It was announced earlier this week that, for the first time since its inception in 2010, PlayStation Plus would be getting a price hike. The change doesn’t take effect until September 22nd, but the price increases are as follows: for a year of PlayStation Plus, the price jumps from $50 to $60, for a three-month subscription the increase is from $18 to $25, and 30-day subscriptions will stay static at $10.
Sony said they were bringing the prices into the current market conditions (e.g.: Xbox Live Gold’s long standing prices), and that makes sense…provided a few things improve along with those costs.
I may be in the minority, but I wasn’t upset by the price hike. Sure, that raises the yearly cost 20%, but PlayStation Plus has always been worth it for me. Being able to play online with others has become a large part of my gaming experience. Having that play behind the paywall will ensure that I’m a PlayStation Plus member for the foreseeable future.
The “free” games Plus offers each month are a welcome bonus, no matter if I like them or not. I don’t subscribe to Plus because of the free games, but I’ve often been pleasantly surprised by them. Perhaps it’s just my memory, but I seem to recall that the games on offer used to be a little more than the seemingly indie fare of late. When the PS4 was early in its life cycle, I assumed that would be the case, but now we are years in, and we are still seeing mostly indie titles. I’m sure it would be appreciated by the masses if a few more AAA titles were thrown into the mix.
Now then, all that being said, I’m hoping a couple of things change a bit. Sure, the price hike doesn’t make me want to subscribe any less, but I’m hoping some better performance is part of that price change.
As many of us know, the PlayStation Network (PSN) isn’t perfect. For my part I’ve seen out of the blue NAT errors (that magically go away when restarting), messages that don’t go through for long periods of time or, sometimes, at all. Time stamps on messages I’ve literally just sent being time stamped as 7 minutes ago or, sometimes, much longer. I’ve seen various issues with party chats (and I love party chats). I’d like to be able to remove some of the tiles from my menu (all those channels I will never need or want).
My list of minor quibbles goes on.
Basically, I’d love to see the PSN become a little more stable.
If the price change pulls it even with Xbox Live Gold, then I’d like to see the same stability as with Xbox Live Gold. And, honestly, Gold has an edge here with their offerings for both 360 and the One playable on the newer hardware through backwards compatibility. Unless Sony dropped a similar bombshell of backwards compatibility, Gold will always have more free games on offer for current gen users.
Something to think about.
As a subscriber to both PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live Gold, I see the good and bad points of both. Sure, I take advantage of Plus more often, but, since I play games online on both consoles, both are necessary for me. I don’t love arbitrarily paying more for a service, but I do hope this means that Sony will be investing some of that increased revenue into their servers.
In the meantime, I will be buying a couple of years of Plus in advance to avoid that hike before September 22nd.
How do you feel about the price increase? Will you be keeping PS Plus? Or will you be ceasing your service? I’d be interested to find out and discuss.
Categories: games
Rebekah Lang 
I don’t mind the price increase at all. I will definitely be keeping it for the same reason as you.
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I agree with Colton. I will be keeping it for the above mentioned reasons. I also think that variety needs to be added to that rationale. Without variety, it would make purchasing PS+ bland & boring. No?!
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Well, I think first and foremost, PS+ is for online play. The games are just an added bonus. That being said, I do hope we see a better variety of bigger ticket games being added to the mix. Mostly I’m hoping they make the servers more stable!
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It really is a minimal hike. I’ve been seeing people all over the internet getting bent out of shape when Xbox Live Gold has been this price for as long as I can remember.
Oh, internet.
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$60 a year is still a pretty good deal, especially considering the free games. I plan on getting a PS4 in the near future, and that minor price hike won’t deter me at all.
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I agree. I just hope they take that added revenue and put it into server stability and security.
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I don’t think that the price hike is that big a deal. I am an annual subscriber, so $10 is like two trips to Starbucks.
BUT, regardless of the price, I would like them to improve the free game offerings. In the early years it seemed that there were a lot of AAA games offered. Now, not so much.
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Ha! You are so right! My partner actually made that exact same comparison! :)
I’m with you on the free game offerings. There have now been three years of games to draw from, and an AAA title thrown in here and there wouldn’t hurt.
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I have a one console household (an Xbox One) and so the Playstation Plus price hike doesn’t impact me. I don’t like paying $60 yearly but I’m usually able to find a $40 deal sometime during the year. But I agree about stability. After paying for the console, the Xbox Live service, and the video games I cannot stand when the Xbox platform is unexpectedly down. I’ve usually have little time to play and incidents such as the Christmas takedown and other outages (which hasn’t happened to me recently) drive me bonkers. I’d be amenable to a price hike if it meant better security and stability.
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That’s smart planning! I’ve also gotten my yearly subscriptions to both PS+ as well as Xbox Live Gold at a discount around Black Friday and that definitely makes the cost more palatable.
But you are spot on; if they are charging us for online play, the servers need to be more stable. I think Gold has the edge there, but Sony could really use to step that up. I keep my fingers crossed.
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I’m not at all disappointed or upset about the price increase. If you really think about it, it only raises the monthly cost of a yearly subscription from $4.17 to $5.00, pretty minor. The main draw for me is the “free” games and has been from day one, and when you add up all of the games over a period of 12 months that’s a steal whether they are all games you want or not.
I love that the games offered are usually games I don’t already have or would have ever purchased on my own. I’ve had some great experiences I would have missed otherwise just by trying something new, which is easier to do when they are part of the monthly Plus lineup.
I totally get putting the online play behind the Plus paywall even if it’s not my primary reason for subscribing. I guess I just like the single-player story-based experiences more. Maybe I should branch out and take more advantage of the social side. Regardless, those services come at a cost to someone, so the money has to come from somewhere.
I’ve always heard about the superiority of Xbox Live to PSN but have never understood it, simply because I’ve never used the other. Ignorance is bliss? Whether or not I can say for myself how they compare there’s always room for improvement, more stability, new features, etc. Bring it!
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I agree, it’s a minor increase. It’s also the same as Gold has been for years.
I’ve also taken advantage of many of the free game offerings and had all kinds of experiences I might never have otherwise. It’s a cool thing, to be sure.
Live servers seem to be more stable. I just hope Sony takes some of this new revenue and invests it in a better network. That’s what I care most about.
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I love that the games offered are usually games I don’t already have or would have ever purchased on my own.
I totally get putting the online play behind the Plus paywall even if it’s not my primary reason for subscribing.
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It’s a wonderful perk to PS+ for sure! I also love that it gets more people to play games they might not otherwise.
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