Sony and Microsoft are the two major gaming console manufacturers with their PlayStation and Xbox lines respectively.
As one sees the other as a direct competitor, whatever one does, the other one tries to do it better. Or whatever one has, the other would strive to have one too and make it even better.
Sony first introduced the PlayStation Plus in 2010, a brand new concept back then, but is meant to be a service to gamers where they will receive free game downloads every month via the Instant Game Collection as well as special discounts in exchange for a subscription fee, notes Game Rant.
Microsoft saw the immense popularity of the PlayStation Plus service of Sony that it has decided to come up with an improved version of Xbox Live. So while the PlayStation Plus has the Instant Game Collection, the Xbox Live has the Games with Gold feature, which are both pretty much the same.
More than the battle on who has the higher number of subscribers, the main gauge or criteria for the two subscription services as far as gamers are concerned is who offers the better free game titles every month.
It is worth mentioning that PlayStation has been around long before the Microsoft gaming console emerged, Sony has a wealth of video game titles to choose from and turn them as part of the Instant Game Collection every month, the former enjoys the advantage on the latter’s Games with Gold, which has very limited game titles particularly for the Xbox One.
However, all that is going to change since Microsoft has announced during its press conference at the recently-concluded Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) 2015 that a future update for Xbox One will make it backward compatible with Xbox 360. That shall open up opportunities for Microsoft in not relying heavily on indie titles or wait at least a year after a game comes out to offer it as free Games with Gold title.
This means that Microsoft can already mine the Xbox 360 library for high quality releases and also giving Xbox 360 games a significantly longer lifespan and reviving classic multiplayer experiences that some may have missed out over the years.
Cross-buy support
It is typical for PlayStation Plus subscribers to get six free games every month, two for each platform. The three different PlayStation platforms are the PlayStation 4, the PlayStation 3, and the PlayStation Vita.
For June however, there will still be a total of six free games for PlayStation Plus subscribers but PlayStation 4 owners will get four free games as a result of cross-buy support. PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita still get two free games apiece.
PlayStation Plus subscribers can get all six games from the PlayStation Store beginning June 2 until the first week of July and the games is theirs to keep for as long as they maintain their subscription.
I am not too surprised that the Xbox Live service is responding directly to Sony’s PlayStation Plus. The sheer brilliance is in both services giving games for free with a subscription. Plus the future backwards compatibility of the Xbox One will make it a instantaneous power-house. Hopefully Sony’s PlayStation 4 will eventually be backwards compatible too.
PS4 will never be. It is the exact reason Microsoft did. Sony won’t drop PlayStation now and all the work they’ve put into it to compete with Xbox. especially since it must’ve been hard to do. Ps4 isn’t going to be backwards compatible because it already makes too much money not being. It’s an incredibly smart move. It’s going to be hard for sony fanboys to defend their console when everything great about it comes out next year. If this is sony’s peak for PS4 and Xbox one is constantly improving, then the winner of this gen’s console race isn’t based on the start but at the end.
i believe the key word in backwards compatibility is backwards. xbox is struggling to keep in this current gen of gaming and is struggling to add “value” to their console. If their endgame is to turn their console into an emulator for 360 games i wouldn’t consider that a win. i like the idea of backwards compatibility but feel the this is just a smokescreen to distract from lacking hardware. Having half the consoles as the ps4 on the market also means that free gold games are more costly for xbox to offer than ps plus, so xbox can now tap into their 360 catalog for no extra cost.
Eric’s comment should highlight why Sony fans are losing ground.
With PS4, you pay an exorbitant fee (a monthly fee) in order to play PS3 games. With the Xbox One, you pay nothing to play your 360 games, and in fact are recouping further on your original investment. You say this isn’t forward thinking, but any financial investor would say otherwise.
There are also three important aspects on the Xbox One which have still not come to fruition.
– Directx 12
– Cloud rendered games (think Titanfall)
– Windows 10 – (allowing mobile phones, tablets and PCs to all play the same game at once).
Eric, this is innovation looking at you in the eye. As time goes on, the Xbox One gets better because it is essentially a virtualized end point. I can’t explain more than that at this point.
I have switched from ps4 to xbox one and I can say overall the xbox one is a way better experience than the ps4