Whilst lazing around in bed having some multiplayer fun (split screen Blur is our game of choice) my beloved asked an interesting question, “Is PlayStation Plus good value for money?”
When Sony release details of an upcoming month’s PlayStation Plus games the complaints are immediate; “Very disappointing update (again),” “You’re giving us lame arcade puzzle games like Critter Crunch,” and “I’m so fed up with the content so far,” are just some of the comments on the EU PlayStation Blog. Are the complaints justified?
Below is a list of the gaming content from the first six months worth of PlayStation Plus. I have not counted avatars, special offers or themes. Any price in italic is an estimate (from my admittedly sketchy memory) as the games are no longer available on the PS Store. If you can confirm any of these prices then please mention it the comments section and I will update the table accordingly.
- July 2010
- LittleBigPlanet – £15.99
- WipeOut HD – £19.99
- Fieldrunners – £2.49
- Age Of Zombies – £0.99
- Destruction Derby – £3.99
- Killzone 2 DLC – £4.79
- August 2010
- Zen Pinball – £7.99
- Alien Zombie Death – £2.49
- Blast Off – £2.49
- Destruction Derby – £3.99
- Motorstorm: Pacific Rift DLC – £4.79
- September 2010
- Sam & Max: The Devil’s Playground – £19.99
- VectorTD – £2.49
- Echoes – £0.99
- Oddworld: Abe’s Odyssey – £3.99
- UFC Undisputed 2010 DLC – £3.19
- October 2010
- Streetfighter 2 HD Remix – £11.99
- Aeroracer – £2.49
- Yeti Sports – £2.49
- Kula World – £3.99
- Fallout 3 DLC – £39.95
- November 2010
- Critter Crunch – £7.99
- Bloons – £3.49
- Vempire – £1.49
- Syphon Filter – £3.99
- December 2010
- Cuboid – £7.99
- Bubble Trouble – £3.99
- Dracula: Undead Awakening – £3.99
- Oddworld: Abe’s Exodus – £3.99
- Sackboy’s Prehistoric Moves £4.99
If my beloved had subscribed to PlayStation Plus back in July, after the initial outlay of £20 (six months worth of PS+ subscription) he would have received £191.02 worth of content. I have calculated how much money I have personally saved and even though I already have some of the more pricey items such as the Fallout DLC I have saved £105.02. In terms of ‘value for money’ PlayStation Plus is a no-brainer, in just six months a single pound of gaming investment has an interest rate of 930%.
This leaves the question of quality, paying £20 for £180 worth of horse manure is not a good idea unless you have a very large garden. Let’s take a look at the Metacritic scores for each month’s main game.
- WipeOut HD – 87%
- LittleBigPlanet – 95%
- Zen Pinball – 80%
- Sam & Max: The Devil’s Playground – 81%
- Streetfighter 2 HD Remix – 87%
- Critter Crunch – 87%
- Cuboid – 79%
PlayStation Plus has provided exclusive beta to access to blockbuster titles such as Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood and Killzone 3, full game trials, automatic downloads, DLC, seven top Playstation titles with an average Metacritic rating of 85%, DLC, minis, themes, avatars, money-off offers and bonus items such as Sackboy’s Prehistoric Moves, all for the price of less than a Big Mac meal a month.
Is PlayStation Plus good value for money? Absolutely.
Note: As many of you have pointed out if you cancel your PS+ subscription then you can no longer access any content you many have downloaded. My apologies for not mentioning this, I did assume this was common knowledge. I still think that for the cost of a pint a month PS+ is excellent value.
R4U Eldave0
Absolutely excellent service providing you don’t regularly buy items off the store. Its also great if you are trying to save some money but still want that gaming fix each month. Well worth the investment.
gazzagb
Totally disagree. Pretty much all of the content is old, and most of it I therefore already have. I’ve been included in both the ACB and KZ3 betas (the KZ3 one I managed to play a month before PS+’ers).
It’s clearly working for Sony though and is great psychology on their part. Those that have bought PS+, are basically in a contractual agreement that they will continue to buy stuff from the Store whether they actually want it or not because they believe its saving them money.
If I counted the content that I bought at the full price in comparison to what PS+’ers pay for the service, and then all the stuff they buy, I know that I have easily saved far more than them by not getting PS+.
If Sony want me to Sub, they need better quality content, and newer content. I’m not going to waste my money on old stuff that I don’t even want.
Tuffcub
How can you NOT want 7 top rated PSN games for the price on one? I didnt ‘want’ Sam & Max but now I have it it’s brilliant. SO far the only game that hasnt impressed me is Cuboid.
gazzagb
They maybe top rated, but that doesn’t mean I want them. I bought the ones I wanted when the first came out, which was ages ago.
CNWLshadow
But isnt that the point, you didn’t want sam &max, you brought it just because you could get it cheap, trying to make your investment in PSN+ more justifyable.
Tuffcub
No I didnt “Want” Sam & Max previously but now I have it, I do like it. However I’ve now paid less than £3.30 for a game that should cost me £20. Win!
gazzagb
That is EXACTLY want Sony wanted to happen.
As I said before fair play to Sony, it’s brilliant psychology to make people think that they are still getting a good deal out of it, and it’s clearly going to bring them more money.
Rocket_345
@gazzagb
I can see exactly where you are coming from but i’ve added up all of the prices of all the games i did want but didn’t have and it has come to £54.53 which means i have saved money. For you maybe it is a waste of money as you won’t get things you want or don’t already have.
SpikeyMikey23
How dare you TC, Cuboid is the bollocks!!
3shirts
It’s been exceptional value for me so far ;)
loonytoon1982
Having owned the majority of the content that I would like from the above list before it was added to PS+ it offers little to no value for money to me at all. It’s a fantastic deal for people who weren’t too fussed about getting PSN games or payed little attention to the store.
For the user who is loyal enough to the service that they buy what they want when it becomes available it offers nothing. I choose not to purchase it because quite simply, it has nothing for me that I don’t already own.
Offering betas as an incentive doesn’t work on me either. I have no problem chancing my luck at getting a code elsewhere. If I don’t, it’s not the end of the world.
The only thing that I would like is the automatic updates but they’re certainly not worth £40 a year. Takes no more than 5 mins for a large update to download.
Ro6afc11
I couldn’t agree more. Personally I think it has been great value. Of the 7 main games TC has listed I only had two of them already one of which was LBP, but it is actually quite nice to have a digital copy. I have enjoyed the other five titles which I may never have bought. Add in everything else you get and I don’t see how it could ever be deemed to be bad value.
I will only whisper this as I don’t want the bigwigs at Sony hearing but for me there is almost too much. I have hardly played any of the one hour trials yet, they are just sat there waiting for me to get round to them. I will though one day. Also can’t imagine how much stuff my PSP will have on it when I next go on holiday!
I would renew without hesitation.
4lf13
I totally agree. It’s brilliant value for money and for me the best bit is the minis because I board at school, so the only gaming time I get is 5-10 minutes here and there on my psp, which is perfectly suited for them.
Caemgen
What they could consider to do, is offer two ‘big’ (as in: the mini’s and everything else will remain the same) games of which you can choose every month, so people won’t end up with a free game they already bought.
Or: Alternatively, offer a -50% price reduction on one of the more recent games in the Store and then disable the download for the free game.
Whatever… just, more choice would be great.
O and did I mention features? Yes I did.
More features!
Foxhound_Solid
I love PS+. Its awesome man, its totally worth for KZ3 Beta alone. All the freebies and discounts are just brilliant. Its suce a good idea….:-)
cc_star
Adding up the money of each item, and its obviously great value.
However, how much of that you’d have bought anyway is a debatable point, its only saving you money if you were going to spend that money.
Also, of the good stuff a sizeable amount of people would have already bought it anyway… Take Shatter for example, the game launched to top reviews, so many people would have bought it, then a month later it was added to PS+ as a full game trial, even more people would have bought it, and now 7 months later they give it away.
I set up a new folder on my XMB & place all PS+ content in it, after I play the new additions for 5mins straight after their uploaded, I don’t think I’ve been in that folder for months.
The content hasn’t appealed to me for the past few months and were it not for the KZ3 beta then end of the year would have looked very sparse indeed… and don’t get me started on MAG being free in the US
I won’t be renewing after my year is up, but I wish I could purchase the auto-downloads separately, because that is handy.
I have also found myself buying far less stuff just in case it ever appears in PS+ which it invariably it doesn’t always, meaning I’ve missed out on some great games in 2010 – although they’ll probably appear in PS+ through 2011, when you could argue they’re worth far less anyway.
FoxHoundGabe
Completely agree.
AND also, remember you dont actually “own” most of the stuff you get, you will lose it if you dont renew, so you are acctually “renting” it for the time you subscribe.
You should take that into account when you compare the two.
minerwilly
Your kidding me right ? is that correct that if you don’t renew you lose all the stuff ! Case Closed if thats true .
Kovacs
Clearly states that in the terms and conditions.
minerwilly
Hit the nail on the head CC . I have yet to sign up and yet to be convinced . I in the last 6 months have bought Peggle (99p) , Joe Danger 9.99 (i think) and Zen Pinball £6.29 . These appealed to me and i bought them so to have shelled out however much a subscription is to get lots of games i would never have bought and childish stuff like LBP costumes is a waste of mine and a lot of others money .
Im not saying everybody is doing this but some people just dont like to admit they made a mistake and try to justify what they did to make themselves feel less daft ! Ive done it myself , i remember owning an old Ford Capri about 10 years ago and friends said why did you buy that old hunk of rusted crap but i’d be defending it valiantly but deep down in my head i was starting to hate hit too and was glad to see the back of it (but never admitted that to my mates ! )
TSBonyman
I am giving subscribtion some serious thought atm. I don’t want background updates if it also pushes content i don’t want/already have. But i buy a lot of games so i know i’ll save a bit with the discounts and will able to take advantage of exclusive betas etc.
Tuffcub
They seemd to have stopped the auto push content.
TSBonyman
that is good news, and probably means i’m more likely to subscribe now..