Sony might be following through its thought of „eliminate the past for good” (as they have previously done so by wiping earlier PlayStation games from their database on PlayStation.com).

TheGamer reports that Sony will close the PlayStation Store for the PlayStation 3, the PlayStation Portable, and the PlayStation Vita. The PS3 and the PSP are reportedly going to see the end on July 2, followed by the PS Vita on August 27, respectively. It’s not official yet, but the site claims that Sony will announce it all together by the end of March, so just ignoring the rumour wouldn’t make much sense.

And it could be an issue especially if you bought many games digitally for the three aforementioned platforms without them ever receiving a physical/retail version. These games could be gone, and the physical copies nowadays could cost a fortune, but thinking about spending cash on them in the middle of a pandemic isn’t the brightest idea. (There’s another solution for this, but that’s not that legal… although there might not be another method!)

It makes sense if Sony doesn’t want to support its older platforms’ PlayStation Store versions forever, but then they should at least work on backwards compatibility. Remember: the PS3 can play PS1 games from the Store, os there is a bit more at play here. The PlayStation 5, and even the PlayStation 4, should be able to emulate PS1 and PSP games without problems. The PlayStation Now solution is just streaming from the cloud, that’s not the real deal.

If Sony doesn’t announce in a week (because we’re nearing the end of the month) that there will be more backwards compatibility after the stores’ shutdown, there could be an issue for the company. Meanwhile, it could benefit Microsoft, as they have been far more forward-thinking with compatibility.

Source: WCCFTech