The 8th gen console experience sucks when your Internet goes down

I recently had a multi-day Internet outage due to...I'm not sure. During that time I had a couple windows where I did have Internet but it was out for the vast majority of the time and while the company eventually sent a technician nobody could really explain what the problem was. It seems to be working now.

Obviously in 2021 during the pandemic that is extremely frustrating (though nowhere near as bad as what some people are going through of course) because I couldn't just go to the movies or drop in on a friend. What I thought I could do was play some single player games. So I did. But the experience also showed how deeply ingrained the Internet is to our modern game boxes.

I will go through the systems I used and the problems with them.

Switch:

Obviously the Nintendo Switch does not require the Internet to work because it's a portable and that would be too crazy even for Nintendo. However, what it does do is record what games need updating from the Internet but not actually install the update until you try to play the game. I thought I might try a nice long RPG as an escape but both Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Octopath Traveler were flagged as needing updates but had not updated. There's no easy way to see the list of games that need updates and while the system is supposed to update automatically it clearly does not work. I could launch the games without updates but I didn't have any idea what they were or why they needed to be done. This is, admittedly, a minor quibble, but it goes back to my irritation with Nintendo's lack of modern features in general.

Xbox:

On my main Xbox I was able to play games fine but you can't get achievements when offline. They are supposed to pop up when you come back online but a bunch of mine didn't. So I'm missing achievements I earned. Alright, whatever, it's dumb but not a huge deal, achievements are stupid.

The real issue with Xbox is with secondary systems. I have 2 Xboxes because I bought a Series X but kept my One X to use on my treadmill. This One X gets more play than my Series X because I treadmill for 1-2 hours most days, but there's no point in using the Series X there because it's hooked up to a 720p TV. Without Internet that One X can only play physical games. It can't launch digital games whatsoever. Not even if I was logged in recently, and not even games that I own (rather than Games With Gold games or Game Pass games.) I understand the need to keep people from downloading games to a system and taking it offline full of games while they then play the same games on another system, but this sucks. Secondary systems are more likely to be used places without Internet (like being taken to a cabin in the woods or on vacation or whatever) so having such limited features really sucks. It also shows how Internet dependent all of Xbox's "play anywhere" stuff is. Not just the cross system sync or whatever but even the ability to play a game on multiple systems unless you have a disc, and a lot of games don't have physical versions on Xbox so...

PlayStation 4:

This was by far the worst. My PS4 was barely functional while offline. It wouldn't load a lot of games at all while connected to my router but without Internet, and even when I disconnected it from the router it struggled. I just got a "please wait" sign and then was told that my Internet wasn't working but not given an opportunity to launch the game anyway, or told why I couldn't. Maybe it has something to do with PlayStation's notoriously buggy license stuff, since games I'd played recently or downloaded recently seemed to work, I don't know, but it was supremely frustrating. I suspect it might relate to the game's landing page and news feed stuff, which...I hate that stuff. I just wanted to play the games I don't care if the leaderboards aren't working. It was extremely frustrating and not at all clear what the issue was.

Then there were games that should have worked but didn't. Race the Sun just wouldn't load at all, and I played that mostly on Vita so I know it works offline fine. But nope, nothing. Crimsonland would let me play the quests but not any of the survival modes for some reason. It just told me I was offline and refused to launch them even though they are single player modes. Possibly this relates to the leaderboards. I only tried about 6-8 games, so having two of them (both single player experiences) not work properly and others refuse to launch just made it all a huge pain.

I genuinely question how useful any digital games would be on PlayStation if the servers ever go down permanently. And while people might smugly talk about how this shows that physical games are the answer, more and more physical games require patches and to be online to work properly. I don't think my Crimsonlands or Race the Sun issues would have been better if I'd had physical versions (if those even exist.)

This outage was a rude awakening for me regarding how dependent modern consoles are on an Internet connection. We might scoff at something like Stadia and its requirements for streaming, but a lot of the games we "own" and have locally are subject to some of the same issues, and even the systems they're on can have issues if not plugged into the Net.

All you needed for an NES to work was an electric outlet and a 13" Zenith color television with an RF port.

I try to buy as much of my stuff on GOG as I can, though that's for PC so I don't know if it counts here.

That aside, I now need to go home and try to play some digital only games on my PS4 and One S. I could have sworn I'd done that before.

@justin258: You can absolutely play digital games on your PS4 without Internet. I did so. It's just that some of the games didn't work (it's possible they were games I transferred over when I switched from a launch PS4 to a pro and a "restore licenses" might have fixed it if I had done that earlier.)

For your Xbox, it will work fine if it's set as your home Xbox. No problems except you won't get achievements. If it's not your home Xbox then it won't launch basically anything if not connected to the 'net.

PC stuff generally doesn't have these issues. Xbox doesn't have issues if it's your home Xbox (beyond the achievements thing). Switch doesn't really have issues (though the borked update stuff is frustrating.) And I think PS4 may be YMMV in most cases.

But the fact that none of the experiences were smooth for any of my systems raised some alarm bells for me.

I think you need to refresh your PS licenses. I just tested and can play everything fine, even PS Plus and downloaded PS Now games which surprised me, unless turning off the network in settings isn't actually turning it off fully.

@michaelpeterson: I may have to do that, though the fact that PlayStation licenses just sort of fall into disrepair without notice is part of the problem. I will note that my PS4 behaved differently when hooked up to a network with no Internet than when the network was turned off. Some games that wouldn't load with a network that wasn't working loaded okay when I turned the network off, so that is a factor.

But none of that relates to the fact that games like Race The Sun and Crimsonland wouldn't work. Both loaded but got hung up, presumably looking for servers or leaderboards, and wouldn't let me play regardless of my network settings. Those are games that should have no problem recognizing that the PS4 is offline and just running their offline modes (and in Crimsonland I could play the Quest mode) but they just don't work properly.

"A lot of your games won't work properly unless you have refreshed your licenses recently and even then certain single player games won't work right" isn't a great experience.

I cannot use my 360 without an internet connection, for what that's worth. It demands you connect to Xbox Live.

FWIW I just tried Race the Sun with the lan pulled on my primary PS and single player worked fine for me, it just said something like "network required options will be unavailable" and I would get a failed to submit score error after a run, so I'm guessing some aspect of your system is corrupt. That said, if/when those license servers get shut down I assume all downloaded games will eventually be unplayable from the 360/ps3 gen onwards. I tried xbox too and some gold games would work while others would not, and no gamepass games would work, so the whole thing seems like a crapshoot, maybe how recently a license was used before a loss of network connection?

Edit: a gamepass game that would not run just loaded up after saying it couldn't be run without a connection, so I have no idea

I've had my internet be down with my Xbox One X and gamepass games and games purchased digitally work. I've had moments where neither worked. If the service is down, basically nothing works but games you have a disc for. It's all very bizarre, and of course the only one that really is easy to work around is Nintendo stuff because they're so ass-backwards with their online stuff that they can't find a definitive way to lock you out of most things.

I didn't know that about the Xbox One and PS4 and their next-gen counterparts. I own both consoles but figured that all of the consoles in your name will just let you use your library on or offline, similar to how (I think) Steam works.

Anyway, it's super weird to think about how the PC is now better about this than anything except the Switch. I remember horror stories about shitty DRM from ten years ago that kept people from playing their games even when online while people who pirated whatever they wanted to play had smoother experiences than those spending money. At the same time, 360/PS3 players never had to worry about anything. Meanwhile, in 2021, you can get a sizeable and fairly modern game library on GOG that will always work offline. I... actually don't know exactly how Steam's policy on offline play works, that probably has a wrench thrown in it when considering third party DRM that other companies throw in there, but I'm pretty sure I can play Black Mesa on multiple computers even when they've both been off and offline for a week.

This puts another nail in my interest in future consoles, I suppose. Bummer, I turn on my Xbox One often to watch movies or streaming TV or Youtube and usually find myself thinking about playing games on it, too, so a PS5 was sort of on my radar. Not that it isn't now, just that it's getting harder and harder to justify that purchase for me.

I remembered some games like Gran Turismo Sport requires an internet connection for most functionality.

@justin258: The thing about PC is that it varies wildly. Steam does pretty well, but I feel like it largely only does so because of how old it is (the server issues that plagued Steam at launch definitely helped, too.) But even Steam has some troubles, in testing right now games feel like they take much, much longer to boot up (several minutes from hitting play, in most cases), and while they're all working fine right now, I could swear there was a time years ago when I awoke to no internet and Steam refused to let me play Terraria despite no update being queued.

Elsewhere on the PC, things are way more up in the air. EGS (a service I don't take nearly as much chagrin with as others do) refuses to even open offline unless you specifically select an option while connected to the internet to specifically prepare your computer for EGS offline mode. However, after setting that / opening it online and then going dark, things boot up completely fine where you would expect/want them to. Don't know about achievements, though.

DRM, on the other hand, is definitely still an issue affecting a fair number of games. Anything using Denuvo (aka: about a fourth of AAA games, by my estimate,) is a complete no-go to my understanding, unless you've booted the game up while connected to the internet at some point in the past ~7 days. Not to mention the number of PC-only single-player titles over the years that have needed a connection to boot, many of which became inaccessible due to server shutdown, like the oft-referenced Darkspore.

PC definitely leads the pack when it comes to offline, but part of that seems a bit like it's more from PC being such an open platform, rather than necessarily because of the effort of present platforms.

@bigsocrates: it's definitely frustrating, but for me most of the games I play are always online as many big games these days are. The other day Destiny was down for maintenance, so I throw Hitman on,which was ALSO down for maintenance. Ended up on Monster Hunter. As it stands my 4 main games right now are D2, MHW, Hitman 3, and Warzone, so no internet=read a book. Just hope I downloaded to my kindle before connection was lost....

All of this is why I specifically mentioned GOG, left a question mark on Steam, and didn't mention anything else. Anything bought on GOG is going to be the most "future/outage-proofed" thing you can buy, as you can just download all of the offline installers, fully-patched, and store it externally or even offsite if you have that kind of know-how. Anything else is a great big toss-up on whether or not you'll be able to play offline. GOG is definitely the reason I've talked about PC the most here. If it weren't for GOG's success, it seems like the Switch would be the only system suitable for offline play.

For Nintendo Switch, I reckon it should be part of the 9th gen console era because it's the successor to Wii U (Part of 8th gen console era).

I don't really see the issue both Xbox & Sony's boxes work the same way, you can use any app/game offline for 30 days before the licence need a refresh/update. You can easily test it.

Disconneted PS5 Ghost of Tsushima(own), Remnant from Ashes(PS Plus+) and World War Z(PS Now) all work fine offline as I've been playing recently.

And Series X offline Forza Horizon 3(own) works fine but my two Game Pass games installed Gears Tactics and Void Bastards won't launch, says to set console as home box. So I reconnect double check, it is. And try again the same both GP titles won't launch, but if I reconnect and launch one of the GP games Void Bastards then disconnect and try again Void Bastards works fine offline and Gears Tactic still doesn't work, cause I haven't played it in the pass 30 days or whatever the cut off time is.

This is connected to Jeff's TV right? Cuz that is another reason I've gotten rather luddite about Internet Of Things.