this post was submitted on 25 Apr 2026

488 points (98.6% liked)

Games

48104 readers

1296 users here now

Welcome to the largest gaming community on Lemmy! Discussion for all kinds of games. Video games, tabletop games, card games etc.

Rules

1. Submissions have to be related to games

Video games, tabletop, or otherwise. Posts not related to games will be deleted.

This community is focused on games, of all kinds. Any news item or discussion should be related to gaming in some way.

2. No bigotry or harassment, be civil

No bigotry, hardline stance. Try not to get too heated when entering into a discussion or debate.

We are here to talk and discuss about one of our passions, not fight or be exposed to hate. Posts or responses that are hateful will be deleted to keep the atmosphere good. If repeatedly violated, not only will the comment be deleted but a ban will be handed out as well. We judge each case individually.

3. No excessive self-promotion

Try to keep it to 10% self-promotion / 90% other stuff in your post history.

This is to prevent people from posting for the sole purpose of promoting their own website or social media account.

4. Stay on-topic; no memes, funny videos, giveaways, reposts, or low-effort posts

This community is mostly for discussion and news. Remember to search for the thing you're submitting before posting to see if it's already been posted.

We want to keep the quality of posts high. Therefore, memes, funny videos, low-effort posts and reposts are not allowed. We prohibit giveaways because we cannot be sure that the person holding the giveaway will actually do what they promise.

5. Mark Spoilers and NSFW

Make sure to mark your stuff or it may be removed.

No one wants to be spoiled. Therefore, always mark spoilers. Similarly mark NSFW, in case anyone is browsing in a public space or at work.

6. No linking to piracy

Don't share it here, there are other places to find it. Discussion of piracy is fine.

We don't want us moderators or the admins of lemmy.world to get in trouble for linking to piracy. Therefore, any link to piracy will be removed. Discussion of it is of course allowed.

Authorized Regular Threads

Related communities

PM a mod to add your own

Video games

Generic

!gaming@Lemmy.world: Our sister community, focused on PC and console gaming. Meme are allowed.
!photomode@feddit.uk: For all your screenshots needs, to share your love for games graphics.
!vgmusic@lemmy.world: A community to share your love for video games music
!freegames@feddit.uk: A community sharing free games giveaways.

Help and suggestions

By platform

By type

By games

Language specific

!JeuxVideo@jlai.lu: French

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

Dremor@lemmy.world

JonsJava@lemmy.world

Dremor@jlai.lu

PerfectDark@lemmy.world

488

[PlayStation] [DRM] Licenses now requires an online check-in every 30 days. (xcancel.com)

submitted 3 days ago* (last edited 23 hours ago) by artwork@lemmy.world to c/games@lemmy.world

107 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hugely terrible DRM has now been rolled out to all PS4 and PS5 digital games. Every digital game you buy now requires an online check-in every 30 days. If you buy a digital game and don't connect your console to the internet for 30 days, your license will be removed.

Source [2026-04-25; +image]

---

You wouldn't "lose" it, the licence would be restored after connecting to internet... provided Sony's servers are still functioning when you do...

Source [2026-04-25]

---

...Trophies on PS4 require the internal system clock (the one you can’t see / alter) to be correct, so people cant change their PS4 date/time to make it look like they got trophies earlier than they really did. If your PS4 clock battery dies, all your games die

Source [2021-03-23]

---

Newly purchased PS4 games now have 30 day valid license timer.
Most likely introduced in March 2026 firmware.
Could be a bug similar to an incident from 2022.
PS5 is affected too, but only shows an error when starting a game.

Source [2026-04-25]

---

Update x2: not a bug - PlayStation just quietly confirmed it’s intentional.
Any digital game you buy after the march 2026 update now requires you to go online at least once every 30 days or it won’t even launch.

Source [2026-04-28]

[Image] Official PlayStation Support Response [2026-04-28]

Source: https://xcancel.com/SmashJT/status/2048887546323808258#m

[Image] "Don't Starve Together" (PlayStation)

(page 2) 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] LemmyEntertainYou@piefed.social 22 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Further reinforcing my decision to hard dump Sony after the PS4.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago

Same, except I dumped them a lot longer ago. (And frankly, I didn't own much from them even before that, except a '90s Walkman and maybe a few other small things.)

load more comments (3 replies)

[–] skozzii@lemmy.ca 18 points 3 days ago

People gotta stop buying Playstations, they keep doing dumb stuff.

[–] NotASharkInAManSuit@lemmy.world 26 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Welp, looks like it’s time to check out some of those PS4 hacks, eh? Ahoy, ahoy.

[–] lath@piefed.social 6 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Find ps4s that weren't updated to the latest because as i understood it, they've essentially bricked its modding capabilities with a patch.

[–] lyralycan@sh.itjust.works 10 points 3 days ago

And that is why turning off automatic updates is sometimes necessary, and a must for games, consoles and mobiles. Because the anti consumer practices by corporate shitlords are far worse than a low chance of being hacked through a "security flaw".

[–] Areldyb@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

My PS4's been collecting dust for a while, so I'm sure its firmware is out of date. Time to see what the homebrew scene is all about!

Edit: we can run Linux now? Oh this is gonna be fun

load more comments (2 replies)

[–] v4ld1z@lemmy.zip 4 points 3 days ago

The latest PS4 jailbreak goes up to like FW 13.50 and there's a plethora of different methods to choose from - all of them pretty easy to do at home with minimal preparation. There's even tools you can purchase that do the jailbreak for you, automatically.

Have a look at Modded Warfare's channel on YT if you're interested. He's doing regular updates on the modding scene and has lots of good, detailed tutorials to follow along.

[–] KindnessIsPunk@lemmy.ca 19 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Remember when they clowned on Xbox for this

[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

No.

They clowned on Xbox for wanting to lock physical games to a single account/console.

The second hand market no longer means shit because Game Pass and PlayStation Plus exist.

[–] KindnessIsPunk@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 days ago (2 children)

No it was also about online check-in you just don't remember

load more comments (2 replies)

[–] Mr_Dr_Oink@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago

So i am clear, as this will affect me, it isn't saying i need a subscription, just that i need to have my ps5 connected to the internet?

Can someone help me to understand why this is an issue if i play online games as well as offline.

Does it just mean it becomes a problem when support for the ps5 stops? Like when you cant log in anymore?

[–] TwinTitans@lemmy.world 15 points 3 days ago

Won’t buy digital. Won’t buy key cards. Won’t buy blank disks.

[–] network_switch@lemmy.ml 15 points 3 days ago

Consoles are a closed off wasteland

[–] sturmblast@lemmy.world 15 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Steal video games until these asshats change course

[–] cookiecoookie@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago

Its been 84 years...

[–] brsrklf@jlai.lu 11 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Shit. I was going to say, maybe I could not update (I haven't in a while) and keep my console offline forever.

But then I remembered that thanks to the piss poor storage capacity of that console half my games must be unistalled right now.

First Sony console I ever bought. After that stunt, also last.

[–] mcforest@feddit.org 13 points 3 days ago (6 children)

I don't even understand why there is any necessity for this. Was there even the possibility to run games you haven't bought on a PS5?

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 8 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Recent breakthroughs in the hacking scene have been made against Sony's current hypervisor layer of protection which has, historically, been the breaking point of getting unsigned code running on the consoles. So it's only a matter of time before you may be able to pirate PS5 games.

load more comments (5 replies)

[–] NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world 5 points 3 days ago

WTF

load more comments