PlayStation Network Details

Gamasutra has details on the gaming network that will underpin the PlayStation 3 online offering. From the article: "Co-developed by Sony Online Entertainment, the company's MMORPG development arm, and GameSpy Networks, the PlayStation Network Platform will allow players to compete online even in its free iteration, unlike Xbox Live. Sony will enforce integrated online capabilities between games, but publishers will be free to run their own servers." The folks on the 1up podcast were just talking about this topic last week. I'm personally not sure 'free' is the way to go. I'm willing to pay if it means I'm getting a quality service. Obviously you'd prefer not to pay but if it means the difference between an unreliable service and one the quality of Xbox Live, are you willing to pay?

Comments

Great analysys, 1up!

[cluke]

What the hell is the world coming to, when you announce something is going to be free, and people start whining that they want to pay for it? Big business has us well trained.
Maybe in some parallel universe where paying for something improves the quality of it, but here in the real world comapnies just do the minimum they need to muddle through, fee or no fee.

Free vs. Pay

[matr0x_x]

It's a tough debate. I like many would prefer to pay for a good service then receive a sub-par service for free. However, I'd also rather receive a crappy service for free then pay for it. Do you think the Playstation network will be good if it is subscription based? Then I for one don't mind paying for it...

Why scramble?

[the computer guy nex]

"Free online play is where Sony and Nintendo are at. Microsoft better scramble to come up with an answer."

I would rather have 8% of my customers paying me $5 per month than have 25% of my customers playing online when I have to pay for all the bandwidth, hardware, and development costs.

Quality of XBox Live?

[Trogre]

I'm personally not sure 'free' is the way to go. I'm willing to pay if it means I'm getting a quality service. Obviously you'd prefer not to pay but if it means the difference between an unreliable service and one the quality of Xbox Live, are you willing to pay?

Well, any lingering hope that Zonk might not be a Microsoft shill just flushed noisily down the gurgler.

So Sony is now doing bad for offering a service for free huh? Talk about damned if you do...

Why not just ask "if paying money means the difference between an unreliable operating system and one the quality of Windows, are you willing to pay?"