The news came in the early hours of July 1st, 2026. The headline started with “Physical disc production ending in January 2028…” and our hearts pounded. It wasn’t an April Fool’s joke; it was a different month, so the news was real. Sony is officially killing our childhoods. No more collecting, no more video game shelves, no more sharing and exchanging, just a whole lot of nothing.

Down the memory lane… Why Sony’s decision hurts

I have been a gamer since I could hold a controller. The first video game I was addicted to as a tiny girl was Duck Hunt. Then came the mighty PlayStation 1, and my brother and I had no life beyond this little gem. I remember coming straight from school in a white little school uniform and turning on the TV to play Crash Bandicoot on PS1. Despite my mom’s constant yelling that I needed to change and eat as soon as I got home, especially as a girl, I was never distracted from getting to the next stage. Because playing video games was my number one priority.

I remember my brother was paying his dues until he saw a PlayStation 2, and my father finally got him one. After this, one of our cousins gave him a whole big collection of video games, and when I laid my eyes on it, I literally heard the angels singing. The first thing I noticed was the disc titled “Resident Evil 2,” and it flaunted the face of a young fellow. When I played that game for the first time, I fell in love with it.

I still remember the countless times we had to put a DVD in my brother’s PlayStation 2, close the disc drive lid, and pray to the gods that it would do the trick without it rerouting us to the system configuration menu.

While I understand that it is 2026 and the world has significantly changed since then, it sucks to be completely digital. It goes without saying that the majority of the gaming community is enraged, and it has spawned dozens of memes in response to this decision.

Here’s why, as a gamer, it doesn’t just suck but is also overwhelmingly outrageous.

No More Video Game Collectors, No More Individuality

I am a physical person when it comes to books. While I always appreciate audiobooks and books in digital media, simultaneously, I would never trade the smell of a new book for the world. The same goes for video games. It’s like you can’t see paperbacks or hardcovers in bookstores anymore. There will be no shelves dedicated to new games after 2028. It’s essentially going to be a graveyard of a bygone era.

Gone are the days when we bought a video game and were surprised with a manual, or a handbook on how to play the game. Better yet, remember the maps they gave us with the game disc? It’s okay, we endured it. It’s over. No point in complaining. But, scrapping physical discs altogether? We won’t be coming back from that.

There are thousands of gamers out there who collect physical copies of video games. My brother was one of them. I, on the other hand, am not much of a collector, but the most recent video game disc I bought made me nostalgic. It was Resident Evil 9. The holographic disc case was brilliantly made. When you examine and tilt the cover, you’ll see a nice, intact Raccoon City Police Department (RPD) on one side, while on the other, a ruined building, a haunting reminder of a traumatic past. The second I saw this, it reminded me how awesome physical discs are. Would you get this same effect from a digital copy? I highly doubt that.

What would you show your friends when they come over? Your empty video game shelf? Worse yet, your digital video game library? Talk about being pathetic.

No Physical Disc Production Means Games Are Strictly For The Rich

No physical copies means no exchanging. You no longer will be able to share your video games with friends or borrow them from anyone. You must always, and absolutely should, own a digital copy to play games, even if the game ends up being crappy.

Most importantly, disc production always ensured one thing: access for all. Video games aren’t cheap, and kids and even some adults still rent video games and buy second-hand. This is exactly why there are shops out there where you could trade your old games for something that you’ve never played before. In other words, you are a gamer, but you don’t have the luxury to spend 80 dollars for a video game and make ends meet at the same time.

Like I previously mentioned, we were gifted a whole collection of games because we weren’t rich. My brother and his friends constantly exchanged video games they owned. But, now, guess what? The fun’s over.

Backwards Compatibility Is Dead

“This transition has no impact on games that have already been released, or will be released, before January 2028 in disc format.” Said Sid Shuman, Senior Director, Sony Interactive Entertainment Content Communications. Of course, this change won’t impact those said games, but going completely digital means your PS5 Blu-rays are obsolete, because the PS6 is unlikely to feature a disc drive.

Thankfully, they will allow gamers to play their older games on a PS6 using a USB disc drive, but it doesn’t mean that it’s truly backwards compatible.

The essence of backwards compatibility is that you take your Blu-ray and put it inside the new console, and bam, you’re going back in time.

Well, not anymore, it seems.

No Real Ownership

After 2028, buying a video game means owning a license. It’s not a keepsake of something you love. If Sony feels like it, this “License” can be revoked anytime. There’s no guarantee that they’ll allow you to keep playing.

So, as far as I could gather, we won’t own anything after next year.

A Final Thought

This situation might be subjective, and as for me, I can’t imagine owning a purely digital console next year. It’s deeply saddening.

Sony is essentially sucking the life out of gaming. It might be fun to own games in digital format without having to worry about running out of space to stack your video games; however, we gamers at least had a choice before: Either buy a completely digital console or one with a disc drive.

This means we, as gamers, have no agency at all. The realm of gaming has changed, and as Sid says, this decision is a result of the preference of the “majority” of the gaming community in terms of how they play and access video games. In other words, they are alienating a chunk of gamers who would prefer to hold a video game in their hands. Even the retailers are faced with a grim choice: leave the business or stay put, hoping that a gamer will step foot in their shop to buy a “digital copy” instead of accessing the PlayStation Store. Which one do you think is gonna happen?

Since Sony is not giving gamers a choice, perhaps we must not buy their “physical” consoles at all?