Have you ever purchased a movie or TV show on the Playstation Store?
Well, it seems like you won’t be able to do that any longer from August 31, 2021.
Sony Interactive Entertainment (more specifically, its head of Video Business, Vanessa Lee) announced this major change, in response to the growth of ad-supported and subscription services, which has replaced direct purchasing or rentals almost entirely.
Here’s what they published the announcement on the blog.playstation.com site:
"At SIE, we strive to provide the best entertainment experience for PlayStation fans, and that means evolving our offerings as customer needs change. We’ve seen tremendous growth from PlayStation fans using subscription-based and ad-based entertainment streaming services on our consoles.
With this shift in customer behavior, we have decided to no longer offer movie and TV purchases and rentals through PlayStation Store as of August 31, 2021.
When this change takes effect, users can still access movie and TV content they have purchased through PlayStation Store for on-demand playback on their PS4, PS5, and mobile devices.
We thank our fans for their continued support, and we look forward to further enhancing the entertainment experience on PlayStation.”
The good news is, all the TV content and movies you bought or rented on any of your devices (PS4, PS5, or mobile) will be accessible even after the Playstation Store drops them.
So, you are free to consume video-on-demand, but not make any new purchases.
And Sony hasn’t referenced any plans to make them “inaccessible” in the nearby future, so this is a massive relief to those who “own” a massive library of films and shows.
This wouldn’t be the first time Sony remove less popular content from their Store (and won’t be the last time either). They removed PS3, PSP, and PS Vita games and add-ons (themes, and avatars) from both the Store’s mobile and desktop versions right before the PS5 launch.
The only way to do it, was while browsing directly through the original device’s store.
But, to be fair, it doesn’t come as a surprise that digital movie renting/buying is barely considerable when streaming services become the norm in how we watch entertainment.
When was it the last time you rented a movie on Amazon, iTunes, or on the App Store?
Now, when was it the last time you used Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon to watch it instead?
Yes. This is just a way for Sony to trim the PS Store’s fat and follow the trend (one that came a long time ago) as they did with its Music Unlimited service years ago, to use Spotify.
Microsoft also shut down “Groove Music” in 2017 to send customers to Spotify. So it’s no possible to purchase digital music from the Microsoft Store, anymore.
With so many alternatives, I highly doubt someone could be upset about the Playstation Store stopping its TV shows and Movie renting features. They’ll somehow compensate for this by releasing 10 PlayStation game adaptations to movies and TV Shows this year.
