It seems that Sony and Nintendo have agreed that we stop buying digital games . The two Japanese companies have already had their controversies with the closure of the virtual stores of their consoles. However, the new controversy of Sony goes much further. Some PS3 and PS Vita game users claim that they have been able to stop playing the games on their consoles because they have an expiration date.
Consume preferably before: see certificate
We all thought that the digital format was the future. Why have a physical disc or cartridge when you can have your video game on a server and download it to your console only when you want to play it? However, if Sony or Nintendo had warned us that once the useful life of the console expires, we will lose the right to download our purchase, we probably would never have jumped through that hoop. We would continue to buy physical games, thus ensuring that our titles stay with us.
The story comes from afar. Last year, Sony announced that it would be closing its PS3, PS Vita, and PSP stores . Gamers took out their torches, and Sony decided to relax and just lock down the PSP digital store. However, a year later, there are users claiming that they cannot play some of their purchased classic games for PlayStation 3 and PS Vita. One of those games is Chrono Cross , which, curiously, is going to receive a remaster for PlayStation 5 in a few days. Is this a Machiavellian move by Sony to sell the game?
Well, although the company has not spoken yet, everything indicates that it is mere chance and it is not the first time that something like this has happened. According to Kotaku, the problem comes from the programming itself. Years ago, Unix engineers had to put an expiration date on the certificates they used for game licenses. Since there was no standard, the programmers themselves invented distant dates. In the 90s, 2022 was quite far away, so it didn’t seem like a problem. However, when porting the game to modern consoles, those certificates don’t appear to have changed.
Once again, the preservation of the video game is once again in danger. This episode shows us that, at the present time, there are still obstacles for us to keep our own titles, so it is Sony itself that is giving a voice to those users who defend pira-cy only because it is the only possibility that exists of preserve intellectual property.
It’s not the first time that something like this happens
Not only Sony has fallen into this error. Far more serious was Microsoft‘s blunder with Windows XP . Last year practically the same thing happened with the famous Redmond operating system. The reason? The operating system’s SSL certificates had an expiration date, and no one came up with a way to update them.
For the same reason, thousands of old computers that still use this system no longer have access to the web as of September 30, 2021.