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A former Square Enix exec believes that PS Store prices could actually come down as a result of Sony’s decision to end all physical media on PlayStation.
Sony announced on 1st July that it will end all physical media on PlayStation, including for games not published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. All releases from January 2028 onwards will be digital-only, including code-in-the-box-style options at retail. It applies to all games releasing on PlayStation, including third-party titles, not just those produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment.
Jacob Navok, former director of business development at Square Enix and now CEO of Genvid, laid out the argument on Twitter/X.
Competition between publishers is what drives pricing pressure, not competition between digital stores. This is because publishers set pricing on digital stores.
Competition between stores like EGS and Steam improves the take rates for developers, not necessarily the price for… https://t.co/6ZZw8EUJ5v pic.twitter.com/0QLQmclwsG
— Jacob Navok (@JNavok) August 13, 2026
His core point is that “competition between publishers is what drives pricing pressure, not competition between digital stores” – in other words, it’s publishers who set the price on a digital storefront, not the store itself.
According to Navok, that means competition between Steam and the Epic Games Store mostly affects the cut developers get to keep, rather than what players actually pay.
Where prices do fall, he argues, is when a title is competing directly against other titles on the same storefront – pointing to a chart of Final Fantasy 16’s Steam pricing gradually sliding downward over time as evidence of that competitive pressure at work.
Applied to PlayStation specifically, Navok predicts: “The more the PlayStation Store becomes digital only, the greater this trend will accelerate.
“You will see more sales and dynamic pricing similar to Steam because publishers will compete among themselves to a greater extent.”
It’s worth noting that cheaper games wouldn’t offset every downside of the move – concerns remain around digital ownership rights, and there’s no physical option left for anyone who still wants one. Whether that trade-off works out in players’ favour is very much a matter of perspective.
If there was ever any doubt, Sony doesn’t seem to be backing down from its controversial decision to stop manufacturing disc-based games. It appears a notice has now been added to new PS5 consoles that have disc drives to warn users that, as announced, PlayStation will cease supporting physical media at the beginning of 2028.
