New PlayStation subscription trials requirement

Sonyā€™s new tiered PlayStation subscription could be announced next week

Long-rumored multi-tier subscription plan might be official ā€œas soon as next weekā€

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Several months ago, there were rumblings of a new (but seemingly familiar) PlayStation subscription service with different tiers ā€” you might remember hearing the codename, Spartacus, which has since lived on in forum posts, threads, and comments. According to a Bloomberg report, Sony could announce this expanded service as soon as next week.

As the story goes, this new subscription will combine PlayStation Plus ā€” our gateway to ā€œfreeā€ PS4/PS5 games and online multiplayer ā€” as well as PlayStation Now ā€” an on-demand game service with cloud streaming and downloads, depending on the platform.

But more than just consolidating these current plans, this new service will have ā€œmultiple tiers offering catalogs of modern games and classics from older PlayStation eras,ā€ as Bloomberg puts it. And according to sources, we can expect a ā€œsplashy lineup of hit games from recent years,ā€ which sure sounds like something Sony would want to lead with.

Iā€™m not expecting anything as comprehensive as Game Pass ā€” and on that front, it sounds like day-one releases for Sonyā€™s big-hitters like God of War Ragnarƶk arenā€™t on the table here, per Bloombergā€™s sources ā€” so weā€™ll see. ā€œExtended demosā€ are potentially interesting as a perk, but I canā€™t say thatā€™ll move the needle for me, personally.

Of course, for some of us, itā€™s going to come down to those potential legacy PlayStation games, and how much itā€™ll cost to play them on a modern platform. Wider access to Sonyā€™s amazing back-catalog is the major piece thatā€™s missing from PlayStation for me right now. As a paying PlayStation Plus member (for I donā€™t even want to know how many years now), dipping back into the PS1, PS2, and even PS3 library could get me to pay more. Could. Itā€™s really going to come down to the specifics here, as we recently saw with Nintendoā€™s Expansion Pack tier. The pricing and game selection have to match up.

PlayStation Now artwork
PlayStation Now already has a rotating library of games.

According to an earlier report from GamesBeat, the most expensive tier could be as much as $16 per month. (Reminder: PS Plus and PS Now are each currently $60 a year.)

Subscriptions can be valuable, but thereā€™s a time and place for them, and when theyā€™re the only option ā€” when itā€™s less and less possible to just buy a thing on its own ā€” then it feels like the walls are closing in. I think Iā€™m decently choosy, but it honestly freaks me out to consider how many services Iā€™m attached to, even just with TV/movie streaming.

Xbox Game Pass, Nintendo Switch Online, and now this meatier PlayStation sub ā€” itā€™s a lot. But thereā€™s room for so much more if the floodgates burst open on game-specific memberships. I can see myself sticking with the ā€œbig three,ā€ but that has to be it.


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Image of Jordan Devore
Jordan Devore
Jordan is a founding member of Destructoid and poster of seemingly random pictures. They are anything but random.