked information, PS Plus’s 2.0 ‘grand’ reveal was fired out with… well, less of a bang and more an inaudible whimper. Light on PS1 and PS2 classics and looking from a distance like Poundland Game Pass, Sony’s initial offering reeked of a quick money grab. A poorly copied scrap of ‘subscription service 101’ homework. Yet, it turns out, the reality is far from the disaster it seems.
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