Sony PlayStation 4 will not be download only
Disc not slipped
Sony's next PlayStation will feature an optical drive - Blu-ray, presumably - after all. Plans to drop disc and go download only have been seemingly shelved.
The change of mind was signalled by the inevitably anonymous moles claimed to be familiar with what the Japanese giant is up to.
They also told the Wall Street Journal that the current thinking at Sony is that the 'PS4' will be out in time for the 2013 Christmas sales season, though whether that's a global launch point or, as before, Japan first, isn't clear.
Games are increasingly being acquired through downloads rather than physical media, with Valve's Steam service leading the way, albeit in the computer rather than console arena.
But Sony, it seems, feels that too many punters either want physical media - which they can, of course, sell when they've finished with the game - or lack sufficiently broad broadband to cope with multi-gigabyte downloads.
Fitting an optical drive to a console adds about $20 (£13) to the Bill of Materials (BoM), worth dropping in these margin-obsessed times. So it's perhaps not hard to imagine Sony - Microsoft too, for that matter, since it has been struggling with the notion of dropping optical drives - offering a disc-less console alongside a premium model to see where the punters stand on the matter.
Earlier this year, it was claimed that Microsoft was considering getting rid of the next Xbox's optical disc, though it now looks that that will not be the case. ®
COMMENTS
It was removed after a load of idiots complained that features cost money. The PS3 was lambasted as being too expensive despite being more powerful, having way more kit, having better backward compatibility, etc, etc, etc.
Not really surprising to see the console makers backing down on this one. They all want an online-only console where they can screw the customer over to their heart's content, but they also all know full well that the first console to do it will get savaged. If the Xbox 3 tried it, the PS4 would come out with a disc drive, keep the important 2nd hand and discount markets, and easily win market share.
It's just console makers acknowledging that online-only is bad for consumers, and they don't want it.*
(*On console. On PC we have Steam, and fairly reasonable pricing, and sales, and competition within the platform, etc, etc, etc.)
"But Sony, it seems, feels that too many punters either want physical media - which they can, of course, sell when they've finished with the game - or lack sufficiently broad broadband to cope with multi-gigabyte downloads."
MS, on the other hand, will do what they're doing with Windows 8: Shove their fingers in their ears and sing "La la la la we know better la la la!".
Re: more downloads
That's what ebay's for, let someone else have the benefit of the stuff you no longer need!
It would mean that all the games for the PS3/Xbox 360 wouldn't work on it (unless you bought them again as download).
Good
If that is true it will give it a massive advantage over the next xbox if the rumours about that having no drive are true.
