Discussing The Business of PS4's PS+ Games

I constantly see people commenting on websites, Facebook and Twitter about AAA games on PlayStation Plus - particularly on the PlayStation 4. Now there's no one-sentence way to clarify this situation, so today I'm going to explain the PS4's PlayStation Plus games from a business standpoint.

Disclosure: I am not an employee of Sony. What I am about to say is constructed from the understanding of a scholar of the console gaming industry as a whole over the last twenty-four years.

Firstly, understand this key point: If they're going to charge to get access to online gaming on the PS4, in all honesty, Sony don't really have to give anything extra. Back in the days of the Xbox and Xbox 360, Microsoft used to charge £40 a year for online gaming and the occasional discount on digital games  - and people were paying it without any concern.

PS Plus was originally a watershed moment in gaming that was rather brilliantly carried out. It was part of the start of the resurgence of the PS3 that ultimately led to Sony pulling away in the final few years of the last console generation. It was done with a two part purpose: A) Boosting console sales and B) Getting PlayStation owners used to the idea of a yearly subscription service - ahead of the PS4.

One of the great things about PS Plus from the beginning was that it got people playing games that they wouldn't normally buy. Following which the development studio would get a higher amount of praise/recognition and higher sales when they release their next title. This then garnered more money in future digital sales for Sony and boosted the industry in the process.
Moving to the PS4, Sony openly embraced this notion as  it was very good for them financially.

On PS3 in 2012 PS Plus had a large number of older AAA titles that Sony were happy to pay out for, for two reasons:
1. Sony were second in console sales and were desperate to find a way to catch up.
2. People saw these inclusions as 'consumer-friendly', despite absolutely no business sense in their inclusion. Those AAA games had virtually no benefit for Sony going forward. They were considered old and the people that would have bought them in a launch window already have. And yet people still lapped this up and heralded Sony for these inclusions.

Flash forward to 2015 and, frankly, when consumers keep requesting games like Knack, Killzone: Shadowfall or inFAMOUS: Second Son to be part of the Instant Game Collection over a newer digital game - this is a baffling concept to market executives from a business point of view.

If you look at it from a business stance, those games are now two years old and subsequently they are very affordable. Anyone that wants to play them can acquire them with ease. In addition, someone who enjoys gaming as a medium is likely to have played at least one, if not all of those titles, already if they had wanted to play them.

So then who benefits from the inclusion of two year old AAA games? Well, the brutally honest but unpopular answer - people too cheap to actually buy those AAA games in the first place.

Crucially, Sony are the current market leaders over the Xbox One. That is why they don't really need to put AAA PlayStation games on PS Plus. They know that the people they need to keep happy are the core gamers, their bread and butter - the people that more than likely already bought inFAMOUS: Second Son when it was first released and wouldn't really want to be given it free now, two years later.
Comparatively, from the other side, Microsoft do now feel the need to place AAA games on Games With Gold for the Xbox One. As Sony were experiencing with the PlayStation 3 in 2011/2012, Microsoft are no longer the market leader. Placing AAA games on Games With Gold is seen as a way to entice gamers to switch to the Xbox One - a tactic that Sony found so effective in 2012.

Now, for a large number of PlayStation 4 owners, because of the way that the service was run on PlayStation 3, the way that the 'free' games on PlayStation 4's PS Plus service are coordinated has become largely misunderstood. And inevitably opinion on what IS available has become clouded by people expecting older AAA games, rather than newer digital, independent or second party titles.

Here's the thing: it's always, ALWAYS about money. And the simple truth of the matter is that the people baying for AAA games on PS Plus are generally not the people that Sony are targeting for their future profit margins.

Look at it like a business equation:
Paying to put old AAA games on PS Plus = Sony lose money with slim to nothing future returns.
Paying to put newer digital / independent titles on PS Plus = Sony make money in the future through higher coverage / word of mouth sales / sequels.

Boiled down to its barest bones, Sony needed PS3 console sales when they were putting AAA games on PS Plus. They're not worried about sales of PS4 consoles right now and it doesn't currently benefit Sony to put AAA games on PS Plus, it does benefit them greatly to put digital / independent games on PS Plus - so that's what they're doing.