Now Loading...Reacting to PSN Outages and Is the Competition Better?

With the PlayStation Network going down yet again the other day, and people getting heated a lot once more, we here at PlayStation LifeStyle decided to throw our hat in the ring, and comment how much we’re affected by those PSN outage news, and whether it pushes us to game on rival platforms in this entry of Now Loading.

Yes, my friends. We are tackling what everyone in the comments hate to see pop up in front of the site, as well as discuss whether Sony should lower PSN prices, and what really irks us when something like this happens.

Do we crucify Sony? How much do we get affected really? Read on and check out the staff responses in the gallery.

What do you make of our responses? Are we too nice to Sony? Should we be burning chairs and rioting on the streets when PSN is down? Sound off and let us know what you think why people seem to overreact to the network being down in the comments below.

Now Loading is a recurring staff-driven feature where PlayStation LifeStyle discusses anything video game-related under the sun (yes, even non-Sony platforms).

Essential Reading:

Now Loading...PSN Down

Now Loading...Reacting to PSN Outages and Is the Competition Better?
Zarmena Khan

@Zarmena

Honestly, the downtimes/maintenance or whatever it is has had zero impact on me in the past few years. I am not a multiplayer person and I only renew my membership for a short period of time when I see games on offer that I wish to try out. Rarely have I run into a problem doing that. But I can see why it would frustrate people who are heavily invested into multiplayer games and purchase annual subscriptions. I don't see Sony ever reducing its prices so the only thing one can suggest is a better investment of funds when it comes to creating a solid network.

That said, it's a mistake to assume the competitors don't have issues. We should focus more on pushing Sony to do better as opposed to mere comparisons.
Alex Co

@excaliburps

Being honest here, am I affected by it? To some degree, yes. But am I affected enough that I want to game on PC or on Xbox Live instead? Nope.

Every network infrastructure will have downtimes, maintenance periods and whatnot, it's just bad that Sony seems to have more of it than the rest.

I will say though, when the PSN is down, people are quick to judge or say that online gaming should be free. I mean, would I want online gaming to be free? Hell yeah! But it's not going to happen, no matter how much we complain.

At this point, I think Sony's network woes are significantly spotlighted more due to what happened to the PSN years ago, and how it seems to be the favorite for DDoS attackes.

At the end of the day, I can choose to game another time, or play with my single-player games until the service is back up.
Ben Tarrant

@Ben_Tarrant

You'll be hard pushed to find such an extensive network that supports so many things simultaneously remain perfect 100% of the time. Blips in the service shouldn't be news and shouldn't be taken so harshly, they're a fact of any internet service, even Netflix has maintainence and blackouts!

It's outlined in the terms and conditions that you accept occasional downtime in service for technical issues and maintenance, I think the fact that Sony compensate whiny customers so often is astounding and testament to the service as a whole, especially considering there's very little forcing them I actually do so, at least legally speaking.
Cameron Teague

@Cameron_PSLS

The network usually goes down during the day on a work day, so I never get affected. That being said, I honestly think both the PSN and Xbox Live have made huge strides since first releasing and while I would say that Live was better than PSN last gen, right now they are neck and neck.
Chandler Wood

@FinchStrife

The network was down? it's a question that I repeatedly ask every time I see another "PSN is Down" article. These down times hardly ever impact me, and I do a lot of online gaming. I'm very curious how many people would even notice that the network was down if it wasn't announced all over the internet. My guess is that nine out of every ten people that complain about how terrible they think Sony's network is are not actually impacted by the network being down in any way.

Obviously some people are being affected, which is how it comes to light in the first place, and I feel for them, I do. It's easy to be upset in the moment when you want to play your online games and there are a few hours where you can't, but in reality, and the grand scheme of things? I'm playing my games online far more often than I'm being told that the PSN is not available.

I won't even go into the argument that you can play offline games while the network is unavailable, because even if every game required online, it's not actually that often that gamers wouldn't be able to play.

Is PSN worse than XBL? I can't say. I don't have an Xbox One, so technically I never have issues with their network, but it's also really hard for me to have any problems with Sony's network when it only goes down every couple of months for two or three hours while I am 20 miles away from home at my office job. Now if it drops out for days at a time, and every month or more? Then we start running into issues, but let's pick up this conversation again when things actually get that bad.
Michael Briers

@briersytweets

I'm in a similar boat in that I don't usually find myself affected by the outages. That's not to give Sony a free pass when it comes to handling the outages and/or maintenances, I just don't believe you can jump from seeing the "we're aware that some PSN users are experiencing connectivity issues" message to decreeing the entire PlayStation Network is a shambles. Same goes for Xbox Live.

I think what frustrates people most is the lack of communication at times, and that's an area Sony could arguably make room for improvement. We can't expect full disclosure, but regular updates during downtime beyond the aforementioned and generic error message would go a long way. There's only so many times you can direct aggrieved users to the PSN Network Status page...
Mack Ashworth

@GamingWithMack

Suspiciously, the downtime always occurs during the hours in which I usually game, quickly turning a planned evening of multiplayer shooter action, into a solo session on an indie title or RPG.

Sure it's annoying, but it would be even more annoying if every game demanded players be online to play, even while playing alone. Thankfully, this is not the case!

More information on issues would be nice, though, instead of the usual copy and pasted spiel Sony currently pump out.