Sony To Close PS3, PS Vita & PSP Stores From July

Sony have confirmed the rumours swirling the closure of the digital storefronts is accurate. From the 2nd July you’ll no longer be able to purchase any digital games or DLC for the PlayStation 3 or the PSP. The PlayStation Vita’s shop will close on 27th August.

The full statement from Sony reads:

We are closing PlayStation™Store on PlayStation®3 on 2 July 2021 and on PlayStation®Vita devices on 27 August 2021. Additionally, the remaining purchase functionality for PSP™ (PlayStation®Portable) will also retire on 2 July 2021. After thoughtful consideration, we decided to make these changes in an effort to focus our resources for PlayStation Store on PlayStation®4 and PlayStation®5, which will enable us to enhance the customer experience even further. We thank you for your support on these platforms throughout the years.

You are still able to download any games or content that you’ve purchased over your time with the consoles, and the multiplayer servers remain live for now. As Nintendo has shown with the Wii, this might not always be the case.

To most gamers, they aren’t effected by this. It’s been 15 years have passed since the PS3 launched and seven years since the PS4 was released so we are talking about a legacy console. However, there are still people who play retro consoles today and with the prices of physical copies for those hard to find games creeping up, the digital storefront was a handy alternative.

That’s just from a consumer point of view. Developers that have exclusively published their games digitally for either the PS3, Vita or PSP will see their game eradicated. Again, we’re aware that the majority of gamers have moved onto newer consoles but there is a strong retro community looking to discover and shout about these titles.

The closure of the PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita and PlayStation Portable stores, brings a curious question. What will happen in the future when the PlayStation 5 store with its Digital Edition console becomes a non-viable option?