Sony is standing firm in the face of backlash over its PSN account requirement on PC. The topic popped up in a recent earnings call, where CFO Hiroki Totoki made it clear that PSN accounts will be required to play PlayStation games come what may.
PSN requirement on PC is to keep players ‘safe,’ says Sony CFO
To preface Totoki’s statement, we’d like to point out that his comments were translated into English live during the meeting, so they don’t necessarily make sense. I had been holding off on reporting this because I was waiting for the written Q&A summary that Sony usually publishes following its earnings calls. However, it looks like the company decided not to publish one this time.
“By offering them [PlayStation accounts], sometimes, that tends to invite pushback,” Totoki said. “But for live service games, in order to maintain order of the gaming, so that anybody can enjoy the game safely, we need to create environment conducive to that.”
We don’t know what “safely” means here, but the gist of it is that Sony wants to maintain some degree of control, and PSN requirement isn’t going anywhere.
Interestingly, Totoki only mentioned live service games in his statement. He didn’t explain why Sony requires PSN accounts for single-player titles.
