PS4 Will Not Require an Always-on Internet Connection

The next generation always-on topic has been lively to say the least, but it has been focused around Microsoft – not much has been heard from Sony. Microsoft has been at the forefront because many rumors suggested always-on would be required. That assumption was further fueled by Adam Orth, who ignited the Internet with the #dealwithit tweet and just recently, fears were put to rest when an internal memo leaked saying always-on would not be required.

Sony president of Worldwide Studios, Shuhei Yoshida, recently gave an interview to Game Informer magazine, which will be featured in the latest issue. According to GameSpot, Shuhei was asked about its upcoming Playstation 4 and if Sony had considered always-on for it; he gave this statement: “Did we consider it? No, we didn’t consider it. The main reason being that many countries don’t have robust Internet connections. It makes sense for people to have Internet connections to play online games, but for offline games there are many countries that we saw [that] do not really have robust Internet.”

This is what I consider to be a common sense approach to the whole issue and I applaud Sony for looking at it on the global market level, rather than just one country and its majority of customers. I have said before that I do think always-on will happen, but it is a far off reality. Implementing it with the next-generation consoles would be bad for rural areas, Armed Forces and even some urban areas.

This thankfully puts to rest the whole always-on debacle for this generation, because if one console doesn’t have it, then the other will not have it. The other company doesn’t want to be looked at as forcing a feature on its customers when they go to buy, and then jump ship to its competitor; it’s competition plain and simple. This time, the customers won out and not corporate greed. Now if you will excuse me, I need to go get my snow gear out.