14 DAY TRIAL // PlayStation Now is a new service from Sony which is designed to be launched on the PlayStation 4, the PS3, the Vita and even on smart television sets and which aims to allow players to play titles remotely, without owning or installing them on their devices.
The big problem with the concept at the moment is the pricing that the company has announced for it, which basically makes it a bad idea for players to pay for limited sessions with titles and makes the new solution interesting only for those who plan to engage with a title in the long term.
The PlayStation Now concept is interesting because it allows gamers to only pay for those moments when they actually play a game, but it also raises a bigger question: how much is the time spent with a video game actually worth and how can a player decide whether an experience offers good value for the money or not?
Tracking and the profile of a gamer
A quick look at my Steam profile shows that I have put more than 220 hours into Total War: Rome II, close to 300 in Football Manager 2014, something similar in Pro Cycling Manager 2014, and around 100 hours into Crusader Kings II, Europa Universalis IV and Hearts of Iron III.
All the games that are listed on my profile are the kinds of experiences that can capture one’s attention for even longer and I suspect that, if I lacked money or interest, I would happily subside in PCM 2014 for six months without any major problems.
At the standard 50 dollar or Euro price for these titles, math says that, for FM 2014, one hour of entertainment comes at around 16 cents. For the games I have spent the least time with, the same formula returns a value of 50 cents.
I also have Command & Conquer 4 in my library, which I bought because I loved the series, but I only spent 4 hours with it and I don’t think I shall touch it again, which means that I spent about 2 dollars for 60 minutes of playtime (it was on sale) and I did not even have that much fun.
PlayStation Now and the rise of a rental-focused future
Clearly a rental system which charges by the hour on Steam would not work for me because I tend to spend a lot of time with the titles I love and I tend to only buy something that I know will appeal to my tastes.
But I also have friends who get a spread of games, mostly based on hype and on advertising, and rarely play for more than 10 or 20 hours, moving from hit to hit in order to keep up with the wider trends of the gaming world.
They are the kind of target audience for a rental system which would manage to make an hour of playtime less than one dollar or Euro and would allow gamers to maybe bring in a friend for some of that time.
PlayStation Now is still in its infancy and is facing some technological hurdles at the moment, but its model might become dominant in the long term and I may be facing a future where I’ll have to vary my gaming diet just to keep my bills down.