Sony makes bold claim about game ownership • Hacker News Board

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#61

Post by philipov » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:23 PM UTC

redwall_hp wrote: post #4

nerdjon wrote: post #3

What I don't understand is why Sony is the one being targeted for this when this has been the case with any digital purchase for 20 years? I don't know of a digital marketplace that works differently. But instead all of the hate, the boycots, etc are all targeting Sony instead of focusing on actually figuring out how to improve digital purchase rights which extend beyond games (and far beyond Sony). I know that some…

Valve killed the previously thriving boxed game industry two decades ago and people can't get over how much they love everything about Valve. Sony follows 20 years later (in a world where internet is faster than installing from BluRay and games are outgrowing three layer discs) and people lose their mind. There's more noise about this than Microsoft's mass layoffs at the game companies they bought up.

Valve doesn't randomly remove stuff I've payed for from my library. Even when the ability to purchase something goes away, people who already bought it keep access to it.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#62

Post by giancarlostoro » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:23 PM UTC

I wonder if anyone will ever have the guts to enter the gaming console market using open source as a base. Linux support for GPUs has never been better than what it is today. I've spent the last 4 or 5 years gaming exclusively on Linux just to highlight how good it has gotten, and no I don't have to run around doing command line incantations. Linux has improved a lot, heck, even AI you have a drastically better experience working with AI on Linux than on Windows (which hearing this 10 years ago would have confused me given how many issues I had with my GPUs on Linux for YEARS).

All someone has to do is assemble a reasonable desktop that runs Linux, gives you access to GOG and Steam, and you've already got more games than most game consoles, the issue right now I suppose would be moreso hardware costs.

You would also want to make sure your Desktop Environment is fine tuned with a controller in mind.

If you can read games from discs, you'd be getting the attention of many people. The facts are that most people have always bought digital over discs but when you take that away, and it becomes clear that they could lose their games forever, everyone wants CDs back.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#63

Post by barnabee » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:24 PM UTC

red_admiral wrote: post #55

Sony is correct here? If I buy a CD or a cassette or a record, I own the physical media but I only have a licence to the music it contains - not the ownership, and not the copyright. Whether I can play that music as a DJ at an event or on the radio, or remix it as a backing track for another song I'm creating and so on, depends on licencing laws and royalty payments. That was true well before the internet, and it's w…

If I buy a game - i.e. I am on a store page title "Game Name" not "Limited Revokable License for Game Name", and I click "buy", then I expect to own a copy of the game or the right to a copy of the game (in perpetuity), not a limited revokable license to play the game.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#64

Post by nerdjon » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:24 PM UTC

applfanboysbgon wrote: post #52

nerdjon wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I maybe should have phrased that better since I do understand their announcement around disks and removing the movies is a reason why they are the current target. I just find it hypocritical, people keep saying they are going to move to xbox or pc next gen and its like. Their policy is exactly the same. You have the same risk and not really ownership. And I am not defending Sony, they have a long history of getting c…

> Their policy is exactly the same. It's not, though. Their ToS is the same. They reserve to right to deny you ownership of your games. Only Sony has been stupid enough to actually do it. Every ToS in the world is designed to screw the signee over as much as it possibly can, so you'd need to go live in the woods if you wanted to escape it, but there is a tangible difference between how much companies actually abuse t…

So its fine that they force you to agree to something when you paid for it but its not fine when they do the thing you agreed too?

Instead of actually trying to fix the issue we just hope that Valve never has to do the thing they are legally allowed to do because we agreed they could.

I honestly don't care who has done what, I don't care what company is supposedly better than another company.

Overnight Valve, Microsoft, whoever could just as easily remove access to a bunch of digital purchases.

How about instead we just don't excuse any of the companies?

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#65

Post by embedding-shape » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:26 PM UTC

singpolyma3 wrote: post #38

Boxxed wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I even take issue with "Purchase license". Shouldn't it be "Lease License"? Purchase implies that it can't be revoked, no?

Nah. Licenses can be revoked. When I buy a hunting license I don't get it forever

But licenses in general you don't just "buy", you "earn" them somehow, then also usually you pay a price for it too, but it's typically about knowing about some rules and/or norms.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#66

Post by hn_submit » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:27 PM UTC

This statement could do Sony in. Gamers will refuse to buy a PS6 if there's not an ironclad guarantee that they own the games they purchase, be it digital or disc form.

And since gaming is the only profit center that's holding Sony above water I see the company disappearing in a couple of years.

I foresee another "gaming winter" like we had in the 1980's. Maybe a decade from now another gaming platform will arise, most likely built around open-source software and hardware.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#67

Post by yakz » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:27 PM UTC

red_admiral wrote: post #55

Sony is correct here? If I buy a CD or a cassette or a record, I own the physical media but I only have a licence to the music it contains - not the ownership, and not the copyright. Whether I can play that music as a DJ at an event or on the radio, or remix it as a backing track for another song I'm creating and so on, depends on licencing laws and royalty payments. That was true well before the internet, and it's w…

The important bit is that you can sell the CD or cassette or record.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#68

Post by jurgenburgen » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:27 PM UTC

singpolyma3 wrote: post #38

Boxxed wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I even take issue with "Purchase license". Shouldn't it be "Lease License"? Purchase implies that it can't be revoked, no?

Nah. Licenses can be revoked. When I buy a hunting license I don't get it forever

You don’t buy a hunting license though. You pay a fee and the government issues you a license.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#69

Post by nalekberov » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:28 PM UTC

red_admiral wrote: post #55

Sony is correct here? If I buy a CD or a cassette or a record, I own the physical media but I only have a licence to the music it contains - not the ownership, and not the copyright. Whether I can play that music as a DJ at an event or on the radio, or remix it as a backing track for another song I'm creating and so on, depends on licencing laws and royalty payments. That was true well before the internet, and it's w…

The difference is that no license holder can force you to give them back. You. Actually. Own. Them.

You might think, like, you've had some eureka moment, but it's all corporate BS.

Re: Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

#70

Post by infinite_spin » Thu, Sep 03, 2026, 4:28 PM UTC

singpolyma3 wrote: post #38

Boxxed wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I even take issue with "Purchase license". Shouldn't it be "Lease License"? Purchase implies that it can't be revoked, no?

Nah. Licenses can be revoked. When I buy a hunting license I don't get it forever

True, but you do get it under clear terms, for a duration that is both obvious and well established.