If you grew up with video games and computers, you certainly felt the joy of opening the lid of physical media when taking out the media, whether in the form of cartridges or discs. However, the era of physical media for video games seems to be coming to an end in a few years, especially with the latest announcement by Sony.
Sid Shuman, General Director of Content Communications at Sony Interactive Entertainment has announced that Sony will stop producing physical Blu-Ray discs for games released for the Sony PlayStation console starting January 2028.
This means that for all new games released in January 2028 will no longer come with Blu-Ray disc media, and all physical boxes sold in stores and game distributors will come with a digital code that can be exchanged for a copy of the game on the PlayStation Store.
This is perhaps not a surprise when you see that Blu-Ray disc production has been declining year by year, and it seems that 2028 is the year that for Sony at least, the existence of physical copies of games will cease.
Offering digital game codes in physical box sales is nothing new. Nintendo already started doing it when they launched their Nintendo Switch 2 console earlier this year. Grand Theft Auto VI, which is scheduled to launch in November, also featured a similar offer at launch, with rumors that the physical media will only be available in mid- to late December.
This is a pretty sad announcement for those who prefer to own physical copies of their favorite video and computer games. It looks like we’re going to be moving to digital-only “ownership” in the future, whether we like it or not.
