Upcoming Sony-Published Game Drops PSN Requirement on PC

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Summary

  • Lost Soul Aside’s PC version has seemingly removed the controversial PSN account linking requirement ahead of its 2025 launch.
  • This will allow publisher Sony to sell Lost Soul Aside in countries that aren’t supported by PSN, boosting the game’s overall reach and sales potential.
  • Sony’s decision to drop the PSN account linking rule for Lost Soul Aside may hint at a more flexible approach for PlayStation’s PC games going forward.

It appears that fresh data supports the claim that the upcoming Sony-published game, “Lost Soul Aside,” has eliminated its PlayStation Network account prerequisite for PC gamers. This change implies that players of “Lost Soul Aside” on PC will no longer need to deal with linking their PSN accounts, and it also broadens the range of regions where Sony can distribute the game when it’s released in 2025, thereby increasing the number of places it can be sold.

Lost Soul Aside” is one of the most eagerly awaited indie games to emerge from PlayStation’s extended China Hero Project nurturing program. This hack-and-slash action RPG, influenced by “Devil May Cry” and emphasizing “fluid combat,” has been in development for nearly nine years by Shanghai studio UltiZeroGames. Sony, the game’s financial backer, is also set to publish “Lost Soul Aside” on PS5 and PC. However, last year, Sony started requiring linking of PlayStation Network accounts for PlayStation games on PC, a move that has sparked criticism from many users on the platform.

Approximately 100 countries globally do not have access to PlayStation Network (PSN), thus games that demand PSN cannot be sold in these regions, limiting their sales and player reach potential. However, it seems that “Lost Soul Aside” will break the mold by not imposing a PSN account prerequisite for its PC version. Just after the latest gameplay trailer of “Lost Soul Aside” was unveiled in December 2024, its Steam page became active. Initially, the Steam page for “Lost Soul Aside” mentioned a requirement for a PSN account, but its update history on SteamDB reveals that this requirement was removed the following day.

Lost Soul Aside is the Second Sony-Published Game to Drop the PSN Account Linking Rule on PC

For gamers eagerly anticipating playing “Lost Soul Aside” on their PC, this news is undoubtedly a source of relief, especially for those living in regions where PlayStation Network (PSN) isn’t available. This development adds an intriguing twist to the concept of PlayStation games on PC, as Sony has only previously wavered on the PSN requirement during the controversy surrounding “Helldivers 2” and its PSN account linking issues. After that incident, it was believed that PSN account linking was a necessity for all PlayStation games on PC. However, the exclusion of “Lost Soul Aside” from this rule suggests that Sony may not be as strict about it as initially thought.

At this point, it’s unclear why Sony is making an exception for the PC version of “Lost Soul Aside” by not requiring a PSN account, but theories suggest that they aim to make the game accessible to as many players as possible. Previously, PlayStation games didn’t fare well on PC once PSN account linking was enforced, with “God of War Ragnarok” accumulating less than half of its predecessor’s player count on Steam.

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2025-01-15 21:04