During yesterday’s State of Play, Sony announced that the massively successful angry-dad sim God of War: Ragnarok will arrive on PC later this year. They also revealed via blog post that it will require a PSN account. At first, the messaging was a tad unclear but Sony edited the post to make the PSN requirement more obvious.
Sony, of course, has been in the news a few times this year due to its PSN account requirements on PC titles. While it’s hardly a new trend (heaps of games from 3rd parties require accounts, like Ubisoft and EA titles) Helldivers 2 drew the ire of gamers due to the need for a PSN account being suspending to begin with and then reintroduced later on.
Really, the need for a PSN account isn’t the news here – we already knew it would most likely need one, and Sony are being upfront about it. Of course, that won’t be any comfort to the 170+ regions in which a PSN cannot be made, and presumably Ragnarok won’t be sold in those regions, much like Ghost of Tsushima and Helldivers 2 aren’t.
Getting back on track though, the real news is Sony’s baffling inconsistency when it comes to the need for a PSN account. Ghost if Tsushima required a PSN account but only for its multiplayer component. The fantastic singleplayer can be played without an account. It still wasn’t sold in the many regions where PSN isn’t supported, although that didn’t stop it from becoming the 2nd biggest PlayStation game on PC.
God of War: Ragnarok though, is an entirely singleplayer experience so its unclear as to why it needs an account while Ghost of Tsushima doesn’t. It could be an attempt by Sony to more gradually bring in the PSN requirement, or perhaps it’s going to be decided on a game-by-game basis. Either way, it’s slightly confusing messaging.
Perhaps Sony needs to make things clearer, but it does seem obvious that all PlayStation titles going forward will need a PSN account, whether they are singleplayer or multiplayer.