Like with Net Neutrality, people only have so much outrage. It runs out, and then the people in charge keep doing what they wanted anyway.

I feel like the only people who change Sony's minds sooner rather than later are the big third-party publishers. EA, Ubisoft, Bandai Namco, Blizzard, and whoever else should honestly just take to Twitter and go "oh, yeah, we're toooootally on board for crossplay, but we aren't sure Sony would let us." Why the fuck not at this point? What have they got to lose? Not like Sony is gonna stop selling their games. And they're all so big that it's not like they can ruin their relationship in any meaningful way, especially because Sony will definitely want their support next-gen as well.

Ideally, I would've like this to have been solved yesterday, but I think it's only a matter of time. I think the longest they can wait is until the start of next-gen. If the next Xbox gains any meaningful traction out of the gate and Sony still won't support crossplatform play, I think that is going to come back to bite them in the ass in a big way. At least early on anyway. They could always change their stance later to save face, but I would just assume they wouldn't want to have that problem at all.

I mean, they should allow it for those gamers that want it/care.

I personally cannot stand playing games online with people on the internet, so I don't really care one way or another.

The people who are mad about this are folks who already own a PS4. I see no reason for Sony to change their policy and lose the exclusivity of their large online user base, a major competitive advantage they have against Microsoft and Nintendo.

Im not clear on how it hurts Sony to do cross play. How does this cause them to potentially lose customers, or income? If anything I would think not doing it would be more likely to cause buyers who own multiple systems to go with Xbox/PC/Nintendo for various reasons like playing with people who only own one of those.

At this point, there's no hope in them changing for the rest of this generation. I firmly believe that the only way to knock them off their high horse (the tried and true console-generation way) is if and when microsoft's next gen console starts outselling theirs. The people that created and made PS4 at the start of this generation (Andrew House, Jack Tretton, even Adam Boyes) are gone, and the current top guys there are only gonna answer if they lose their market share and it hits them financially. There's no changing the 80M install base they've already built this gen, but it just feels inevitable that they're gonna fall on their faces, and only then are they gonna wake up.

If Microsoft were leading the console sales they wouldn't do it either. But since they are not...

That’s next on the list after PSN ID changes.

Expect cross-platform by 2077.

It comes down to money. While your impact is minor, buy Xbox, Switch, and PC over PS4. Click on articles about Sony’s position being terrible. Comment on those articles. Retweet them. Etc.

If you want change, try to keep the story going encouraging others to spend elsewhere. It probably won’t do much, but it’s also probably your only bet.

It's a really bad look. I would think something has to give.

I guess the hearts and minds conscious Sony of the launch of the PS4 is dead and gone.

If I play a lot of Fortnite on PS4, and my buddies all play Fortnite on PS4, and we can't play on different platforms, then everybody has at least one reason not to jump ship even if someone really would rather just buy an Xbox or PC and play everything there.

If one buddy wants to play on Xbox and the other three want to play on PS4, then the one buddy has to buy a PS4 to play with the other three.

It's a way to anchor players to a single platform, and it's real shitty.

They already dug this hole

. There is no turning back now.

The only way to force their hand is to but the xbone and play all cross platform games there en mass

Nothing for it this gen. But next gen, so long as there isn't some other major reason that the PS5 is way more appealing than the XboxSomething, buy Xbox. Losing market share is the only thing that'll reach business folks...

...Unless fellow business partners, i.e. the major publishers, really step up the pressure. But that seems unlikely.

@john1912: I've a friend who bought an Xbox One this generation. The rest of us had PS4's and played online together. He eventually caved in and bought a PS4 and games on the system because he couldn't play GTA or Titanfall 2 with the rest of us. If Sony allows cross console play, there's no reason for people who aren't into their first party games to buy their hardware and maybe software on their platform if they already own another.

Similarly I will now not buy an Xbox One because Microsoft decided to put their first party titles on PC. They removed the one reason I had to potentially buy one.

Exactly. There's no tangible gain for them to do it so why bother. Spend your money and resources on something worthwhile.

Unless one have a bunch of friends on a bunch of different systems and all of you want to play together, this whole thing is a non-issue. I have zero interest in it as a one system owner with no ”cross-platform” friends. And aside from PR, not really sure what Sony’s motivation would be. But here’s to hoping for those affected get to enjoy it eventually.

No, why on earth would they?

Next gen is a totally different matter, however.

Possibly for Fortnite and nothing else. I'm leaning towards "no" though. Then, next generation, when Microsoft sells the most consoles and Sony says "Hey, guys, we've seen the light and are finally ready for cross-platform play," Microsoft will say they can't.

I don't care about cross-play, I'm a single-player gamer, so it's not a feature I would need.

I don't understand the obsession certain gaming media outlets have with it. Most of it just looks like click-bait to me, as they never had a problem with it before. Suddenly it's a newsworthy issue and everybody is running with it. These gaming media channels have a bad habit of "feeding frenzy" when bored though.

It was exactly the same with micro-transactions and lootboxes, which was fully OK with most of our gaming media when it came to games like Hearthstone, CSGO, WoW and so on, … but they dramatically changed their tune when multi-platform games started offering microtransactions and lootboxes as well. Suddenly micro-transactions and lootboxes were the most evil thing ever. It's all just so hypocritical.

Honestly, this. As you said, with the sizable install base that Sony has with the PS4, there is really no reason for them to do it this gen. However, thinking forward to the PS5, they may decide that the potential impact on that console will be great enough, forcing them to do something with the PS4 now.

I would say the only way would be to force their hand with a debacle the size of "always online" was for Microsoft, but the opportunity is gone. Fortnite is the best chance the community had to make a splash, but it needed a platform with enough visibility.

Imagine the following: The E3 MS conference is about to end, and Spencer makes one last announcement, the lights fade out and we see a team of 4 players playing fortnite. The camera changes to take the perspective of different players, the game is frantic and it is over relatively quickly so it doesn't gets boring to watch, but that is not the point. As the lights turn on, Spencer takes the stage to present the rest of his squad: Tim Sweeney from Epic, Gabe Newell from Valve and Reggie Fils-Aimé from Nintendo. As people try to understand what is happening, Phil makes a passionate speech about cooperation and being able to play with your friends, regardless of their plataforms; emphasizing each of the presents in turn. He then announces that the game will be playable for anyone with a PC, XBox or Switch, all the while making it obvious that those are notall the platforms the game is on, but some are not ready to play ball. Finally, he says that they will support developers and publishers that approach them to create an environment where their own games can take advantage of this cross-play experiment.

That would be the kind of splash that would force Sony's hand. Unfortunately, it needs something the size of Fortnite and a scenario the size of E3 to move the needle, and both opportunities passed as far as this year counts.

I know it doesn't effect them in the slightest, but I've kind of shied away from using my PS4 since this whole debacle started. I don't even like Fortnite all that much or feel the need to play it across all consoles... but I do love Rocket League. And Minecraft. I'd really like all my versions to talk to each other because it's technologically feasible and doable and just needs a Sony exec to okay the switch flipping. I also really want to play the new God of War, but until Sony changes their tune on this, I'll be denied that pleasure. It's all I can do personally, but it feels like something I shouldn't budge on.

I wonder if at some point the amount of people still looking to get into the console game is minor enough that Sony can open the walled garden and not have to worry about too many people choosing Xbox over PS4. Like, this console is years old already. The amount of people that are interested , but haven't bought a console yet can't be that gamechanging anymore right? And the amount of people willing to sell their ps4 to buy a xbox one after this whole saga seems quite minor to me. It would give Sony a nice popularity boost and take away Microsoft & Nintendo's `WE do have crossplay` bulletpoint. Would be a good position to announce your new hardware with. You don't want to announce new hardware when everyone is whispering to eachother to not buy the thing because 'Sony doesn't want you to play with your friends'

I don't see this happening at all.

This

It probably just depends on how hard it is to implement it, because heck, we can't even change our PSN names.

When the 360 was top dog Microsoft did the same thing. It sucks but it makes sense for the leader to play it that way, and I doubt it'll change any time soon.

Does Call of Duty or Battlefield have cross play?

I don't think that they do, so I'm confused on why this is an issue now other than shitty internet people that need something to complain about.

I think the big issue that nobody has thought about is moderation of the online experience, if you are playing online and "PS player" starts seriously harassing "Xbox player", how does that get resolved? What happens when two players have the same account name? Sony already has problems dealing with account names within their own system, I seriously doubt they have a way of dealing with that.

Sony has also had some serious network breaches that compromised customer data in the past, I can understand why they would want to keep their network as tight as possible.

Really the only thing I know that Sony has absolutely done wrong is locking players epic accounts up, that's undeniably shitty, seems to me that Epic should have a way to flag an account so that platforms can choose to recognize only natively purchased upgrades or not and that would solve the issue.

this close to next gen? Nah, as others have pointed out there's no benefit to them doing so. They've already taken the worst of the PR hit.

and Microsoft will likely do the same thing again if they win next round

@john1912: There are a couple places where Sony can argue they lose money. First is on console sales. Anecdotally, most of what I have seen and heard from people is that console choice is first and foremost driven by what their friends have. Cross play means those sales aren't a guarantee. If I can only afford one console why buy a PS4 to play Fortnite if the cheaper Switch will do the job?

Sony also gets a cut from every PSN transaction. If you had one unified Fortnite account (which is the other side of this issue) you could theoretically buy something om your PC/Xbox/Switch and then bring it to PS4 without Sony getting their cut.

In a lot of ways I look at this like backward comparability. It would be nice but its not something I care about, and I'm a little surprised how much people seem to care. When you bought your ps4 did you believe that you could use cross play? Yes it's clearly sony being the only one holding the whole thing back, but haven't we our whole console lives picked one or the other? I think a better question might be if sony doesn't do anything next time around will you stick with them? Personally, I'm not going to switch to xbox cause I've been on the sony side for years. My digital library is all on sony's side. Will I get another console? maybe? maybe I'll finally switch to just pc.

@nutter: i do not get the psn name thing just make them pay 10$ same as xbox.

I really don't give a shit.

I don't own a PS4 to play generic multiplayer shooter #3245. If I wanted to(I don't), I could do that on my PC.

People don't care that much about crossplay. This outrage is heavily driven by the Fortnite account locking, which should be changed.

Because the Switch is not a PS4, is not that much cheaper and it has a much worse version of the game.

@rkofan87: It sounds like the universal ID in their database is the name a user enters, which is insane.

Even so, you’d think you’d just use a unique string as another field that becomes the new de facto UID. I guess maybe old games would have an issue accommodating that?

I’d LOVE to know the actual reason, as the situation is pretty nuts.

I don’t think it will happen. Which sucks, because I would like to play Destiny 2 and Monster Hunter, with my PS4 friends. I’m not going to buy a game twice, and I usually buy multi-plat games on the Xbox because I prefer the controller.

So you made a choice even though you had friends that played on a different platform, so Sony has to make decision's based on your free will? And lets be clear activison/bungie didn't let any D1 progress move over to PC or console and no one seem to care, hell other then you character model came over to the consoles if you played D1.

@deanoxd: At what point did I ask Sony to do anything? I would like to play games with my friends, and it would be cool if I could. I’m simply commenting on why I would like cross platforming to happen, and how I don’t think it will. I do not expect special treatment, nor am I asking for it.

I think I am in the camp of, "Who cares, really?" Most friends are playing with each other on the same consoles/platforms anyway. Why do I want cross platform with a game like Fallout 76 or other PC games where I might run into hackers way more than not? If people, in 2018, wanted to play with their friends they would have gotten the same platforms they were on. If Sony wants to do it that's great but this is merely Microsoft trying to find something to go after Sony for and its hilariously transparent and sad. This is one reason why the PS4 install base was so high so quickly, friends who played games together on 360 switched to the PS4...together. Yeah, its cool that my wife can play Minecraft on PC with her friend who is on the Switch but at the same time if it wasn't there then she would just use my switch to play with her friend. I own all the current consoles so its cool when something has backwards compatibility but I almost never use it.

I am of the same mind set, really the first world problems of some of the gaming community and games media just being a bit sheepish and just jumping on the outrage train. Because its my experience that if someone is a very involved gaming they usually don't own just one platform, maybe not all but at least two.

This. It really is a matter of "who cares". Microsoft stood their ground for the same reason last generation and it was because they were on top. Expect Sony to do the same.