PS+ questions

So I just got a subscription for PS+ and after looking around for a few minutes I sure feel underwhelmed. It looks like I just payed $50 to be able to play Super Meat Boy. This is the famed instant game collection?! I haven't owned a Sony console since PS1 and back then there was no PSN so I'm totally new to this network. I hadn't known that PS+ games get removed almost as quickly as they get put up. Do they also get removed from your console when they remove them from the service? I was looking around on this page ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Instant_Game_Collection_games_%28North_America%29

... and noticed on the bottom there's a few games with no listing for date removed but I searched for one of them on PSN, Super Time Force Ultra, and it was $15 so either I'm not doing something right or that page isn't up to date.

Besides online multiplayer and my $50 rental of the $15 Super Meat Boy (No thanks to Broken Age, looks lame) is there any benefits to PS+ that I'm missing? I don't know, I just thought something called "Instant game collection" was gonna "instantly" have more than this. Looks like I might have to be subscribed for a while for it to become worth it.

Edit: OK, looked up some things. I guess that you can keep playing em after they get removed from the service. I think what bugs me is the name more than anything. This is absolutely NOT an "instant game collection." It's a "stay subscribed long enough and eventually this will build into a game collection."

@Wickerman777:" It's a "stay subscribed long enough and eventually this will build into a game collection."......as long as you keep paying your subscription fee, that´s right, the moment your subscription ends you won´t be able to play again those "free" games in either PS system you have them ( PS3, PS4, PS Vita ) until you renew, so they are not "giving" you the games, they are renting them in reality.

But let´s look at it from another perspective, you can´t play on-line in a PS4 if you don´t have PS+, they "lend" you games to play and if you don´t like them you can just delete, still if you don´t have PS+ you can´t play on-line so consider those "free" games a bonus. Oh yes, you can store saves and things in the cloud, as long as you keep paying your membership, once your fee is gone, well you can´t access the cloud until you pay again. You can get extra discounts and "sale" prices reserved for PS+ memberships ( which are for real ), there it doesn´t matter if your membership expired, your purchases will continue to be there.

Well, I don't have PS3 or Vita so I won't be getting any of those ones. I don't care for multiplayer games, almost never play them. Really I just signed up to PS+ for the game collection. Guess ya gotta wait a while for the purchase to be worth it. There's definitely nothing "instant" about it.

@Wickerman777: PS+ games are up for a month, that's not quickly at all. You only have that 30-day window though to add a game to your personal library. To answer your other question, when the PS+ games are removed, you still continue to play them until your sub runs. You can even let the sub lapse and then later renew PS+ and the games will be playable again.

If your subscription runs out, your access to the "free" PS+ games goes as well until you renew. For comparison, Xbone's GWG service is the same way in that GWG requires a subscription to keep and play the games btw.

Other PS+ benefits include:

1. The PS+ Cloud saves,
2. Online multiplayer access,
3. The amazing PS+ discounts (sometimes games go on sale for $1-$3 and you always keep them even if your sub runs out),
4. Deals on free DLC for PS+ members (Free DLC also stays with you even when the sub runs out),
5. Free themes, etc.

I will say this month wasn't a great month to get started on PS+, but the last few months has some great games. Every month is different.

You didn't ask, but you might be wondering so I have some basic breakdowns of the competitive service.

As far as PS+ statistics go:

To date for PS4:

$50 PS+ has offered 62 PS+ free games (releasing 3-5 new games, never repeats)

To date for Xbone:

$60 XBLG has offered 24 GwG free games (multiple months of releasing a single new game a month, repeats games month-to-month).

62 PS+ PS4 free games >>> 24 GwG Xbone free games

---

Then there is the bonuses to think of if you have other machines:

1. PS3 (2-4 newer-older games a month),
2. Vita (2-4 newer-older games a month).
3. 360 (2 older games a month).

I own all these machines.

Also, it should be noted that PS+ allows you a full month to redeem games. Many of XBLG's GWG games, you are only given a much smaller 15-day window instead of the 30 days afforded to you with PS+.

I posted stats to give you an idea of what is offered across the board so you know what to expect per month.

As a side note: With PS+ you can redeem from the PS online store from your PC and redeem Vita and PS3 games. If you ever get those machines, you will have access to those games.

For example, when I got a Vita, I had like 100 PS+ games instantly.

Also, some Vita and PS3 games are cross buy. What that means is that although these cross-buy titles are "free" PS+ Vita/PS3 games for that month, the cross buy games are also available for your PS4 many times.

This month, you should do a store search on your PS4 for the free vita and PS3 games and you will find a few "free" PS+ games that you could easily overlook as those games were "free" for Vita or PS3 but happen to be cross-buy. To date, I've gotten about 23 cross-buy games on PS4 that were advertised for PS3 or Vita.

@SolidTy: Thanks for the info. Will keep an eye on the cross buy titles from the other systems. I guess that after a while this will build up quite a bit as I see I've already missed about 60 free games on PS4.

@SolidTy: ". For comparison, Xbone's GWG service is the same way in that GWG requires a subscription to keep and play the games btw. "

Actually, they get to keep their games that they claimed even when their subscriptions runs out. It's actually a huge advantage to that service. Furthermore, you're emphasizing quantity over quality when it comes to these services. Bigger games tend to get released on the Xbox while the Playstation receives more games but with many of them being smaller, indie games.

Anyway, "Instant Games Collection" used to be more accurate because they used to keep more games (and bigger games) as part of the collection for longer periods of time, only periodically replacing a few games at once. Now, like mentioned, it's 2 unique games per system being replaced every month. Over time, I still think it's a good deal, especially if you take advantage of sales and whatnot. But don't expect too many "big" games anymore. For the most part, those days are over. They will probably be handing out games like inFamous: Second Son and Killzone: Shadow Fall eventually, but you should expect smaller games like you see now.

So, yes, it's more of an investment. But personally I feel as though I've easily gotten my money's worth from this service over the last couple or so years I've used it.

It's really something to consider, if you'd really just like to have PS+ for the Games. I once had a free Playstation Plus Month + Three Months of Subscription and it was actually pretty neat. Hotline Miami, Tomb Raider, X-Com, A Tale of Two Brothers and so on.

Hi!

Wow, I guess you didn't get the memo when GWG started on Xbone.

Actually, you do NOT get to keep the GWG games on Xbone when the subscription runs out. There is no huge advantage to that Xbone GWG service. You are operating with old information that never applied to Xbone.

Read my sentence again:

"For comparison, Xbone's GWG service is the same way in that GWG requires a subscription to keep and play the games btw. "

Xbox.com even states at the bottom of the page:

"Free Games Offer: For paid Gold members only. On Xbox One, active Gold membership required to play free games you’ve redeemed.

^"Games with Gold offer for paid Gold members only; active Gold membership required to play downloaded Xbox One games."

I own every single GWG game ever released on 360 and Xbone and I keep up with the news. I don't post things without research, but it's fair to say that I'm quite the expert in the PS+/GWG field.

What you are remembering is the "Games with Old" for Xbox 360 which did allow you to keep your GWG on 360 when your $60 XBLG sub ran out, but that never applied to the current generation Xbone, but I was talking and specifically mentioned the Xbone's GWG.

@SolidTy: Oh, didn't know it only applied to the 360. I don't own either of those consoles. I just always hear about them being able to keep their games forever. So it's only an advantage if we weren't looking at current gen, but that's kind of a moot point since most people have moved on.

@SoNin360

Thing is I was always talking about Xbone in my first post and made sure to type "Xbone GWG" multiple times.

My breakdown for the the TC.

Ah, I see, you said you don't own those consoles and were correcting me about those GWG games? It turns out you were just sort of repeating incorrect information regarding Xbone GWG from what you had heard from others?

I have those machines and all the GWG games ever released. I turn on my 360s, PS3s, Vita, PS4, and Xbone every months to DL the PS+/GWG games. I don't have all the PS+ games ever released since I was reluctant to jump on board initially being a XBLG subscriber. The vast amount of high quality retail titles won me over in the late PS3 era.

If people are still saying and repeating that you keep Xbone's GWG games to you, they are either trolling with misinformation you (and others) because they are guessing you don't know the truth. You know how it is, sometimes trolls will outright lie to see if people even know about the subject they are discussing. Regarding Xbone GWG, they were always wrong though. You might be the 100th user I've corrected since last year, so there is a lot of misinformation floating about out there.

The other option is they are misinformed and they have no business correcting people in the first place. They corrected you with misinformation, then you attempted to correct me with false info, and the misinformation sort of spreads by people not researching the wrong information, but parroting the original trolls/misinformed users bad intel.

I know this stuff because I own all these machines. These GWG/PS+ numbers/titles to me aren't headlines I memorize, but rather games I've downloaded and played.

I was very specific to the Xbone's GWG because when that service launched they required an XBLG sub to play the games.

The reason why is actually Playstation Plus was getting newer and more up to date games from publishers and Games with Gold was offering much older games. The catch was, GWG originally allowed gamers to keep the games after the sub. Publishers were reluctant to give their games away forever and there was a huge safety net with PS+ that didn't exist on GWG. There was a huge disparity on which system got the better and newer selection (PS).

That wasn't working out for GWG hence the "Games with Old" moniker all over the internet. With Xbone GWG's M$ decided to emulate PS+ sub requirement. They lost the advantage of being able to give games to the consumer, BUT there was a gain in being able to give newer games away as publishers had more confidence in giving away much newer games.

Yes, you missed the first 59 PS4 PS+ games, but they roll out 3-5 PS+ games every month so hopefully next month is more exciting.

Right now you have access this month to Super Meat Boy, Broken Age, and Unmechanical Extended.

Super Meat Boy and Broken age are advertised for PS4, but you can nab Unmechanical Extended a cross-buy title for Vita for PS4 as well this month. :) I admit this wasn't the most exciting month for me but if I had never played Super Meat Boy, it would have been a bit more exciting. Maybe next month.

Make sure to DL all three games instead of the advertised two PS+ PS4 games.

Also, there is a FLASH SALE on PS4/PS3/Vita going on right now. Sony seems to have a lot of Flash and good PS+ sales you should check out on the weekends. You can sometimes find some great games for $1-$4.

My personal top 20 exciting PS+ PS4 games that released in the past year or so were:

1. Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes
2. Injustice Gods Among Us Ultimate Edition
3. Infamous: First Light
4. Trine 2: Complete Story
5. Rocket League
6. Transistor
7. Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty!
8. Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris
9. Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition
10. Resogun
11. Outlast
12. Valiant Hearts: The Great War
13. The Swapper
14. Apotheon
15. Towerfall: Ascension
16. Velocity 2X
17. Rogue Legacy
18. The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth
19. Stealth Inc. 2: A Game of Clones
20. Strider

The PS4 is barely two years old on it so the value for the "free games" on it really isn't the best(usually it's 2-4 indie/small titles a month depending on crossbuy). At least it comes with automatic updates, cloud storage, and extra discounts on buying games. And you might want to add the PS3/Vita games to your account if there is any chance you'll get one, which you can do on the webstore.

Just a heads up, PS+ on PS4 hasn't released only two games for the service since Jan 6th, 2015. In 2014 it would range between 2 PS+ games a month to 3 PS+ games a month (July, October, November and December 2014 PS+ had three games a month that year).

2015 has been stable over 3 games every single month save for January.

For the rest of this year after Jan 6th 2015 PS+ drop, we've gotten 3-5 PS+ games a month. Three games minimum every month for PS4.

The issue is some times cross-buy titles are missed because Sony will advertise on PS4 the two main PS4 PS+ entries and it's easy to overlook a cross buy PS4 PS+ game also available that month.

For instance, this month of October PS+ members have access to Super Meat Boy, Broken Age, and Unmechanical Extended on PS4.

Super Meat Boy and Broken Age are advertised for PS4 PS+, but anyone with a PS+ account can nab PS4's Unmechanical Extended a cross-buy title for Vita for PS4 as well this month. :)

You seem aware of the cross buy, but I just wanted to clarify the "2-4 titles a month" statement since actually this year we've seen consistently 3-5 titles a month (the average has been four games a month).

January was the last 2 game month we saw two games after December 2014's 3 PS+ game month.

Feb = 3 games

March = 5 games

April = 3 games

May = 5 games

June = 4 games

July = 4 games

August = 4 games

September = 4 games

October = 3 games

That's why they've already released 62 PS+ games.

I do agree with your analysis on the age of the newer PS4 having an effect on the PS+ "free" games. I've said so myself to users in the past.

@SolidTy Oops, I meant 3-4. Looking at your list we did have a lot of months in a row with 4+ from May to September.

@Eikichi-Onizuka:

Yeah, I hope Sony keep the pace up. :)