If you like playing online multiplayer games on your Xbox One but hate that you can never play your pal because she’s a PlayStation 4 devotee, here’s some promising news. [More]
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Sony’s PlayStation Vue Now Available Nationwide; Starts At $30/Month
By 3.14.16
It’s been almost a year since Sony launched its PlayStation Vue live-TV streaming service in a limited number of cities. The company is now adding 203 new TV markets to the Vue family for a lower monthly price than its previous streaming TV plans — but without the perk of live broadcast channels. [More]
Sony Finally Handing Out Free Game Codes From 2014 Lawsuit Over 2011 Outage And Breach
By 3.8.16
Do you remember the Great PlayStation Network Hack of 2011, which caused a 23-day outage and a massive credit card breach? I didn’t: I had to look it up. If you were one of the estimated 70 million people affected, and you happened to know about a class action suit settled in 2014 to file a claim, you can expect to receive some game credits soon. Make sure that the claims administrators know where to find you. [More]
Raiders Of The Lost Walmart Find Another MP3 Player Case That No One Will Buy
By 3.7.16
Walmart has almost got this thing with clearing out their old electronics figured out. They found an old item somewhere in the bowels of the store, which was great. They marked it down from $19.88 to $3, which is more reasonable than most of their electronics markdowns. Unfortunately, they may have overestimated the market out there for silicone cases for MP3 players from 2007 or 2008. [More]
GameStop Planning To Sell Sony VR Headset In The Fall
By 2.16.16
We’ve been hearing about the Sony VR since it was dubbed “Project Morpheus,” but as much as the tech giant loves to show it off, Sony has yet to give a firm release window for the virtual reality headset. However, GameStop CEO Paul Raines tipped his cards on that schedule during an interview this morning. [More]
Sony Cuts The Price Of A Year’s Subscription To PlayStation Now By More Than Half
By 12.7.15
If you’ve been eyeing PlayStation Now — Sony’s PS3 game streaming service — but if you haven’t been willing to fork over $19.99 for a month’s access or $44.99 for three months of the service, now might be your moment, as Sony is offering up a year’s subscription for $99.99. [More]
Betamax Tapes Going Off The Market: This Post Was Not Written In 1988
By 11.10.15
You may remember the videotape format wars of the 1980s, where VHS eventually triumphed over Betamax, making that one family on your street who couldn’t borrow videos from everyone else feel very silly. After the format wars ended, Betamax didn’t vanish. Players were still manufactured until 2002, and Sony was still making tapes until very recently. [More]
Want To Watch ESPN Without Cable? Buy A PlayStation
By 11.5.15
Live sports — the supposed killer app that keeps people subscribing to cable when otherwise they might cut the cord — is, well, going cordless. Disney today announced a deal with Sony that will bring all of their programming, including ESPN, to a streaming service near you. At least, if you live in the right area. [More]
How My Credit Card Company Helped Save My Broken PS4 When Sony Wouldn’t
By 10.6.15
It’s been 11 months since Michael’s brother PS4 failed, months he’s spent trying to get Sony to fix what should have been covered by the gaming console’s one-year warranty. But because there was no proof of his efforts to have the PlayStation 4 repaired under warranty, prompting Sony to basically shrug and wipe its hands of the situation, Michael had to take another route to victory. [More]
Sony’s Virtual Reality Headset Is Called…. PlayStation VR
By 9.16.15
After spending more than year referring to its virtual reality headset with the over-the-top working title Project Morpheus, Sony finally revealed the true identity of its immersive accessory, and it’s a bit of a letdown: PlayStation VR. [More]
Sony: You Actually Shouldn’t Use Waterproof Xperia Phones Underwater
By 9.11.15
Sony’s doing a bit of an about face after touting its Xperia devices as being waterproof enough that users can take pictures and videos underwater, updating its support page to advise against doing exactly that. [More]
Don’t Expect To Play Your PS3 Games On A PS4 Anytime Soon
By 6.19.15
Owners of Sony’s PlayStation 4 hoping the company would follow in Microsoft’s footsteps and add backwards compatibility to allow PS3 games to be played on the newer console shouldn’t hold their breath, as executives for the electronics company say they have no immediate plans to implement the technology. [More]
Sony Says My PS4 Is Too Infested With Bugs And Dust To Fix Under Warranty, Won’t Offer Proof
By 6.17.15
There’s a certain sense of relief provided by a warranty — when your product stops working, you can just send it in for repairs or sometimes receive a new one to replace it. But Consumerist reader Levi says he found himself out of luck after his PlayStation 4 gave him the “blue light of death,” despite the fact that it was under warranty. [More]
How Do Video Game Publishers Continue To Get Away With Mistreating Their Customers?
By 6.17.15
It’s E3 time: the annual video game conference — still, barely nominally, a trade show — is taking place this week in Los Angeles, drawing developers, publishers, and media from around the world to gawk at titles large and small. From Facebook games to Fallout, everything is on display… including the long history of the contentious, adversarial relationship between the companies that make the games and the consumers who play them. [More]
PlayStation Vue Will Sell (Sort Of) A La Carte Pay-TV Channels; Launches In L.A., San Francisco
By 6.15.15
Sony’s PlayStation Vue streaming pay-TV service launched earlier this year in three markets and while it offers up competition for traditional cable and satellite providers, the bundles weren’t that different from what we’ve been getting for decades. Tonight, the company announced vague plans to offer more customizable pay-TV options through Vue starting later this year. [More]
Two States Probe Apple Music Over Antitrust Concerns
By 6.10.15
When Apple moved into the e-book market several years ago, the company colluded with the country’s largest book publishers to fix prices and gain a foothold in the market. Now as Apple jumps into the subscription streaming music business, at least two states are asking whether the company may be repeating itself. [More]
Why Cord-Cutters Aren’t Getting The Holy Grail TV Of Streaming Services Just Yet
By 5.14.15
As a growing number of consumers drop — or never sign up for — traditional pay-TV services, it’s easy to point to Netflix as a big reason. And yet, Netflix and similar services don’t actually replace the TV experience, especially when it comes to sports. Newer offerings, like Sling TV and PlayStation Vue, replicate the live TV watching experience, but falter compared to traditional pay-TV when it comes to things like DVR functionality. What’s stopping the big players from offering an all-in-one online service now? [More]
Showtime May Soon Announce Standalone Streaming Service
By 4.24.15
Back in Nov. 2014, CBS CEO Les Moonves said that his company’s Showtime network would “fairly definitively” launch some sort of standalone streaming service in 2015. Since then, there hasn’t really been much news about it. But since HBO has launched HBO Now without the world coming to an end, it looks like it might be time for CBS to unveil that service. [More]
