PlayStation is done with discs, and it’s a travesty for game preservation and game ownership. Despite the deserved furor, we can’t hold onto these scratch-prone optical frisbees as our saving grace. Discs are a dying medium, and it’s time we think beyond them for the sake of gaming’s future.
Sony Interactive Entertainment told gamers on Wednesday that they won’t be able to buy any new physical copies of new games starting in January 2028. The news hit fans hard, and I’m right there with them. I regularly bask in the glow of my collection of physical games sleeved in their colorful, plastic packages adorning my shelves. Some games in my collection are not available in any other format than their original discs. A 2023 report from the Video Game History Foundation found that nine out of 10 past games are commercially unavailable, a large part because companies like Sony have not made them digitally accessible.
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Game preservation has relied on discs, but the physical medium is terrible for keeping gaming history alive. Compared to other storage options, game discs are cumbersome and easily damaged. Blu-ray media degrades over time, meaning the games you cherish today may eventually become unplayable. In an ideal world, digital media could remain accessible as long as you keep transferring it between drives.
