Sony offers latest PSN service update

By Fred Dutton Published 10 May, 2011

Seybold: "At least a few more days."

PSN services won't be back up and running until the end of the week at the earliest, Sony has revealed.

A new PlayStation Blog update from communications chief Patrick Seybold read, "I know you all want to know exactly when the services will be restored. At this time, I can't give you an exact date, as it will likely be at least a few more days.

"We're terribly sorry for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience as we work through this process."

Yesterday Eurogamer learnt that matchmaking would likely be the first PSN service back online.

The network outage is now in its 20th day.

Picture of Fred.

About Fred Dutton

Fred Dutton is Eurogamer's US news editor, based in Washington DC.

Read more articles from Fred by visiting the Fred Dutton archive page.

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Comments (46) Latest comment 1 year ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • GamesConnoisseur #1 1 year ago

    Please dont make it a fourth weekend! Would be quite relieved if up and running this Fri or so.

  • xero521 #2 1 year ago

    said same last wk! i will belive it wen i turn my ps3 on and have to update it!

  • Billy_Sastard #3 1 year ago

    It's not the end of the world, take your time Sony.

  • GamesConnoisseur #4 1 year ago

    Er! Didnt see bleaseboxx comment, and dont mistake my quite relieved reference with his tossing er thingy!

  • Haq-1 #5 1 year ago

    Waiting for the inevitable coolbritania hate comment...

  • markmitt #6 1 year ago

    Seriously need to sort out the PS3 browser. It is so inadequate, it may as well one have one! Can it really be that difficult to update the flash every time it needs it? SORT IT OUT!

  • joelstinton #7 1 year ago

    Be good to have it back on thurs afternoon, of to london to see roger waters tomorrow.

  • Felwyn #8 1 year ago

    why connoisseur? do you not masturbate?

  • joelstinton #9 1 year ago

    haha, fair comment! although i think they betting off asking for a shovel and digging a big deep hole

    also.. nothing wrong with a bit of gardening!
    Edited by joelstinton at 10/05/11 @ 18:48

  • coolbritannia #10 1 year ago

    oh dear. absolutely laughable...

  • jonsaan #11 1 year ago

    HOW can you not give exact timescales? There must be a project team working on this. Projects have timelines. Sounds to me like they have no idea how long it is going to be down because they still don't know what their end goal is. Shambolic.
    Edited by jonsaan at 10/05/11 @ 18:56

  • jonsaan #12 1 year ago

    One thing's for sure. When it does come back up. Nothing will be any different as far as the front end goes. It's nice to have dreams though people right?

  • Murton #13 1 year ago

    I suppose it's easy to assume people are being patient when you're preventing them from logging onto the blogs and forums to comment. Odd that the US blogs and forums are working though, if us Europeans hadn't been silenced though, and could still post on the blog/forums, this is what I'd have to say to Sony:

    Of course there's no guarantee that this new deadline will be met either, after all the same bloke said this time last week that basic functionality and multiplayer would be restored by the end of the week and not only was it not but he and everyone else neglected to update us at all during the weekend and now we're told "by the end of the week" again? I understand that the network is complex, I recognise that it takes time to restore and test it thoroughly before bringing us back online and like many others I'm trying my best to be patient, but such vague timescales don't inspire confidence I'm afraid. End of the week is fine, but what parts of the PSN will be on this week? Multiplayer? Friendslists? Trophy syncing? Online saves? Give us some sort of detail, something we can be confident in and positive about, something to make it look like things are under control over there.

  • Mnia786 #14 1 year ago

    "The network outage is now in its 20th day."

    EG is acting like the world has come to a fucking standstill because PSN is down. I'm abit narked like everyone else but Sony have to do what they have to and we have to accept that.

    Should make sure all the teens/uni students are actually studying for exams rather than playing games for once! :p

  • HyperTails #15 1 year ago

    I'm fed up with updates. Seems that even updates are getting updates these days, and it looks like not even Sony know when it'll be back.

    Oh well, at least I can play Dragon Age 2 offline, so i'll live.

  • callum9999 #16 1 year ago

    I understand this is a gaming website, so it isn't representative of most people, but I personally find the reaction to not being able to play games online pretty laughable. I know its not true for most of you, but the way people go on it sounds like your life consists of little more than sitting alone infront of the TV playing online games.

    And Murton - they aren't assuming people are being patient - they are just saying it. They (like any company that gets in a situation like this) can't criticise anyone in case it annoys them so they just play it safe by thanking them for whatever patience they are showing (even if it is a tiny amount, like they are just refraining from throwing the PS3 out the window!).
    Edited by callum9999 at 10/05/11 @ 19:10

  • SHPanda #17 1 year ago

    Bored of these updates about when it will be back up.

    Let me know when it's been announced what the 5 games are we can choose two free titles from.

  • Negotiator1 #18 1 year ago

    PSN will always be susceptible to hackers because of the open nature of the network, Live in comparison is a closed network and almost impossible to hack. Add in the fact that Sony is packed full of incompetent morons and its a disaster waiting to happen. I won't grace the PSN network ever again because I have no faith in Sony at all, my money and time will go to Microsoft's Xbox Live the only safe and secure online network for console gaming.

  • RodHull #19 1 year ago

    PSN isn't working but Brian Wilson's brain is. What a topsy turvy world we live in.

  • kosigan #20 1 year ago

    @jonsaan: that's the nature of testing software - you develop what you think will do the job, test it to see if it actually does do what you want, then go back and fix the problems you find, starting the testing cycle all over again. It's irritating from an end-user point of view - I'm as keen as anyone else to get back online on my PS3 - but as a software developer myself, I can understand the process. Sony don't want to turn it back on only for it to be hacked again within 15 minutes, so they'll be being as thorough as they can; the external security companies will help with that - in my experience, it's always better to have someone other than the developer test the software, as things I tend to sum up as "but why would you be so stupid as to try that?" are the ones that tend to catch you out.

  • Beano #21 1 year ago

    "oh dear. absolutely laughable..."

    I think most here will say the same - just not about the same subject.

  • martmart #22 1 year ago

    @jonsaan

    Absolutly right. Sony should show us their Gantt chart for all to see.

  • m0thr4 #23 1 year ago

    Interesting... as I just heard a statement from Sony on Channel 4 news just now that said the service will not be back up for another month.

  • Murton #24 1 year ago

    "PSN will always be susceptible to hackers because of the open nature of the network, Live in comparison is a closed network and almost impossible to hack." - Amazon and Play were hacked last year, suppose they're open systems too? For future reference, the terms "open" and "closed" when it comes to software platforms refer to the terms of use, typically an open platform gives the publisher/creator direct control over their product and a "closed" one does not, it has literally nothing to do with security or did you honest believe that PSN being an "open" platform meant that anyone could just walk in and trash it?

    @callum - rereading my post that line does sound a little inflammatory doesn't it? It wasn't intended that way. I merely mean that as Sony have knowingly created a one way communication situation with the userbase, their thanking us for our patience isn't exactly sincere, the only indication of patience that Sony can see is how many times an update is "liked" on Facebook. More detailed information is a must though and I suspect that when SCEE lifts the forum lockdown the majority of posts will be overwhelmingly positive, there will be more than a few questioning why Sony didn't maintain better communication with us during what will likely be a month long service outage.

    I'm fine with an "end of the week" ETA even though the last one was missed, I just want to know which parts of the PSN are being worked on this week, even if they announce three and only deliver two, being kept up to date is infinitely better than being kept in the dark.

  • Baines20 #25 1 year ago

    Charliechan... I expected this from you tbh lol

  • callum9999 #26 1 year ago

    Murton - I do see what you mean but I didn't realise they had "silenced" anyone. I assumed you couldn't comment on the forums etc. as they require a PSN login, something they obviously can't manage at the moment! Maybe that's not the case though?

    Communication does appear to be a big problem in this. While my view is it takes however long it takes (being kept updated doesn't make anything go faster - and I sincerely hope people aren't attempting to timetable online game playing!) it does seem to annoy others.

  • trubadman #27 1 year ago

    PSN services won't be back up and running until the end of the week at the earliest, Sony has revealed.
    I'm sure I've heard that one before!

  • timewarp87 #28 1 year ago

    I dont know about anyone else, but this made my day [link url=http://www.thinq.co.uk/2011/5/9/anonymous-civil-war-anonops-sites-are-hacked/
    ]http://www.thinq.co.uk/2011/5/9/anonymou...[/link]
    and
    [link url=http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/after-sony-psn-hack-civil-war-fractures-hacker-group-anonymous/
    ]http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/a...[/link]

    Oh the irony :)

  • coldfoot #29 1 year ago

    Time to finally get to FF13 then. It's only slightly less boring.

  • Murton #30 1 year ago

    @Callum - the US blog and forum are fully active if you take a look. Login details are the same as your PSN ID but it works over there, just not here. And they're clearly not part of the network or they'd be inaccessible and couldn't be updated, so it certainly seems (to me at least) that our inability to use the blog and forum is wholly artificial and not linked to the outage despite what Nick Caplin and the rest SCEE says.

    As for updates, I'm in no particular rush to play online, I haven't had the pleasure of a mutual day off with any of my regular co-op buddies for a couple of weeks before the outage let alone during it and after reading some of the reviews for Brink I'm undecided as to whether or not I'll be picking up my preorder. What a lot of people don't realise though is that the PSN delivers so much more than online gaming and the store. I have friends on there with whom the PSN is my only means of contacting, I use video chat to keep in touch with my brother, I'm a regular user of VidZone, I occasionally like to visit HOME and I need to sync my trophies so that I can install this new HDD without losing all of my recent progress. If nothing else it would be nice to know if I'll be able to sync my trophies this week, at least then I put a few hours aside on Sunday to install my new HDD and start reinstalling my games if nothing else.

  • LowEnergyCycle #31 1 year ago

    The "Notwork" meme got old really fast.

  • azic #32 1 year ago

    Dam. 6 buds now joining me on xbox live. Shame, we were having so much fun on little big planet 2.
    I reckon end of may at the earliest.

  • funkateer #33 1 year ago

    In the meantime, Anonymous seem to be hacking each other now.
    Which sounds dirty somehow

  • epiazk #34 1 year ago

    Being able to sit exams because they cut online access for a month?

    That's the fucking positive?

    Why be so "nice" to them, they are a billion dollar corp.

  • xLeGiT-BLaDEx #35 1 year ago

    This had better be solved soon!!! Its been a long and tiring process and some of my friends claim that they are ditching playstation because of it. Ill always be a psn user up till 20 days ago i never had any unnecessary problems. That being said, make sure you don't rush yourselves! Before you get psn up again make sure everything checks out! Its bad not having it now, but if it crashes again after you "fixed" it people will get P***** OFF!!! Thanks and ill continue to support ya :D

  • crickson #36 1 year ago

    Still interested to know what people do if they 1) no longer have their original ps3 and 2) set up their psn account with a university e-mail address they no longer have access to.

    Am I the only one in this sort of situation?

  • bazza #37 1 year ago

    This "update" from Sony was straight out of Obi-Wan's Jedi mind tricks - This isn't the update you've been waiting for. Move along.

  • KrazyFace #38 1 year ago

    I'm not here to say much about this "news" post, I just wanna say how nice it is to read Murton's posts. It's just good to know there's someone with a brain out there...

  • homerramone #39 1 year ago

    >Yesterday Eurogamer learnt that matchmaking would likely be the first PSN service back online.
    Yesterday.. wasnt that one of the first things they said when asked about restoring the service.

    It will get dark tonight.

  • Murton #40 1 year ago

    @Krazyface - cheers dude. I've gotten a lot of good feedback for balanced and thoughtful posts throughout the outage period and I'd like to think that people have found my more positive and factual posts helpful compared to the sensationalist slander of EGs writers and the hate posts of various fanboys.

    @ crickson - if you come back and read this, that's not a nice situation. I do believe however that if you contact Sony's customer services once the network is restored they can change the email address for login for you so that you can recover your account.

  • Ryze #41 1 year ago

    Sony simply can't 'do' networked software and services.

  • bigtechno #42 1 year ago

    Well seeing as I haven't switched on the PS3 since January (& that was for a bit of singstar) I can't say I'm that bothered. PSN can be down for ever, I do all my online gaming on xbox

  • Kaminari #43 1 year ago

    PSN...? Oh yeah, PSN! I had almost forgotten about it.

  • strange-quark #44 1 year ago

    what's going to happen when millions of people all try logging in at the same time?no problem for the new servers?

  • HASJ #45 1 year ago

    "...and appreciate your patience as we work through this process."
    Patience? That never existed. Am I right?

  • Murton #46 1 year ago

    "what's going to happen when millions of people all try logging in at the same time?no problem for the new servers?"

    The old ones coped with that same situation when coming back on from maintenance, why would these new ones not do it when returning from the outage? Especially if you consider that Sony will likely have taken advantage of the outage to perform upgrades at the same time as restoration.

    People really need to think about what they're about to say on these boards. The PSN outage threads in particular have been especially prone to some outright drivel being posted without being thought through properly.