An EU commissioner warns: Europe cannot force PlayStation to continue producing physical games
European authorities have ruled out intervening as the digital business grows and player protests have little impact on the company’s revenue.
PlayStation’s decision to stop manufacturing discs starting in January 2028—and, with it, the end of its physical-format games—continues to be a hot topic of discussion. And it’s far from over. What gamers are currently wondering is whether the relevant authorities will be able to do anything to stop this strategy, and Michael McGrath, a European Union commissioner, has already warned that the EU will be unable to do anything at all.
McGrath is specifically responsible for the area of Democracy, Justice, the Rule of Law, and Consumer Protection, and was questioned at the European Parliament’s headquarters in Strasbourg. The commissioner was very clear: Sony—and any company—is free to offer its video games in whatever way it sees fit, as long as it complies with the law.
“It does come down to commercial and contractual freedoms, and companies are free to offer games and services in the manner that they see fit, provided that consumer rights are fully protected in line with national and EU law,” McGrath said.
“At this time, we did have to consider a European citizens initiative on this question of whether games should continue to be available after a new edition of the game has been brought forward,” referring to the Stop Killing Games movement, which recently suffered a major setback.
It was last month that the European Commission decided not to propose legislation requiring video games to remain playable after being discontinued by their developers, in response to the SKG movement.
What can we expect from here on out?
If the law doesn’t prohibit PlayStation from continuing with this strategy, it seems unlikely that the Japanese company will be able to back down. Only a major move by the gaming community might be able to make Sony reconsider, but it would have to be something absolutely unprecedented. For now, the petition on Change.org has reached 300,000 signatures, which, while that may seem like a lot, represents only about 0.25% of a player base of approximately 120 million.
Or, to put it another way, as analyst Serkan Toto put it: “Sony has over 120 million active PlayStation users. Around 50 million people subscribe to PlayStation Plus. As a thought experiment, let’s say 500,000 cancel in protest, that would be just 1% of that business gone — of course not enough to Sony to start rethinking. Digital is just too lucrative.”
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That said, everything seems to indicate that the chances of PlayStation continuing to produce discs starting in January 2028 are currently minimal.
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