Sony has announced the PlayStation Plus Collection will be shut down on 9 May 2023, despite earlier speculation that these offerings would expand in future. The collection, which currently contains 19 classic PlayStation 4 games, will be removed for all players – although Sony has noted that games will remain claimable until the service is dropped.
Everyone with an active PlayStation Plus subscription will maintain access to previously claimed games, even beyond the May cut-off date.
A reason for the shut down was not provided, but it appears the service did not achieve the popularity Sony aimed for – likely as a result of players seeking out their own collections, or preferring to play newer PlayStation 5 games on their consoles.
Read: PlayStation Plus Essential games for February 2023 leak
As an add-on for PlayStation Plus users, there were certainly merits to the collection. Any new or younger players suddenly had a collection of free games to play when they subscribed to PlayStation Plus – including multiplayer hits like Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, and Battlefield 1. It was also a chance to revisit the classic hits of the prior generation.
That said, it appears these benefits did not have wide appeal.
‘We’re going to wait and see how the world receives the Plus Collection,’ Jim Ryan, CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment told GQ in late 2020. ‘You know, which games are played how much they’re played before we make any decisions about [expanding the service]. We think it’s potentially going to be a great user acquisition tool.’
It appears that, while hopes were high, the service has not been received as intended. In fact, it’s likely the cost of licensing games for the collection has far exceeded the benefit of offering free games for subscribers. In early 2022, Sony lost the right to include Persona 5, for example – and it’s highly likely other non-Sony titles were set to follow shortly.
Now that the honeymoon phase for the PlayStation 5 is over, expect more changes on the way. In the meantime, active PlayStation Plus subscribers should pop into the Collection hub to claim any game that takes their fancy. Infamous: Second Son, Monster Hunter World, God of War, and Bloodborne are all highly recommended picks.
The PlayStation Plus Collection will shut down on 9 May 2023.
All the PlayStation Plus Collection games
- Batman: Arkham Knight
- Battlefield 1
- Bloodborne
- Call of Duty: Black Ops III
- Crash Bandicoot: N-Sane Trilogy
- Days Gone
- Detroit Become Human
- Fallout 4
- Final Fantasy XV: Royal Edition
- God of War
- InFamous: Second Son
- Monster Hunter World
- Mortal Kombat X
- Ratchet & Clank
- Resident Evil 7
- The Last Guardian
- The Last of Us Remastered
- Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End
- Until Dawn
