Agreed to the author’s opinion at the end:
You don’t own the games installed in the console. Physical media requires Sony’s hardware’s validation. Now you start to not even own the hardware anymore. And all that being slowly normalized for decades, drop by drop, and just now the situation seems to be reaching a breaking point.Also impressive Sony didn’t keep pulling a Nintendo after the Bleem Emulator case. Imagine how bad it is to be able to run a game outside of the native hardware. /s
Furniture rental services are the devil’s work, it really is.
Semi-related, my family had rented furniture before. We had rented like this bedroom set and a wardrobe. It’s ludicrous to be into doing that. That’s why I thrift for furniture. Will I ever come across a PS5 thrifting? Probably never, not unless it’s just the shell of the console itself but even then someone will take it.
recently a friend managed to snag a perfectly fine used ps5 for 200€. i think that’s a really nice price. buying used is just pretty epic for a lot of product categories.
With the PS5 getting older, I think it’s 6 years old now which is hard to believe and people anticipating the PS6. I’m not really surprised that deals are coming up like that. I think someone on the FB Marketplace wanted some $150 for a PS5.
sure, but knowing the market for computers and computer parts there’s no way sony will offer a better deal in the first few years. also there won’t be many exclusive titles for the ps6, if any, especially not in the first few years.
Only use-case I’ve had for rental was when I was at a military school for five months. My roommate and I needed a TV in our barracks room, but there wasn’t much point in buying a TV (each of us had TVs back home), so we rented one for five months. It was great. One of us also bought a Wii (dating myself here), so it was a great time.
That’s about the only case I can think of renting furniture/appliances. If you are temporarily someplace and can’t thrift an item at a reasonable price.
You’ll own nothing. And be happier for it.
Is what corporations and the predatory class would have we believe.
Folks here jest, but this business model is coming to PCs next. Bookmark my words!
(Literally, you can right-click the perma-link to this message and have quick access to it later so you can reply, “Damn, you were right!” And post the link to big PC vendors suddenly offering a similar services because DRAM and GPUs have become so expensive, normal people can’t afford to buy PCs anymore)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pomC1CfpC0
You’re late to the party, GN released this a year ago. They’ve been doing this already, but because most people who PC game are semi-tech savy, build their own.
Sorry, you don’t get any points for this prediction, because it already exists.
To be fair I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s already a vendor for that. They already kinda do that with Chromebooks at schools, and work computers are sometimes lent out to workers including those with beefy hardware. Doing it strictly for gaming wouldn’t be that much of a stretch lol
Pretty common in corporations. In a company I used to work I got a new computer with the latest specs every year. In the one I’m now they own them and I have to fight to get upgrades.
Can’t recall the vendor, but I saw at least one that tried a rent-a-PC things aimed at gamers. But the price was egregious, and I wanna say they didn’t even ship the hardware they advertised.
Anyway, point was it’s already being tested in the wild…
No, because PC is an open platform, not dependent on specific hardware.
“You will own nothing and you will be happy”
People used to rent their televisions because the technology was too expensive to own outright. It’s weird that this business model is becoming viable again, and specifically for hardware that’s been in circulation for a while. I appreciate that Sony are just looking at ways to expand their player base, and i’d presume some of the economic drivers are out of their control, but I don’t think this should be encouraged or tolerated.
People are buying takeout on credit. Pushing small recurring fees (and interest) for things consumers can’t afford to buy outright has sort of been the name of the game for the consumer economy for the last 20 years or so.
Maybe more interesting that there is enough of an overstock to do this.
It’s viable again because well… gestures vaguely at everything
HP just launched a laptop ‘subscription’ service too. It’s a rather disgusting sign of the times. Companies would love for this to become the norm, because renting is a highly profitable game. Get that sweet money coming in month after month. And you are right; we must not encourage them.
I’d rather save up and go to the second-hand marketplace than line a corpo’s pocket by renting.
Hell, at least when I did this for my Series X & GP, it was 0% interest and I kept it at the end of the 24 month period! Granted it was $35/mo not $13.50, but that’s crazy to lease a console without the option to buy after. 13.5x36=486 so you should buy outright for, say, $150 after?
You shall own nothing.
When Xbox did this you paid monthly, subscribed to game pass and at the end of two years you owned the console. It was also less expensive than the separate cost of console and subscription, to the tune of 1p. 😂
In the US I think I saved $20 at the end of 2 years by getting the console and gamepass bundle. Then canceled gamepass when they raised the price.
It wasn’t a bad deal for me. I was going to be paying for Game Pass anyway, and this was when the consoles weren’t always staying on shelves. Managed to snag one of the lease-to-own versions or whatever and never regretted it.
Back then, my wife wanted to play Halo 5 co-op and without split screen, this was the best way to do it.
We could also rent our couch! It’s only $25/month!
Let me guess, if it isn’t in 100% mint condition when you return it, you get to pay for it, including a service fee of 150€ for their inconvenience.
I paid $30-something a month for an Xbox Series X and GamePass for 2 years. And I got to keep the Xbox!
(Xbox All Access. It’s no longer offered. And you saved $20 if you did it, at the original price of GamePass Ultimate, $15/month, it’s since doubled in price since they told Congress buying Activision would lower prices for consumers.)
Useful idiots go crazy










