Sony explains 17 million figure for PSN

By Robert Purchese Published 15 January, 2009

Includes website and PSP sign-ups.

Sony has revealed that website and PSP sign-ups to PlayStation Network were counted to bring the overall user-count to 17 million - the same number Microsoft announced for Xbox Live.

"The PSN numbers include people who have created accounts on PS3, the website and PSP," the platform holder explained to MTV Multiplayer, refusing to be drawn on PS3 specifics.

"Additionally, since PSN is a free online gaming service, some households create multiple IDs so that a father can keep a separate list of friends, trophies and stats from that of his daughter for example." Yes sharing the same friends would be strange.

The press release, issued by Sony last night, boasted 2.1 million sign-ups during December alone, which represents a 90 per cent monthly improvement. This, reasoned the company, was as a result of PlayStation Home entering open beta.

Sony Entertainment boss Kaz Hirai told us recently that Home had been downloaded 3.4 million times, and we now know around 900,000 items of clothing, furniture and so on have been acquired by the virtual inhabitants.

According to the latest official PS3 figures, Sony has sold 16.84 million PlayStation 3 consoles around the world, prompting much eye-bulging over the 17 million PSN user announcement.

The last PS3 count came on 30th September 2008, however, and so excludes the rampant holiday months of October, November and December - Q3 of Sony's financial year.

Microsoft, meanwhile, has shifted 28 million Xbox 360 consoles around the world, over 10 million of which have yet to sign-up for Xbox Live.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (44) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Lexx87 #1 3 years ago

    lol

  • DFawkes #2 3 years ago

    Yep, no people with multiple accounts because you keep shafting Europe exist. None at all.

  • Xerx3s #3 3 years ago

    I may be caught in a time loop but didn't they do exactly the same bs a month or so ago with releasing exactly the same statements?

  • moggsy #4 3 years ago

    I don't believe a word Sony says these days, especially when it comes to figures. They make shit up they really do.

  • Pro_Gamer #5 3 years ago

    PSN is an embarrasement to the industry. It is about time $ony learn a few things from XBL including paid subscribtion. PS3 owners WILL benefit in the long run.

  • JohnnyWashnGo #6 3 years ago

    @Pro_Gamer
    Why is PSN an embarassment?

    If you are making sweeping generalisations then at least have the decency to provide the reasons behind your thinking.

  • Zomoniac #7 3 years ago

    I have 4 accounts for me and one for my gf on my PS3s. 5 accounts for two people probably isn't uncommon amongst us lot.

  • Pro_Gamer #8 3 years ago

    Johnny, if you played on XBL for a SINGLE night you would understand why.

  • KayJay #9 3 years ago

    why is PSN an embarrassment. If I wanna buy a game I can buy a game. If I want to speak to friends I can speak to friends. If I want to go to Home I can. But if I don't want to do any of these things and Just play my game online I can.

    Whats embarrassing about that. Oh and I don't have to pay for it either.

    It works fine for me. Also for me PSN is PSN no matter if its on the PSP, PS3 or website. If people sign up they sign up...

    Multiple account must account for a few of these though :-)

    Do MS count the Window's games that support Live in their totals?

  • NotSoSlim #10 3 years ago

    Ignore Pro_Gamer...look at the Resi 5 demo post he made. Shows what sort of gamer he is...

  • menage #11 3 years ago

    @Pro gamer

    PSN is fine (most of the time, I still get kicked out once in a while while playing LBP). Euro PSN isn't.

    i haven't got 5 accounts for nothing. I Jap, 1 US, 1 UK because I don't want my freaking trailers in the worst Dutch voice overs ever, 1 for my GF and 1 Dutch to buy PSN games with.


    Edited by 1 at 15/01/09 @ 10:07

  • DFawkes #12 3 years ago

    Okay Pro_Gamer, I've taken your challenge and played on XBL not only for a SINGLE night, but the 2 afforded by my trial with Gears 2. My personal experience is both XBL and PSN are excellent, with great connection speeds in the games I played. I even tried a couple of games I've played on both, and performance was identical.

    But yeah, fucking embarrasment in most other regards, admittedly. That's more a SCEE thing though.

    Edited by 1 at 15/01/09 @ 10:09

  • NotSoSlim #13 3 years ago

    So MS have a 12 million lead in console sales? Thought it was 8 million? All these figures dont add up

  • Shinji #14 3 years ago

    NotSoSlim - the PS3 figure quoted doesn't include the last three months of 2008, the Xbox 360 figure does. So the gap is significantly smaller than those figures indicate.

  • NotSoSlim #15 3 years ago

    @ Shinji

    Okay that makes sense then. Too many figures nowadays

  • bioreit #16 3 years ago

    "Microsoft, meanwhile, has shifted 28 million Xbox 360 consoles around the world, over 10 million of which have yet to sign-up for Xbox Live."

    Well, I'm probably not helping, what with only having the one Gamertag across three 360s - and I know I'm not alone in using 360s as media centre extenders, so a fair few could probably be explained by that.

    @ Pro_Gamer

    I tentatively agree with some of your points. I haven't played too many online games on PS3 yet, but my experience of the Euro PSN store has so far been hideous - almost impossible to easily find things I want to download, like demos, and the speeds are horrendous when compared to XBL Marketplace, no matter what the time of day. Sony definitely need to invest more in the infrastructure and interface side of things.

    Still, even if on average every PSN member actually accounts for say three accounts, that's still a damn good number.

  • Nuada #17 3 years ago

    They forget to mention that 16.98m of these can never log in due to 8002A548 errors. I got the 160gb version for christmas and have only been able to play GT5 all of twice since then because of it :(

  • andijames #18 3 years ago

    @Pro

    I realise you're trying to justify why you pay you're online subscription but saying PSN is an embarrassment is a bit OTT. It's a fantastic service. Granted MS' live is excellent and beats Sony in many areas but end of the day i find PSN covers all my needs.

    Plus i refuse to take anyone seriously who spells Sony with an $ :)

  • DFawkes #19 3 years ago

    Sounds lie something wrong on your end if it's that consistent, or possibly something affecting your region. Especially with that error number, most people that do manage to fix it have something up with some settings.

    Better error messages would be better though. If my Live doesn't work for some reason, it teels me which part (only happened once, wireless adapter came lose).

  • Sunyavadin #20 3 years ago

    @andijames
    ----Plus i refuse to take anyone seriously who spells Sony with an $ :)----

    Quite right. It's SonҰ. They're JAPANESE. Micro$oft use dollars.

  • moggsy #21 3 years ago

    Well the PSN Store is quite embarrassing compared to XBL. There's very rarely anything new on there whereas XBL is updated daily with something or other and weekly with XBLA games.

    Plus the PSN store is very corporate compared to XBL which seems far more down to earth. The magazine type shows on XBL are localised and very informal which I like. Also why can I not demo something before I decide to buy it? I can do this with every XBLA game but not every PSN game.

  • DanWhitehead #22 3 years ago

    Well, I'm probably not helping, what with only having the one Gamertag across three 360s - and I know I'm not alone in using 360s as media centre extenders, so a fair few could probably be explained by that.

    The majority are probably owned by families who bought an Arcade unit and have no interest in online whatsoever. They just want to plug it in, maybe buy a memory card and put a disc in the tray.

  • Spekingur #23 3 years ago

    @DFawkes:
    Wait, you took up his challenge for two days... from today? Did you timetravel or something? :D

  • penhalion #24 3 years ago

    So they counted everyone who even looked funny at PSN as a user. I can just imagine the execs at that meeting

    Boss: "We need to boost out PSN numbers to counter Microsofts 17 million"
    Exec1:"We can add in all the PSP accounts"
    Boss:"Good...what else?"
    Exec2:"How about all the duplicate accounts from different countries"
    Boss:"Better..that pretty much doubles the PS3 numbers.....keep going"
    Exec3 :"How about anyone who signed up to the website through a PC"
    Boss:"That adds an extra 10 odd million....get that man's name it's promotion time....unless this backfires of course in which case...."

  • Nuada #25 3 years ago

    Wll I've been trying it at 3 locations on 3 different ISPs, behind a router and connected directly to the modem, ports forwarded and added to the DMZ, media server disabled, UPnP enabled and disabled, fucking everything really and on the rare occasion that it will connect it'll kick me off after a few minutes. It's definately not my ISP or router :(

  • Petulant_Radish #26 3 years ago

    “Gear of War Co-op was piss poor as well, comms sometimes worked, sometimes the other player couldn't connect, sometimes lagged really badly making it unplayable. Halo matchmaking was something like set it off, go and make a coffee, sit for a while, get fed up and give up.”

    This sounds to me like a bad connection, the only time I have had a problem with Halo’s matchmaking was when the whole of Live went tits up Christmas 07. It is the best matchmaking on a console I have come across. Never had any issues with Gears co-op, but then I’ll only play with friends, but the less said about their matchmaking the better.

  • SeesThroughAll #27 3 years ago

    Appart from more racism and squeaky kids on XBL.

    That is to be blamed on popularity (especially if we factor in the "popular" crowd), rather than XBL. Were the PS3 more popular, we'd get the same amount of squeaky kids, if not more.

  • Darren #28 3 years ago

    Well I'm thankful that Sony's own PSN at least doesn't cause my PS3 to freeze for 10-30 seconds while accessing my Friends list to send/read messages like it does on the Xbox 360. I've hardly used my 360 in the past month because I've got a new PC but upon turning it on last night to check my messages, I was "rewarded" with the usual freezes, which only occur when accessing the Friends list. My PS3 and PC all share the same wireless connection to my router as the 360 and all of them are the same distance away. Annoying really.

    The PSN might not be perfect but it works for what I want it for and I couldn't ask for more than that, particularly as it's 100% free anyway.

  • rotmm #29 3 years ago

    @evilfoxhound, "Appart from more racism and squeaky kids on XBL."

    I think most of them have moved to Home now, along with a whole new gang of sexual predators.

  • Petulant_Radish #30 3 years ago

    @ Darren, takes me about a second to bring up my friends list...PSN about the same...

  • moggsy #31 3 years ago

    @ Darren

    I suspect a friend cull is in order.

  • jaywalker3010 Verified Mastering Manager, Square Enix #32 3 years ago

    @retibra

    PS3 is not region free with boxed titles. 360 has its `world` region which means can be played anywhere, but SCEA, SCEE, SCEJ are all separate titles still..
    Edited by 2 at 15/01/09 @ 14:12

  • Garulon #33 3 years ago

    Boring old Sony lies!

    Come on Sony, lie about something new like (erm) Killzone 2 pre-orders or how important that little flap that doesn't do anything at the front is going to be this time next year. EG needs the hits in these uncertain economic times.

  • Garulon #34 3 years ago

    "How do you think people like me were playing Silent Hill: Homecoming, or Afrika months ago."

    I think the more important question is not so much "How" but "Why"

    (looks at PS3 and PSP game releases)

    Oh, fair enough then. Carry on!

  • jaywalker3010 Verified Mastering Manager, Square Enix #35 3 years ago

    @farticusmaximus & retibra

    I am AT a publisher by the way

    Hmm not sure but every title i've worked on and thats many in my decade here, each PS3 title has had a US version and an EU version submitting to SCEE and SCEA separately.

    Whereas aside from an age rating issue all our 360 titles have been World signed so a copy bought in US works fine in UK

    Not misinformed, i can assure u of that :)
    Edited by 1 at 15/01/09 @ 14:41

  • DFawkes #36 3 years ago

    @Spekingur

    Yes, but I really should've waited until tomorrow to travel to tomorrows' tomorrow (Saturday) to get the Lottery numbers, but wasted it playing games. I suppose I could always sell the Time Machine, or perhaps use it a second time, but I can't be bothered. Plus there's the transcription errors etc. Wasted effort to try and please Pro-gamer, which is impossible anyway.

    Regardless, onlnie play on PSN andd XBL is equally good for me, but I agree the PSN store is rubbish. I certainly enjoy browsing the virtual shelves of XBLA a whole lot more, plus MS seemed to allow SF2HD through, where PSN Europe can't. Gits.

  • jaywalker3010 Verified Mastering Manager, Square Enix #37 3 years ago

    360 is definitely a region `free` console IF we desire it to be, and as i stated all the games published by us, except for age rating restrictions in germany, have used the W signed ID to enable to work everywhere in the world.

    Guess all our Sony titles just always been split by US/EU/JP then.. we've always got US/EU/JP product codes (our last title definitely submitted to both SCEE and SCEA so are different masters.. altho why we do double the work is a mystery :)

  • chessboxer #38 3 years ago

    I think you're all getting confused between the 2 type of region locking on PS3 games (not sure about 360).

    The games themselves will play on any PS3 from any region. The multiplayer aspects however may be locked which would prevent someone from the EU playing against someone in Japan or the US.

    DLC on the other hand is locked to the region of the store that it is purchased/downloaded from.

  • jaywalker3010 Verified Mastering Manager, Square Enix #39 3 years ago

    I just know the games we make have 2 versions, US and EU product codes for identical games therefore locked to region by that. Personally never tried running a SLUS product coded game on a SLES region deck (ie US game on EU deck) i just go by how i know we've made games.

    PSN is definitely region locked, and Live is the same.. altho playing games ACROSS the regions are possible for sure

  • callum9999 #40 3 years ago

    I like the PSN but they should reclassify some of the cateogries on the UK store, for example, they don't have a demo section whereas the US does which makes it a lot easier to find them.

    I've never used Live but the PSN has all I need so it won't be any better than the PSN for me, and has the disadvantage of having a cost.

  • bonker #41 3 years ago

    "The games themselves will play on any PS3 from any region. The multiplayer aspects however may be locked which would prevent someone from the EU playing against someone in Japan or the US. "

    Really?? God, I had no idea - that's kinda sooo 1990s innit??

  • chessboxer #42 3 years ago

    It depends on the devs. Merc 2 was multiplayer region separated until the 1st patch came out. MGO is separated by region and so were the KZ2 betas, although I do remember hearing a lot of US accents whilst on the EU environment. I also heard many US accents 2 of the Resistance 2 betas, but not so much now the game has launched.

    Being separated from other regions doesn't really bother me. I only speak one language and it can get frustrating if you're playing a game with loads of people that you can't understand, especially shouty, squeaky voiced kids. Nothing against other nationalities but it can be vital for your survival in a game to understand people (and vice versa).

    The other thing to consider is lag. I don't play on many non UK servers in CS:S because in a competitive FPS game, it's frustrating to encounter lag. It's bad enough on UK servers when someone on a shitty 512MB connection joins and their ping is above 80ms and mine is down to the low 20's (don't believe Valve's BS about the netcode - it's not as good as they say it is).

    I'm not sure what it's like on Live (being peer-to-peer), but in an environment which uses dedicated servers, ping is extremely important. I will say that the PSN's 1st party hosted servers (like the Resistance 2 servers) have been lag free in 60 player battles and 8 player co-op. EA's Bad Company servers on the other hand... well... they apologised to the 360 community when Bad Company launched, I want an apology too.

  • MattyD #43 3 years ago

    Face, meet palm.

  • DrDamn #44 3 years ago

    "Neither console enforces region-locking, but 360 games usually are region-locked, and PS3 games are usually not. This is decided by the publisher, not MS or Sony."

    I'm pretty sure Sony have decided there is no region lock on PS3 games - they are all region free. If it was purely up to the publisher then why would there be such a difference between the two when the publisher is the same on a lot of titles. For example Rock Band is most definitely region free on the PS3. If you go to Play Asia where region locking is covered with games you can't find a region locked boxed PS3 title.

    (Edit DLC stuff already discussed)
    Edited by 1 at 16/01/09 @ 09:43