PlayStation's PC Future After Helldivers 2 Controversy: Following Xbox's Path

After PlayStation announced that Helldivers 2 on Steam would no longer require PSN login, it revealed a lot. Just three days after the announcement of the PSN login requirement for Helldivers 2, PC gamers expressed outrage, forcing PlayStation to backtrack. Three days is too short a time span, highlighting PlayStation's vulnerability. Firstly, it shows that PC gamers' habits and reactions are not similar to console gamers. Secondly, Sony is lagging behind in seamlessly integrating PC and console gaming to ensure gamers' comfort.

Certainly, from now on, Sony will have to tread more cautiously and thoughtfully with their PC ventures if they don't want to alienate PC fans. This incident has also left a stain of mistrust, with PC gamers scrutinizing every PlayStation game ported to PC, fearing another Helldivers 2 scenario. Overall, it's hard to conclude that removing PSN from Helldivers 2 marks the end of PSN on PC, but undoubtedly, in the long run, PSN will have to be present on PC, and gamers will have to get used to it sooner or later, as it is how PlayStation is building their ecosystem across both platforms. Similar to how Microsoft did with Xbox on PC a decade ago.

So why is Microsoft's move not as contentious as Sony's?

Looking at the starting point of these two companies reveals much. Xbox's declining sales indicate that Microsoft's PC move is smart for wider game distribution to optimize revenue and profit. Therefore, Xbox's PC move has been in place for 10 years, making gamers accustomed to it. Not to mention, the crucial aspect of connectivity, the Microsoft Account, which serves beyond just game login—it is used for Windows, OneDrive cloud storage, Office 365, and more. Moreover, Microsoft has had almost no security breaches. This indicates that using a Microsoft account for gaming is likely something gamers already have before playing games on PC.

Now, what about Sony? PSN serves no purpose other than gaming, and in the past 15 years, PlayStation has faced quite a few personal data hack incidents, notably the infamous PSN debacle during the PS3 era. But even if we overlook these factors, one thing is hard to ignore—the nature of the two corporations: Sony is hardware-focused, while Microsoft is software-focused. As Microsoft realized that the future of consoles might not be sustainable and may not meet the stringent growth demands of one of the world's top five technology corporations, PC became their territory. Hence, with Windows being their home, and PC gaming commanding 95% of the market, coupled with decades of software experience, it's clear that Sony is trailing behind if they want to go multi-platform and integrate globally.

Some might argue that PlayStation is a console and its PC presence is secondary, and Microsoft's move to PC happened because Xbox sales were poor. While partly true, after leaks, especially the Insomniac leak, it's evident that PlayStation needs PC more than ever, and they will consider PC on par with consoles sooner or later. As game development costs rise and selling millions of copies doesn't guarantee success, distributing games across platforms becomes the best solution to avoid reducing game development budgets.

Sony has been and is learning from Microsoft about a multi-platform approach, specifically with PC, and they are in the early years of doing so. The absence of Windows ownership or software experience might be their weakness, but Sony has shown that they can't be stubborn about console dominance anymore. PC gamers have spoken, and Sony has yielded. This clearly shows that they'd rather listen to PC than let their Helldivers 2 die. Especially since without PC gamers buying the game, it wouldn't even be among the top 20 best-selling games this year. Therefore, even if PS's core fanbase is on consoles, and even they don't fully support it, it's time for Sony to realize that they need to respect and value PC gamers, as they will be an equally important customer base in the future. And also because in today's oversaturated live service game market, a successful game like Helldivers 2 is very rare. Hence, with the golden egg newly laid, it's understandable why Sony is willing to protect it rather than stubbornly let it die.

But what are the consequences of this? Clearly, PSN will still need to be deployed on PC because Sony wants its PlayStation system to span across platforms, and there's nothing wrong with that. Xbox has been doing this for 10 years without much controversy. Perhaps what Sony needs to do is expand PSN to as many countries as possible and clearly announce whether PSN is required on PC from the outset or not; otherwise, PC gamers will assert their power here.

Lastly, the Helldivers 2 incident where Sony backtracked shows that they will respect PC and release games on PC simultaneously with PlayStation (day and date). In theory, this may affect console sales, but we all know that making money from selling hardware has never been successful, except for Nintendo. Therefore, the most important aspect is still software sales. And it's possible that games on PC will launch simultaneously, especially when the PC market has shown readiness for PlayStation games. Following Xbox's path may have sounded ironic in the past, but now it's more accurate than ever.

Ultimately, when we look at all three giants—Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo—we see that only Nintendo specializes in games and has always refused to follow the footsteps of the other two. This means they always have a lower growth expectation on a much smaller scale compared to the two giants. The pressure to maintain successful growth every year is much lower for Nintendo. Also, notice that their game development costs are much lower than Sony and Microsoft. So while Microsoft is a software conglomerate, and Sony and Nintendo specialize in hardware, it turns out that Sony and Microsoft are more alike than Nintendo.

Both Sony and Microsoft are diversified conglomerates, not solely focused on gaming like Nintendo. Therefore, the pressure to grow revenue and profit annually from shareholders is immense, and turning revenue into profit is extremely challenging. So, we can confidently think that Nintendo will never bring games to PC and only focus on consoles, which is entirely understandable. However, if someone suggests that Sony should only focus on consoles and abandon PC, that would be utterly foolish. Sony needs stable cash flow more than ever, with significant debt still looming. Other business areas like TV or smartphones continue to lag, so PlayStation and camera sensors become more important than ever to carry the burden and find ways to expand revenue, which is mandatory when the console market has been stagnant in terms of growth for the past 20 years.

Lastly, when the leak from Insomniac revealed that the PC build of Spiderman 2 is almost complete and comparable to the PS5 version, it's evident that PlayStation is much closer to PC than we thought. It wouldn't be surprising if after Helldivers 2, Sony considers PC on par with PlayStation sooner rather than later, just as Xbox is doing with their entire ecosystem.