PSN Developers Discuss PSN Disaster

John Funk

U.N. Owen Was Him?
Dec 20, 2005
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PSN Developers Discuss PSN Disaster

How is the PSN kerfuffle affecting developers who make downloadable games for the service?

Despite an PSN disaster [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/109579-Some-Good-News-Surfaces-Regarding-PSN-Catastrophe] is one hell of a debacle. But while the outage - and related problems - are causing headache for consumers, what about the indie studios who make a living selling downloadable games over PSN?

"Well, the outage has certainly affected our sales," Creat Studios' Bill Fryer told Gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/34306/Developers_Say_PSN_Outage_Affecting_Sales_But_Remain_Hopeful.php], "[But] we are supportive of Sony and hopeful that this extended maintenance will lead to a more secure network altogether." Creat's Test Yourself, released March 8th, was one of the top 5 downloadable games on PSN at the time of the service outage.

Beyond sales, said Fryer, the outage means that PS3 users aren't seeing banners or ads, so the company (and its game) has lost visibility and mindshare in addition to sales lost.

Alexey Menshikov, CEO of Kiev-based Beatshapers, was slightly more confident in his studio's stability given that the game most affected - StarDrone, which released in early April - wasn't the company's only product on sale. Still, while he doubted any "permanent damage" would happen to the studio, he admitted Beatshapers was feeling the loss of a week's sales. "This is a sad situation."

He hopes that Sony would recompense developers in some way when service was restored, perhaps in the form of decreased royalties on sales.

Of all the companies who make games on PSN, PopCap is almost surely one of the most stable - after all, it makes a ton of wildly popular games on a ton of varied platforms. Like Test Yourself PopCap's Plants vs. Zombies, which we here at The Escapist adore, was one of the top five downloadable games on PSN at the time everything went kaput.

"We're rooting for Sony to resolve the issue as quickly as possible," a PopCap rep told Gamasutra. "PSN is one of our primary channels for reaching console game fans, and it does feel as though Sony should compensate customers, if not developers, for the outage."

I think most consumers would probably agree with PopCap there.

(Gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/34306/Developers_Say_PSN_Outage_Affecting_Sales_But_Remain_Hopeful.php])

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GeeksUtopia

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Feb 26, 2011
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Yeah I mean they should compensate their loyal customers for this outage. I mean if people who are willing to stick by sony even after such an outage, should deserve a little bit of gratitude. Perhaps like a free downloadable game from the psn or perhaps an extra five bucks in the psn wallet, something to show gratitude who know how to stick to their system
 

Keith K

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Oct 29, 2009
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I want no compensation. It would probably be something useless, worthless or something I already have.

I just want to change my password and billing information.
 

RatRace123

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Dec 1, 2009
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Keith K said:
I want no compensation. It would probably be something useless, worthless or something I already have.

I just want to change my password and billing information.
Seconded, I don't want any meaningless "We're sorry" thing, I just want to change all my stuff.
 

gellert1984

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Apr 16, 2009
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GeeksUtopia said:
Yeah I mean they should compensate their loyal customers for this outage. I mean if people who are willing to stick by sony even after such an outage, should deserve a little bit of gratitude. Perhaps like a free downloadable game from the psn or perhaps an extra five bucks in the psn wallet, something to show gratitude who know how to stick to their system
They won't charge you for the time the PSN was down.
 

Eri

The Light of Dawn
Feb 21, 2009
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As long as they at least give me free credit monitoring for a year or two, I'd be happy.
 

Onyx Oblivion

Borderlands Addict. Again.
Sep 9, 2008
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I'll buy some titles to help these companies when it gets back up...Well, not they're titles.

But that new Diablo rip-off.
 

gigastar

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Sep 13, 2010
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The most satisfying thing i could want from Sony right now is them tracking down the ones who did this and sueing them into perpetual bankruptcy. Either that or a copy of Castle Crashers.
 

Gaiseric

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Sep 21, 2008
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This is the second article today I've seen the word "kerfuffle".

I don't want any compensation. Simple admission they dun fucked up, fixed the problem, and if at all possible somehow finding out who's responsible and tearing them apart.

edit: and helping people out who got the credit card info stolen would be a stand up thing to do.(PSN cards for life!)
 

mireko

Umbasa
Sep 23, 2010
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gigastar said:
The most satisfying thing i could want from Sony right now is them tracking down the ones who did this and sueing them into perpetual bankruptcy. Either that or a copy of Castle Crashers.
Suing is too good, kill them. Fire them into space, fill them with bees, fire them into bees full of space. I don't care, as long as it ends them.

Or that Might & Magic game. It looks pretty cool.
 

Sniper Team 4

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Apr 28, 2010
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mireko said:
gigastar said:
The most satisfying thing i could want from Sony right now is them tracking down the ones who did this and sueing them into perpetual bankruptcy. Either that or a copy of Castle Crashers.
Suing is too good, kill them. Fire them into space, fill them with bees, fire them into bees full of space. I don't care, as long as it ends them.

Or that Might & Magic game. It looks pretty cool.
Nice. Very nice indeed. These people need to die.

If Sony is willing to give a free twenty or fifty dollar credit to their store, I won't complain, but I really just want my stuff back.
 

Littlee300

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Oct 26, 2009
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They should make some popcap games for free if they are doing the percent of price goes to the dev thing for sales since they're being so greedy.

Edit: I hope they fire the idiots who worked on sony's security...
 

nipsen

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Sep 20, 2008
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Mm. I know that if I had just managed to finally get a sweet version of The Fancy Pants Adventures released - and the network goes down for a week right after release-day - I would be pissed.

fancypantsadventures.com/ [http://www.fancypantsadventures.com]
 

TheComfyChair

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Sep 17, 2010
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I'm pretty sure most indie companies with their head screwed on the right way all use steam as a primary platform anyway.