UPDATE: On November 17th (Pacific Time), the PlayStation network will undergo maintenance. Once this maintenance window has completed, the new policy will apply. If you want to purchase content under the current rules, please do so before this maintenance begins on November 17th.
We’d like to inform you of some upcoming changes to the usage policies for PlayStation Network game content. As of November 18, 2011, the number of devices that can be activated on one PlayStation Network account for game content purchased from the PlayStation Store will be updated as follows:
For game content purchased after November 18, 2011, a new policy will apply and the number of devices that can be activated will be as follows:
- PS3: Users will be able to play the game on up to 2 activated PS3 systems.
- PSP: Users will be able to play the game on up to 2 activated PSP systems.
Please note that this update will not affect game content purchased before November 18. The PSP rights include PSP-1000/2000/3000 series as well as the PSPgo system.
PlayStation Network users are able to change the activation setting through each device, and Sony Computer Entertainment plans to provide a new PlayStation Network account management website where users will be able to deactivate particular devices attached to their PlayStation Network account via their PC.
For more details on how to activate/deactivate the devices, please visit here or contact consumer services.
This is crap. I have 3 PS3’s so I can play in different rooms. I was thinking of replacing one them that has been freezing lately. But now I’m not going to since it will be a wast, since I will only be able to play my DLC in two out of the three rooms. This will greatly affect what I purchase from the PSN. I probably wont even purchase any more from the PlayStation sure because it will just piss me off knowing I can’t play it in all my rooms. This my even affect my buying of some disk based games. Because if they tend to have lot of DLC that would paid for I don’t want those either. Being only able to play those games in two rooms also will just upset me so why get them an cause heartache for myself. I THINK THIS IS A VERY BAD MOVE ON SONY’S PART. I know I wont be spending nearly as much money on Sony products or stuff for my PS3 or PSP’s, I even reconsidering my pre-order of the PS Vita. My loss will also be your loss Sony.
That kinda sucks, but also good so it will stop all these guys from game sharing instead of just buying all of their damn stuff. lol
PS3. It only keeps doing less.
So…If I have 4 kids w psp’s and I want a game we can all play, I must have at least 2 (possibly 3!) Playstations and two (..*cough 3!) seperate accounts, buy the game at least twice, maybe a third in order for us all (5) to play? Granted it will make network usage look better, but it doesn’t sound very family friendly (have u seen the news, americans r not made of money anymore). I really think u will lose big on micro-transactions this way. It basically sounds like waiting for tablet support on Steam will b better than getting any Vita’s.
hello, just wanted to ask a question and hoped that an employee of sony would help.
My brother had a ps3, the hardrive corrupted and he sent back to sony, so does theis mean i have lost an account? or can i still deactivate it? PLEASE REPLY!!! Thankyou!
I look forward to a way to deactivate PS3 systems via a PC. It’s about time!
Whatever dude… I like sharing! I bet allot of others do too… I like to go over @ my friends/family and use my content. Yeah, I got more than two friends with PS3s… Heck I even wanted to have more than 2 PS3s… I feel so restricted and impotent… Makes me wanna throw up…
this makes no real difference to me.. i’ll be able to retrieve dead activations for all the games i already own and i havent really been buying anything lately.. alot of the games and dlc that release now a days suck
glad they changed this and im suprised they held out this long .. loosing 4 sales on games for every 1 purchase.
like half of you guys that are complaining are just mad that you actually have to purchase content
typical people always looking to get out of paying for stuff
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o yea and it doesnt say your loosing activations for ALL CONTENT!!.. only things you buy after the date will only be limited to two activations..
omg that you can deactivate other devices via pc is the greatest thing ever!!! im so proud that is the best feature and im sure other people that is reading this blog would be excited as well since some ppl game shared and other broken and wont come on
so that is a major big plus for you sony!!! +1
As i said we have 5 PS3’s as we as a family like to play online together, i think that it should be IP address limited so you have to have the 5 consoles in the same house. this would have been a better option. I certainly will not be buying DLC content and games 3 times with this new limit of 2 accounts, also PS+ will not be re brought.
I love the fact that there’s going to be a web site to deactivate/reactivate your account, this should have been implemented right from the beginning. I couldn’t deactivate my system a while back because it had broken down.
funny to see only people that think its a great idea is the jalous peoples that dont brought games over PSN and have no friends, so they cant gameshare anything lol
this is uncool , i have 3 ps3s why should i be limited like this ?
thats why they want our slot to be reduced, they are a bunch of jalous with no friends
If it was downgraded to 3 it would’ve been perfect. My two best friends and I split the money. If someone buys a 15 dollar product then the next person has to buy the next 15 dollar item and so on. But downgraded to 2, really Sony? The only people who support this idea are people who have no friends that trust their account info to them.
I understand that content purchased only AFTER 11/18/2011 is affected, but I’m just curious about the actual activation of my account. I have my account activated on my launch 60GB PS3, which is now dead and long since gone from my humble abode, my current 120GB Slim, my room mate’s PS3 and my live-in girlfriend’s PS3. So, my account is activated on 4 consoles, at the moment, one of which I don’t have access to in order to deactivate.
That said, will this set-up be possible to continue post-11/18? Or, does this only affect the actual activation of the license we purchase when downloading content?
I guess what I’m trying to say is, can my account still be activated on 4 consoles after 11/18? Its just the one console I no longer have access to worries me… as that’s one strike against me that I can’t amend, and only leaves me with one more console to activate my account.
And, as I don’t see a reply feature, I thank you in advance, Karen.
First they lock the ps2 software emulation on slims and then they sell ps2 games for money on the store. Now this. What will they take away next?
A good number of my RL friends were persuaded to buy a PS3 because of the ability to share with 5 PS3’s. You can go ahead and complain about piracy but fact of the matter is that these guys: would not have a PS3 otherwise and would not buy PSN content if they couldn’t share it amongst themselves (and of course disc based content they purchased for themselves). Some is better than none Sony.
I think they are being over reactive babies but they are talking about selling their PS3’s and sticking to their 360’s. Which makes me shamed to call them friends :). Reality is even if these people are wrong I don’t see this move benefiting Sony as clearly this is going to rub people, even people who never ‘abused’ this system the wrong way.
Also, the deactivation system can still let people do this very thing. Albeit it in a more annoying way (only 2 buds at a time). In fact, over time if people were so inclined it could be WORSE since people could just keep passing and deactivating games to many PS3’s. It also would probably lead to more security headaches for Sony as I am sure some people would trick others into giving away information in exchange for a game.
Ah good to know, now I won’t make the mistake of buying a third.
@SJ_Sh4ks… Ur $$, Ur pride, Ur life and ur soul
Note this Sony: Downgrading to 3 PS3’s instead of 2 would be more acceptable amongst the community.
Geez… Sony must not be doing so well by the way they keep harassing their users… Why doesn’t Sony work on a real firmware instead of insulting it’s customers by calling them theives… If you haven’t noticed Sony, the real fans are the ones that stayed after your onlining system was compromised… Hmm…
WOW! are you serious playstation! thanks a lot. you guys are sooo good at doing what the community wants…….NOT!
NO ONE IS HAPPY ABOUT THIS!
Finally, I can deactivate my main account from other PS3 systems. Good thing that my sub account is only gameshared with family memebers and 1 friend, all of whom who have no internet access. But if they do update their system, they all have jobs to pay for their own downloadables.
Only reason for anyone to even be mad at this is people that have multiple PS3’s in the same house that people other than themselves use. Other than that, no one should be mad. If you play on more that 1 PS3 at your own house (that you, and only you, play on), what is the point of even having more than 1, maybe 2.
If you gameshare with people (“friends”), you literally have no reason to be mad. Just buy your own and they can buy their’s.
Either way I look at, I am personally affected by this in a positive way.
What an absolutely horrible move. This has been an absolutely terrible year for PSN. Fail after fail and this is just the icing on the cake.
I just don’t understand what the power in charge are thinking.
Let’s remove feature after feature, on top of already extremely damaging PR incident earlier this year.
I’m just in shock. Plain and simple.
Not to mention, if I ever get another PSP (already had 6 or 7, maybe more), I can deactivate those too :)
Oh, and too people who want to switch to Xbox:
Go ahead. You can still gameshare on PS3, even if it is only once. You can’t gameshare at all on the Xbox.
Good idea! :D I am glad that we now have the ability to remotely deactivate our PS3’s from the website if any of our PS3’s breaks.
Will being able to deactivate your systems via PC be an easy process? I’m out of activations due to disc errors and YLOD none I have access to except 1. Is something going to be required to deactivate such as serial numbers or just a few simple clicks? Thank, Karen.
Thanks for helping me decide. I wont buy another PS3 now.
only 2? That’s pretty lame, 3 would have been fine, but 2? Major downgrade.
correct me if im wrong but if i deactivate a PS3 with all my game in it via PC activation and activate an other PS3
but never put back on the network the old PS3 nothing can stop the “old” PS3 playing all “activated” games offline, that mean i can get 5 PS3 activated that i can play online only 2 will work for new contnents but i can get infinity of offline PS3 with all my games playable!
so people will start to gameshare even more but only for offline games
cuz if i download everything in one PS3 and activate it. put back the PS3 offline reset network setting go via PC activation/deactivation deactivate the PS3, but since u never put back that PS3 it’ll always stay “activate”
it sure work bc people will be able to reset even ylod dead PS3 so that mean peoples will start stealing even more from sony
Upon first reading the announcement, my initial reaction was of great concern and even some anger, as my original PlayStation 3 (purchased in November 2006) broke 2½ years ago. I’m now on my second PS3, and I was worried that if the number of activations was reduced from five to two, then I might get shut out of the many downloadable games I’ve purchased over the years if my current system ever breaks down as well.
However, after reading some of the comments and responses, I was comforted to learn that even broken systems can be deactivated through the PC. With that in mind, I’m fairly content with this arrangement. In my opinion, the ability for the user to activate and deactivate systems at will more than makes up for the reduction in the total number of concurrent activations. I think three PS3s and three PSPs/Vitas would be even better, but as long as activation and deactivation is an easy process for the user, then I’ve got no problem with two.
What a F*(kin wast. I just traded my ps3 to gamestop for $90 and got $87.75 for my games (disk). Grand Total of $177.75… I paid $300 for my ps3 bundle w/ kill zone 3 160g and over $800 in games (disk). That doesnt include the 18 ps1 classics and the 3 ps2 games i purchased on PSN and of course the $200 I spent on PS Home… Thanx SONY for ripping me off with everything u got… Over $1500 in 8 months n all I got was a lousy $177.75 back. N u call US the THIEF’s? *Gives Middle Finger*
hope fully I see a reply for this comment . So your saying in my household with me my gf and my 2 brothers we would have to buy content more than once thats bs I have an account just for my family in which I buy a at least 70$ dollars a month . Im sure other people have it this way aswell I guess I wont be purchasing anymore that many games on psn unless they have couch coop because almost no games do . maybe the fact that you will be able to dissable psn account from certain ps3 would have been enough to scare the people who game share since they know the real owner can just dissable the content that was given to them.
This is a load of crap Sony. I have been a happy customer of the Playstation line for many years. I was not happy with some of your dissicions over the years such as the removal of Other OS and Backward compatable, but could understand why these things were done. But this is not right on so many levels. I have 2 Playstation 3s and 1 PSP at this time. My house hold is just Myself, my wife, and 2 daughters. I am purchasing the Vita and possibly a 2nd PSP for my wife. If I am now going to have to purchase multiple copies of the same games just to have it on both My PS3s, PSP and future Vita than I will have no reason to puchase any further PSN games. Just a thought Sony. Dont punish the lagitamate game users for the things others do.
@OCxViRuXz
That is more or less your’s and Gamestop’s fault, not Sony’s. For any game system, you will get less than half of what a “Used” one costs back at Gamestop, even less if you don’t get in-store credit.
You are kinda really ignorant with that comment. Digital games do not count towards the trade-in credit as Gamestop fully formats the hardrive so nothing is on it (factory default). That is almost completely YOUR fault that you spent so much, not Sony’s.
I cooped up sum money for a game on psn my friend hates me now so when he can deactivate devices can he deactivate mine so i cant play that game?
@HeroKane
If you even read the post, you can still use your account on your current and future PSP and both your PS3’s. They said you can have 2 accounts active on each, not just 1.
@Cyb3rfr34k-iso
Sorry to tell you this, but you are extremely wrong. Once you deactivate the account, the games tied to (downloaded from) said account are deactivated too.
I hope you are rich oh thats right you are.
casue players who own more than 2 ps3 and 2 psp systems that have payed
big money.
wont be able to use psn on their 3 or 4 system or handheld
so if I was them Id charge full price of the system to you all.
Just saying
Im not doing that I only have 2 psp’s 1 I use and the other psp 1000 I rarely use.
But I am getting a new psp limited which is out of circulation a 2001 v1.
I will be useing psn on it.
and 1 ps3.
meaning I own 1 ps3
Sony’s having a really great year.
let me explain in a easier way;
i game share with a friend but he never play “online”.
his PS3 is “activated” on my account.
suppose i “lie” and say that this “friend PS3” was my and YLOD
that mean i can deactivate this PS3 VIA PC website
without deactivate with the very own PS3
that mean i can activate an new PS3 download/install my 2000$ games
and let my friend (who never play online) with the activated slot will be able to continue forever playing all my games
& in the same time i’ll be able to re-take the slot i gave to that friend & 2 put on a new PS3 system
Will you guys be clearing out each accounts current registered consoles and Portables? I’m actually one of the guys that has gone through 3 PSPs and have a lil bro that was registered on my account and his got stolen. I was hoping Vita would have it’s own slot so I wouldn’t be stuck with one portable spot. Whose to say the Vita won’t be problem free and not die on me before I can actually deactivate the system?
@Cyb3rfr34k-iso
Either way you look at it, your account would still be deactivated on his PS3 whether he gets online or not. He wouldn’t be able to play the games because the games are tied to the account. The only way around it is if you do it now and he never updates his system.
nah man i think u really dont understand how activation work
that was the reason why SONY counld not deactivate a PS3 by customer service, phone or anything.
they had to phisically deactivate the PS3 while the PS3 is connected into PSN
Because you can always play games offline whithout any activation chekup.
Yes! A way to deactivate online without having to contact Sony a million times to deactivate a PS3! This would’ve been helpful awhile ago, to me! I had 5 active accounts on PS3’s I didn’t have control over, therefore I was afraid that my PS3 may brake and then I would have to make a new account! THANK YOU SONY!
that mean u can pretend one of your PS3 you only play offline is dead, deactivate the PS3 via website
& still continue playing OFFLINE with it.